Alleged Portland Gunman Wanted to Shoot ‘Commies and Antifa’: Report

The man who allegedly opened fire on racial justice protesters in Portland over the weekend, killing one and injuring others, has been identified by local activists and news media as a 43-year-old machinist who regularly ranted about “wanting to go shoot commies and antifa.” 

Alleged gunman Benjamin Jeffrey Smith had lived in northeast Portland for about a decade. His former roommate told local news outlets The Oregonian and Oregon Public Broadcasting that he’d become increasingly “radicalized” over the Trump years, and recalled hearing him yelling “racial slurs in his room and deriding women.”

The Portland activist community is reeling from the shooting, which took place Saturday near Normandale Park. Protesters began gathering there around 7 p.m. in preparation for a protest to demand justice for Amir Locke, a 22-year-old Black man whom Minneapolis police shot and killed while executing a no-knock search warrant earlier this month. 

A couple streets from the main staging area, Smith allegedly confronted a group of people affiliated with the protest—part of a volunteer motorcade group who were responsible for putting together a safety plan and reroute traffic, the New York Times reported— and hurling misogynistic slurs and calling them “violent terrorists.” One of the victims who was injured, Dajah Beck, told the Times that Smoth threatened, “If I see you come past my house, I’ll shoot you.” 

Moments later, he opened fire, Beck said. One of her friends, 60-year-old June Knightly, was killed. Three others were injured. The Oregonian reported that a protester returned fire and shot Smith.

On Tuesday, Portland police formally identified Smith as the alleged shooter and said he remained hospitalized “in serious condition.”

Video posted by a local Portland activist appears to show Portland police officers at the residence of Smith, removing several firearms. 

In an email to VICE News, Portland Police Lt. Nathan Sheppard confirmed that agents did execute a search warrant at Smith’s residence, but he declined to offer any additional details about what they found.

Smith’s former roommate Kristen Christenson told Oregon Public Broadcasting that Smith had a large arsenal, including rifles and handguns, and that he occasionally repaired firearms for other people.

“He talked about wanting to go shoot commies and antifa all the friggin‘ time,” Christenson told OPB. “He was just a sad, angry dude. He talked about wanting to do this for a while. He was angry at the mask mandates, he was angry at the damned liberals.”

Smith’s brother told The Oregonian that he had become increasingly obsessed with the protest scene in Portland, which surged in the summer of 2020 amid an international racial justice movement in the wake of George Floyd’s death. He also was angry at homelessness in the area, as well as COVID-19-related health mandates, according to The Oregonian. 

In a statement Sunday, the Portland Police Bureau described the shooting as a result of a “confrontation between an armed homeowner and armed protesters”; however, one of the victims told The Times that no one in their volunteer motorcade was armed. “The scene was extremely chaotic, and a number of witnesses were uncooperative with responding officers,” police wrote. “This is a very complicated incident and investigators are trying to put this puzzle together without having all the pieces.”