Oregon Public Broadcasting reports finds police across the U.S. to be covertly involved with white supremacist outlet that participated in the January 6 insurrection

AP

Under no circumstance can police officers or any public officials be allowed to be secretly (or not-so-secretly) involved with groups that are terrorist outlets engaged in sedition. Nor should the very existence of said terrorists be tolerated a day longer; but we all know terrorism in America is tolerated and even embraced by millions, along with one of our major political parties, when it is of the white nationalist populist variety. I’m not holding my breath than any of these police officers are ever going to be held accountable for this, and the closer we come to civil war the worse this ‘problem’ (not strong enough of a word) is going to become. Excerpt from the OPB report -  

In early summer 2018, it looked as though Oregon voters might get a chance to ban assault weapons in the state. 

It was barely two months since a shooter had killed 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. 

The proposed Oregon ballot measure met stiff legal challenges and was kept off the ballot, but not before militia groups like the Oath Keepers used the proposed gun restrictions as a rallying cry to bring hundreds of people out to a gun rights rally in Salem. 

And those recruitment efforts by the Oath Keepers appear to have had some effect. 

Not long after the pro-gun rally in Salem, Portland police officer Joseph Webber appears to have joined the Oath Keepers militia, an anti-government, anti-immigrant extremist group that was thrust into the national security spotlight for its role in the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol insurrection. 

According to data leaked earlier this month and reviewed by OPB, Webber — who is still a Portland police officer — is among more than two dozen current and former police officers, sheriff’s deputies, corrections officers, and members of the military in Oregon who appear to have joined the Oath Keepers militia since the group was founded in 2009. OPB compared data in the Oath Keepers leak against public records, social media and state law enforcement certification information to verify the information. 

Reached by phone on the same number appearing in the leaked database, Webber denied joining the group before hanging up. He didn’t respond to follow-up text messages. 

Portland Police Chief Chuck Lovell said he expects officers to follow the bureau’s conduct and professionalism policies whether on or off duty. Potentially applicable policies include a prohibition against associations with people advocating criminal behavior or actions which might discredit the bureau or city. 

Lovell told OPB this case has been referred to internal affairs for investigation. 

The hacked Oath Keepers data was sent to the transparency group Distributed Denial of Secrets, which provided the information to journalists and researchers. In several cases across the country, journalists and citizen sleuths have been able to confirm law enforcement and military members using the leaked data. New York City police officers and a detective in the Hudson County prosecutor’s office were in the leaked data, prompting investigations from those two agencies. 

The data include names, membership join dates and contact information for nearly 40,000 people across the country who at one point paid dues to the organization, including more than 1,000 names in Oregon and Southwest Washington. Except where people paid the approximately $1,000 for a lifetime membership, it’s not clear from the data if people are still members. (Read more)

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