The feud between the leaders of Portland's protest community and Mayor Charlie Hales came into full focus Tuesday as critics accused the mayor of engineering their arrests the night before because he's fed up with their brand of activism.

In a tumultuous day of traded statements and accusations, anti-Trump protesters mostly kept off the streets and instead launched a war of words aimed at Hales and police.

In turn, Hales canceled his March of Hope, blaming a planned counter-protest that he worried would disrupt the family-friendly rally. He said through a spokesman that any claims of retaliation aren't only wrong but dangerous.

The bad blood had been building steadily since the election of Donald Trump spurred sometimes-violent protests that put Portland on the map as one of the nation's most cantankerous pockets of dissent.

Key figures in the 2-week-old movement that calls itself Portland's Resistance said that irritation culminated Monday evening when police officers closed in on three of them -- suddenly handcuffing them before carting them off to jail for no legitimate reason, they said. They were soon released from custody.

Micah Rhodes, one of the arrested leaders, said police targeted him and two other activists because the city wants them to stop. The protests have brought thousands of people to downtown Portland -- filling city streets and freeways, sometimes bringing them to a standstill. One person was shot as a protest crowd blocked traffic on the Morrison Bridge.

"Portland has been deemed the center of the Trump resistance," Rhodes told The Oregonian/OregonLive. "There's been a lot of media coverage. The world is watching. They're trying to shut us up ... because it's making them look bad."

While most people have participated peacefully, a small number of rioters whacked cars and shattered business windows with bats, lit fires in the street and spray-painted graffiti on the third day of protests after the election. Police Chief Mike Marshman estimated the damage at $1 million.

More than 120 people have been arrested during the demonstrations, although police have said most of them weren't directly responsible for the damage.

Rhodes said that as a leader of the Resistance, he promotes peaceful protests -- and that's exactly what he and fellow organizers Gregory McKelvey and Kathryn Stevens also said they were doing Monday afternoon and evening as they marched to support high schoolers who walked from Northeast Portland's Holladay Park to downtown.

Rhodes, 23, McKelvey, 23, and Stevens, 24, said they weren't directing the march and were only following the students' lead.

Police, however, said the three were telling students to defy police orders. By evening's end, officers had arrested all three on accusations of second-degree disorderly conduct, interfering with police or both.

McKelvey said the officers appeared to take some satisfaction in the arrests.

"They told us, 'Tonight, we get to arrest you,'" McKelvey said.

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Rhodes, McKelvey and Stevens on Tuesday told a crowd of reporters on the steps of the Multnomah County Justice Center that they weren't leading the march or making any decisions, but they were relaying directions from student leaders to other members of the crowd.

"I was one of the people with a bullhorn that communicated the direction of students," McKelvey said. Rhodes said when student leaders decided to do a "die-in" on the Burnside Bridge -- telling everyone to lie down on the pavement for 4 1/2 minutes -- he repeated that direction to students in other lanes of the bridge.

Stevens, who was clutching what she said was a sprained hand and elbow caused during her arrest, said she was too sore to speak much. But she nodded along as the other two spoke.

"It hurts to stand, walk, breathe," Stevens said.

Rhodes, McKelvey and Stevens made their first appearances in court and learned prosecutors have decided not to pursue misdemeanor criminal charges against them for now. Instead of being arraigned on the criminal charges, the three each received a citation -- similar to a traffic ticket -- for allegedly failing to obey police.

McKelvey called the charges "fabricated" and condemned police for arresting them "as a tactic to silence people's First Amendment rights."

Even though the allegations have been downgraded to citations, McKelvey said the three have their pick of defense attorneys who are eager to represent them. "We will fight this tooth and nail," he said.

Prosecutors said, however, that McKelvey, Rhodes and Stevens still could face criminal charges at a later date. They need more time to review evidence in the case. That's also true with scores of other arrested protesters who showed up to court last week and received only citations: Prosecutors said they could still be charged with crimes, too.

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Police spokesman Sgt. Pete Simpson repeated what he's often said since officers started arresting protesters: They haven't been arrested for continuing to exercise their First Amendment rights.

"They were arrested due to their criminal behavior last night during the protest," Simpson said, Tuesday. "We don't arrest people when laws are not broken."

A spokesman for Mayor Charlie Hales also weighed in -- to address comments from McKelvey that he believed the mayor called for his arrest in retaliation for rejecting Hales' invitation to take part in the March of Hope.

The march had been scheduled for Tuesday afternoon, but Hales called it off after learning McKelvey and others were planning to counter protest. That included holding signs accusing the mayor of being hypocritical by organizing his own march when Resistance protesters felt they were unfairly hindered by police.

"The mayor, as police commissioner, does not have the authority to direct Portland Police to arrest anyone," Hales' spokesman Brian Worley said in an email. "People are arrested for breaking laws. To claim the mayor would arrest people for political retaliation is not only inaccurate, it is dangerous."

But the American Civil Liberties Union of Oregon sent a letter to Hales and the police chief, accusing the city of retaliating against the Resistance leaders because their anti-Trump protests "were publicly opposed by your offices."

Student organizers of Monday's protest echoed the sentiments of the ACLU. In a written statement, they said they thought police were trying to squelch the voices of the movement's leaders, as well as their own.

"This is police tyranny," their statement said. "It is an unsuccessful attempt to drown out the voices of students who are scared of this clearly oppressive police bureau and government."

More protests are planned for Friday during after-Thanksgiving shopping and Saturday night.

-- Aimee Green

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