It was adding insult to injury.
Independent journalist and conservative commentator Nick Sortor was arrested by Portland police late Thursday while covering the ongoing unrest outside an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility, Fox News reported.
And the arrest came after Sortor said he was “jumped by antifa thugs” — part of a mob that has been attacking the building.
“This was as big of a surprise to me as it was to everybody else. All of a sudden, you know, I’m being jumped by antifa thugs,” Sortor told Fox News’ Bill Melugin.
“I get back up, I stumble away and go back toward cops where I think, you know, at least, all right, well, maybe that’ll be a safer place for me to go… never suspected that I was going to be the target of the arrest, that they were coming in to me.”
The arrest has already gotten attention at high levels in President Donald Trump’s administration, which has designated antifa as a “terrorist organization.”
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt on Friday vowed a “full investigation” into the case by the Department of Justice.
???? BREAKING: In response to my wrongful arrest in Portland, President Trump has ORDERED his staff to review federal aid to be CUT in the city, per Karoline Leavitt
“We will NOT fund states that allow anarchy!”
This arrest is going to cost Portland leftists DEARLY! pic.twitter.com/ESpB7BwfDV
— Nick Sortor (@nicksortor) October 3, 2025
Sortor told Melugin that police in Portland “take the side of the violent criminals that are here every single day.”
“And then a reporter comes and tries to embed deep within the chaos that’s going in out here and he’s the one who gets arrested?”
.@BillMelugin_: “What’s your message to Portland police and the city leaders of Portland after your arrest?”@nicksortor: “This is going to backfire on them tremendously.”
“They take the side of the violent criminals that are here every single day assaulting ICE officers,… pic.twitter.com/nYhVHVZcrY
— Fox News (@FoxNews) October 3, 2025
Still, Sortor said he was so surprised by the police behavior that he actually thought it might have been a ruse — that the police were simply trying to keep him safe by pretending to the antifa protesters that he was being detained amid the violent atmosphere.
“And when they put me into handcuffs, the first thing that went to my mind wasn’t, ‘Oh, you’re being arrested,’” he said, according to Fox News.
“It’s, ‘Oh, they’re trying to help you and get you out of here and make it look like they’re doing something.’ Because they weren’t telling me what they were doing. They weren’t telling me I was under arrest. They weren’t telling me what I was being charged with. And it took over an hour for me to find out what I was charged with.”
Sortor was charged with second-degree disorderly conduct, according to police.
Portland police acknowledged Sortor’s arrest, but said that his conservative outlook — which has helped him garner more than 1.2 million followers on his account on the social media platform X — had nothing to do with it.
In a news release, Portland police said Sortor’s arrest came after a scuffle between two men around 8:00 p.m. that was witnessed by “Dialogue Officers” — police who staff demonstrations and act as liaisons between protesters and law enforcement.
Other officers “were responding when the fight ended following one participant being knocked to the ground,” the statement said. “He did not lose consciousness and never requested medical help.”
“Both involved were detained by federal law enforcement and were later released. Neither party indicated they wanted to make a police report,” the statement added.
The Portland Police Bureau “continued to monitor the situation and responded after seeing additional fights break out,” the statement said.
The police Rapid Response Team moved in at 11:16 p.m. and arrested three people, booking them “into the Multnomah County Detention Center (MCDC) on charges of Disorderly Conduct in the Second Degree.”
Sortor’s interview with Fox News didn’t mention an earlier scuffle, but he doesn’t deny getting physical with antifa after being attacked — possibly what the police were referencing in the comment about “additional fights.”
“So they threw multiple punches at me,” he said, according to Fox News.
“They broke my camera by hitting that. So I was on the ground at that point. I tried to swing. I missed. I think I have every right to swing on somebody that has got me on the ground after punching me and after breaking my equipment.”
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