Man Booted From Downtown Bar for Wearing a Shirt Reading "Anti-Fascist"

Here's the political shirt that got Engelhard kicked out of the Jackknife. Seth Engelhard

Seth Engelhard went to the Jackknife bar Friday night looking for food.

He and his partner has just left the Portland Timbers game, where they'd participated in boycotting stadium concessions to protest Timbers management's recent ban on anti-fascist signage, like the Iron Front. As soon as the match ended, the hungry pair beelined to Jackknife, which is located inside the Sentinel Hotel.

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After finishing his meal, Engelhard went to use the bathroom located in the lobby outside of the bar. When he tried to re-enter, Engelhard was met by a security guard.

"He said that he needed to talk to me about my shirt," Engelhard told the Mercury in an email. "He said that... they don't allow any political apparel that might cause conflict. I couldn't wear it in the bar."

Engelhard was wearing a black t-shirt bearing a simple message written in cursive: Anti-Fascist.

After having spent the evening protesting one organization's ban on anti-fascist signs, Engelhard was kicked out of a bar because of another company's ban on anti-fascist shirts.

Like the message shared earlier this month by Timbers management, the security guard's reasoning was that the phrase was "too political."

According to Engelhard, the security guard explained that Jackknife doesn't let people wear Make America Great Again hats in the bar, either—equating a politician's campaign swag with a declaration against fascism.

"I said that being anti-fascist isn't a political position," Engelhard recalled. "He said it doesn't matter and that they don't want anything that might start a fight. He said it just creates more work for his team."

Engelhard and his partner grabbed their coats and left. On the way out the front door, he questioned the security guard one more time.

Engelhard recalled, "He said something to the effect of it wasn’t his position, he just has to enforce their policy."

Jackknife does not have a "no political clothing" policy. It does, however, have a policy against clothing that promotes hate groups. A spokesperson for Jackknife's parent company, Lightning Bar Collective, said the bar's policy was "misinterpreted" by the security team.

"This situation is a huge mistake on the part of security staff," wrote Josh Buck with Lightning Bar Collective, in an email to the Mercury. "This is NOT our policy. To be anti-fascist is to stand for human rights. We do not view anti-fascists as a hate group or even a political affiliation."

Jackknife's security is contracted out to M & B Security, a Portland company with a substantial record of complaints made against its employees online. M & B Security also staffs Century Bar, Victoria Bar, the Doug Fir Lounge, and the Bye and Bye—as well as the Sentinel Hotel itself, which is notoriously owned by a major Donald Trump donor.

Regardless of who's to blame, the fact that someone believed an "anti-fascist" shirt was dangerous enough to be banned from a bar speaks to the local—and national—fear of anti-fascist, or "antifa," movements.

Engelhard blames the far-right and Fox News for stoking fear about groups that oppose white nationalist organizations.

"They have spun the narrative that 'antifa' is a dangerous political group who uses violence to make their points and a lot of people believe them," he said. "While in reality, antifa is just short for antifascist; it simply means being against fascism."