Portland’s anti-ICE protests are a magnet for MAGA influencers

Right-wing influencers and media figures have flocked to Portland, helping bring national and Trump administration attention to ICE protests in the city.

PORTLAND, Ore. — Within a week, Nick Sortor experienced the lows and highs of being a MAGA influencer.

Last Thursday, Sortor was jailed in Portland after police arrested him on suspicion of disorderly conduct. A fan of President Donald Trump with 1.2 million followers on X, he had traveled to Oregon’s largest city to document the protest scene outside an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility. Police said he was involved in an altercation with demonstrators but was ultimately not charged.

But six days later, Sortor was back on the upswing: By Wednesday, he was sitting at the White House just a few feet away from Trump, as he and other conservative media figures were invited to participate in a roundtable discussion about the anti-ICE activity they had seen in Portland.

“It was not fun sitting in that jail, but I’m glad to see what has come of it,” Sortor, 27, told Trump during the livestreamed event.

The roundtable was a unifying moment for the alternative, right-wing media ecosystem that is helping shape perceptions of protests against Trump’s mass deportation campaign, showing how the MAGA influencers and the Trump administration are playing off one another in response to anti-ICE protests around the country.