Several hundred Occupy Wall Street activists took over the ports of Oakland, Portland, and other West Coast cities on Monday as part of an attempt to slow or shut them down to stave off profits to corporations that use the ports.
Occupy protest camps across the United States were closed down by the police over the past several weeks, and the move to shut down the ports could be viewed as an attempt to keep the movement visible.
In Portland, protest organizers said more than 500 people took part and were deployed at several terminals to close down the ports, holding banners that said: “Shut Down the Ports, Shut Down the 1%.”
Occupy Portland, in a statement, said the move “specifically aims to disrupt business-as-usual for Wall Street on the waterfront,” saying that several companies including Goldman Sachs and food giant EGT do lots of business there.
Occupy organizers said they were working directly with port workers and union members to coordinate the shutting down of the terminals.
“The support from workers at the port has been incredible. We were out at the ports talking to workers multiple times a day during the organizing of this action and today we see them honoring the community picket,” protester Jordan McIntyre, a union painter, said in a press release.
Across the Colombia River, protesters said they shut down the port in Longview, Wash., and are specifically demonstrating in front of EGT’s offices there. Protest organizers in Texas also said the port in Houston was shut down for several hours.
In Oakland, activists attempted to storm the port but were met with “huge numbers of police in riot gear” armed with beanbag shotguns, the statement read. Eventually, activists said that they were able to close the port down.
It is not clear if port shutdowns would considerably affect the corporations who use them for business.
The Port of Oakland, in a statement, confirmed protesters disrupted operations at the facility but said it returned to normal later in the day. “Traffic is now flowing into and out of the port,” it said.
Protesters also turned out in Bellingham in Washington, Vancouver in British Colombia, San Diego, and Los Angeles. Organizers said the entrance to the Port of Long Beach was shut down for several hours and the street entry into the Port of San Diego was also closed before police forced them to leave.
The Port of Oakland said, “Closing the port is a bad idea,” because it is linked to more than “73,000 jobs in the region and more than 800,000 across the country,” according to a statement. A potential closure adversely affects the families and job security of port workers, many of whom are struggling during the current economic downturn, the port added.
“Our goal today is to minimize disruptions to workers and working families that depend” on the port and in a way that acknowledges the “importance on everyone’s safety and security, and which is respectful of everyone’s First Amendment Rights,” said the Port of Oakland in a press release.
Local reports said that there were only a small number of arrests across the cities on Monday.
Early last month, demonstrators successfully closed down the Oakland port, which received international attention after protesters clashed with police officers. A number of officers and demonstrators were injured in the melee, while there were widespread reports of vandalism and property damage.
