On this edition of Oregon On The Record hear from Alex Zielinski of Oregon Public Broadcasting about her story showcasing the mayor of Portland's decision to move the city's Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion policy toward the White House's mandate.
You'll also hear from Dave McClain of Lane County Democrats for our continuing series about how the party is doing locally and nationally.
The following transcript was generated using automated transcription software for the accessibility and convenience of our audience. While we strive for accuracy, the automated process may introduce errors, omissions, or misinterpretations. This transcript is intended as a helpful companion to the original audio and should not be considered a verbatim record. For the most accurate representation, please refer to the audio recording.
MICHAEL DUNNE: I'm Michael Dunne. Our metropolitan friend to the North - Portland - is both one of the most liberal cities in America and also a frequent target of right-wing wrath and consternation. As such, it's easy to imagine its leaders taking every opportunity to poke the bear that is the Trump administration. Well, in one particular matter, you'd be wrong. Very recently, the mayor of Portland, Keith Wilson, by executive order, changed the city's DEI policies to comply with the Trump administration's own executive order. Today on the show, you'll hear from my colleague at OPB, who covers Portland government and explains both the rationale behind the mayor's decision and the blowback. Then in the second part of the show, we'll continue our week-long check in with Lane County Democrats to get their view on how the party is doing.
Alex Zielinski, who covers Portland government For OPB, thanks so much for coming on and talking with us.
Alex Zielinski: Thanks for having me.
Dunne: I read and I heard your story that you did about the mayor of Portland changing the DEI policy. Give us the 30,000-foot view of your story.
Zielinski: Yeah, so Mayor Keith Wilson's order essentially directs city departments to ensure that all city policies comply with federal anti-discrimination laws, which seems pretty straightforward and kind of obvious, but since it comes hand-in-hand with the Trump executive orders restricting Diversity Equity and Inclusion work, it feels a Little bit more significant. Essentially, Trump's executive orders from earlier in this year threatens to withhold federal grant money from jurisdictions with policies that violate the Civil Rights Act of 1964. And according to the federal government's current interpretation of the Act, that includes, really any policies that attempt to prioritize certain races and genders above others, so that any equity programs that are meant to benefit marginalized groups in Portland, according to our mayor, that could include roughly 75 city programs and policies. Ones that prioritize contracts with minority owned businesses, or, rules of interviewing people of color and women for director level positions. And so with that in mind, and with a lot of money on the line, the city gets about $350 million in federal grant funding that could be clawed back if the city doesn't comply, Mayor Wilson decided to kind of put out the statement saying, 'yes, we're going to comply with federal anti-discrimination rules', which, the undertone there is, we're trying to make sure that we can get access to federal funding.
Dunne: Okay, I noticed that this was done by, and I'll be honest with you, I didn't even know mayors had executive order power. So this was an executive order. Was the thinking there that to try and do something via normal council action that wouldn't have passed, and so the executive order was a way to ensure that this would get passed, or was there some other calculus that you could determine?
Zielinski: My understanding is it's really just the balance of power in Portland city government. We just overhauled our entire government at the beginning of the year, and really gave in that process. Gave the mayor a lot more administrative power than that office previously had, and now kind of in the way that our government operates. These decisions can really be made quickly, a lot more quickly, by the mayor, than going through council itself as well. That was another roadblock in that, yes, it could go to council, but it could take a long time to get to yes. And this deadline, I didn't mention, there's kind of an August deadline to sign documents saying we accept this grant funding with the condition of, 'yes, we're following Trump's executive orders.' This deadline would have passed, probably before council could come to a conclusion. So, I think there was a level of expediency from the mayor, and also that's really his power right now, is to be able to pull up levels at the administrative level.
Dunne: Okay, I also noticed in your story that Mayor Wilson, I believe he characterized it as we're doing this, but we're not going perhaps as far in terms of scrubbing DEI or any kind of protected class action, than perhaps other cities are doing. And the reason I'm asking this question is that we have seen from this particular White House, they'll say, 'okay, you need to do this,' and then organizations do it, and then they come back and say, now you need to do more. And I guess my question in all that is, is there a concern that the Trump White House may look at what Portland is doing and say, 'no, we want you to go further'?
Zielinski: Yes, absolutely. And that's the loudest kind of criticism we've heard of this decision from the mayor is, like you said, the goal posts will just continue to be moved the further this goes along. And to capitulate now, to comply in advance, what does that say about future demands from the White House. And at the same time, I think a lot of folks are pretty skeptical that Portland will even get this funding, even if they follow Trump's orders. We all know. We saw the national headlines in 2020. We know what the Trump administration thinks about Portland, it's become a bit of a punching bag. And so, yeah, so there's a lot of questions around, okay, what precedent does this set? And are we really thinking of putting Portland's values on the front burner here?
Dunne: To that point, what did some of the other councilors tell you? What did council members tell you about this decision, and perhaps since your story ran, what are some of the both critiques and supporters of what the mayor did that you've been hearing?
Zielinski: Yeah, well, so most city councilors seemed to kind of cautiously agree with Wilson's logic. They said that, yes, we need this funding. Portland, like many cities, is struggling financially. And every budget session is a crisis. And so having this funding from the federal government is important. And so a lot of folks said, yes, this is obviously prioritizing the needs of our city, even our more marginalized members of our community will benefit from getting these federal funding dollars. Others are pretty upset. One city councilor, her name is Loretta Smith, she kind of spoke out saying the city shouldn't be putting equity programs on the chopping block to just capitulate to Trump, and that we shouldn't say, wait to be penalized. To wait for the hammer to drop, and then challenge the administration in court, kind of defend Portland's values. Like I was saying one thing that's interesting, the mayor turned to a lot of local community leaders for advice on putting this together. And one of those people is the director of the ACLU of Oregon, Sandy Chung, and I spoke with her, and she really sided with the path that Wilson took. Because in the big picture, cities are responsible for aligning their policies with federal law, like civil rights laws, and that this is something that maybe, just saying, hey, the city should be following city or civil rights laws. That's something that the city should be doing already, whether or not Trump is in office. I do think that that partner, like this coming out, and this decision coming out, in alignment with the anti-DEI kind of rhetoric from the Trump administration, though it has made especially a lot of folks in the community in Portland, pretty upset with the framing. They think that this is kind of rolling over to Trump and not drawing a line in the sand in the way that some people want to see from our leadership.
Dunne: Obviously, down the road from you, about an hour is Salem, where the state government is located. And of course, our Attorney General has been suing the federal government over a lot of different policies. It seems to me, that what the mayor is doing here is getting in compliance, but obviously, chances are the Trump administration is also seeing, 'Oh, well, your state's AG, is after me on a whole bunch of different lawsuits.' What's it like trying to, at least from what you've been able to determine, what's it like for some of the leaders, like the mayor of the biggest city in the state, to have to sort of navigate this minefield coming from the federal government?
Zielinski: Yeah, it's certainly not easy. And there's no guidebook, right? Like no one's kind of doing it, right? We see a lot of cities, progressive cities, trying, across the country, trying to capitulate in certain ways. And universities too- and still get hit with huge fines and be sued themselves. One thing I should mention, Portland, yes, the state of Oregon is suing Trump in many ways, but Portland has also joined in on a number of lawsuits. One sanctuary city kind of lawsuit that Trump has threatened to withhold money to any sanctuary cities, and actually a lawsuit against specifically, Trump's decision to withhold funding to cities based on their DEI and equity policies, which I think kind of fell to the wayside in this news dropping last week from Mayor Wilson's office. Because a lot of folks are saying, hey, we need to take this to court and challenge and they are doing that. But of course, these lawsuits drag on, and like I said, this August grant deadline would have been far in the rear view once this court challenge wrapped up. And so, the city just really wanted to make sure that while this stuff played out in court, they were still getting some funding. So, if cities suing the Trump White House puts a target on their back, that target is in Portland, regardless of whether or not you know they're changing some of their equity language in the meantime.
Dunne: My two last questions. The first is this: a lot of city leaders in other cities throughout Oregon may not admit this, but let's be honest... Portland is a trend setter for a lot of cities, and so they're going to look at this action and wonder, okay, well, the most well-known mayor in our state did this. Do you think that the actions of Mayor Wilson are going to be emulated by other cities throughout our state?
Zielinski: Sure. I mean, like you said, I can speculate and say that, yeah, other cities model their policies after Portland, especially progressive cities. And it's easy to say, well, Portland did this. So, this obviously, is something that we should be comfortable doing. At the same time, Portland's like, a little behind on this. A lot of cities and jurisdictions and counties have already kind of made adjustments to their DEI language because of this executive order. Or, far, far, long before Portland, Clackamas County, Washington County, Multnomah County- a lot of the largest counties in the state are already making changes, and that goes a lot farther than what Portland has done. To be clear, Portland is not saying we need to close diversity and equity offices. Need to get rid of these positions that are focused on improving equity in the city. We need to just erase DEI language from the city's set code language in general. It's just saying we need to change some things to make sure we're not accidentally violating the Civil Rights Act and some of these other counties and jurisdictions, they're defunding programs, they are firing folks. They are really erasing language in ways that Portland isn't doing. But just to say that, yeah, Portland might set the trend for some other cities to look to in Oregon. But a lot of this is already being done.
Dunne: So, Alex, my last question is this, and you sort of teed this up earlier. All of us in the state know that your city that you cover has been in Trump's crosshairs for quite some time, and the rhetoric about the lawlessness of Portland and whatnot, I guess I just kind of wanted to ask, how do most electeds in Portland, whether it's through the county government, through the city government, or just other leaders that you talk to, what is the general feeling about Portland's place in this world, in this new world order, where you have a president who is certainly not afraid to say very incendiary things about blue cities, and certainly, like we've said, Portland has been in his crosshairs for quite some time.
Zielinski: Yeah, I mean, it's very much on the mind of city leaders. We have a pretty much brand-new city council and mayor that all started, entered office, the same month that Trump reentered the Oval Office, in January. And so they didn't have much time to stop and think about their strategy. It's been kind of a lot of making it up as they go and trying to try to put together, kind of cobble together a strategy while these different executives. Orders and policies drop and also splinter the community. So right now, there is definitely a kind of this back and forth binary between, like, should we, be quote, unquote, kind of "poking the bear," which is Trump by really loudly pushing back, by showing up in the streets and protesting, by, sending out kind of messaging that, like, Portland is not going to just roll over, or should Portland be kind of trying to stay out of the spotlight and under the radar and do what it needs to keep the city functioning, but not maybe even, like, do performative kind of actions to get on Trump's radar again. So, folks I've spoken with, there's no consensus about the way forward. Like I said, there's no really best practices in this arena. It's very new, and a lot of it's just trial by fire, kind of, and I think that the focus is just protecting-doing whatever can be done to protect- the more vulnerable people living in Portland who could be impacted first by whatever policies come down from the White House. But yeah, there certainly is no clear directive forward.
Dunne: We live in interesting times. She does a great job up at OPB covering Portland politics and government, Alex Zielinski, thanks so much for coming on and talking with us.
Zielinski: Thanks for having me.
Dunne: We've been bringing you voices from Lane County Democrats all week to get a temperature check on the party, both locally and nationally. Here's another installment with a gentleman named Dave McLean recorded at a downtown Eugene restaurant during their informal get together.
Tell me about what you feel the Democrats locally, statewide and nationally, are doing well to get back into power or remain in power here, locally, especially, but also, you know, maybe some things that you would like the local, state and national party to do in this unprecedented time we're in?
Dave McClain: Okay, that's a good question. Things are doing well. Well, I think they're good at mobilizing their base, and getting them out and in having them represent themselves. I participated in a number of protests here locally in the last four or five months, and it seems every one of them, there's more people than there were before. I see people at these now that have never been to a protest ever, that are as old or older than me. I'm almost 70, so they're coming out for the first time, so I think that's crucial to make people aware of how important it is to stand up and resist what's happening. So that part, I think they're doing well, things I wish they did more well. So giving us candidates that, quite honestly, can win, I'm not saying that Harris wasn't capable of winning, but I think it's still in this day and age, it's sad thing to say there's still too much racism and sexism to elect a woman, and especially a black woman, and I believe that that was the issue, just that people don't want to talk about this, that that was the issue more than anything else. Of the last election that prevented her from winning, they gave us a candidate that was unelectable, like it or not.
Dunne: Do you think that a candidate, whether it's for president or even just a local race, do you think youth is important for the Democratic Party in 2025? Do you think that those candidates need to be perhaps younger than Chuck Schumer is in his late 70s. Nancy Pelosi was in her 80s. Joe Biden left the race ostensibly because of age. Talk about that from your perspective.
McClain: That's a great question, and I think you're right. We do need younger candidates, whether it's Gen Z or whatever label you want to put on it, but yeah, age is an issue for sure. More candidates, more diverse candidates, candidates that represent all aspects of the party. And I don't have any. I don't have a problem with age. Quite honestly, it's the person I'm voting for. But yes, let's get some 20-somethings, 30, 40-somethings. Youth has a lot to go for it, and maybe some fresh ideas here as well. I'm not saying the Democratic Party is stuck in a rut, but perhaps they are.
Dunne: It's interesting. I see where you're wearing a resist pin on your shirt, and I'm wondering if the Democratic Party is doing enough, and this is, I understand, a delicate balance between resistance and being proactive. If you could give the Democratic Party a grade on both things, on resisting what's happening, but then also on being proactive with our own ideas and policies.
McClain: I think on the resistance, I'd probably give them a B+. I think they're doing well, they're proactive. It's a tougher one. I hate to say it, but I might give them a C as average. I think there is still work to be done here. And your question about age, I think is very relevant. Yeah, there needs to be some fresh blood, some new blood in the party. I hear rumblings of a movement that is pushing that forward, but I'm not aware of how prevalent it is at the local and state level here.
Dunne: You've lived here for a long time…
McClain: 20 years.
Dunne: 20 years. Okay. Are you optimistic about both the strength and the energy and even the youth of the local Democratic Party as well as the state Democratic Party?
McClain: Yes, I am, yep. And I've talked to several candidates here locally that were very young, that seemed very competent and aware of what was happening here locally. It gave me a lot of confidence that that was a good direction for the party to take, and then I was glad they were embracing these people and promoting them.
Dunne: Dave, thank you so much.
McClain: Thank you.
Dunne: That was our conversation with Dave McClain of Lane County Democrats. We'll bring you our final conversation with them on tomorrow's show. All episodes of Oregon On The Record are available as a podcast at KLCC.org. Speaking of tomorrow's show, we're going to bring you a conversation with a national sports reporter from The Guardian who wrote recently about the pay disparity for players in the WNBA and how the calculation for raising pay is not that simple. As Oregon gears up for its new WNBA team, The Fire, the issue of popularity versus economic power is only going to heat up. I'm Michael Dunne, and this has been Oregon On the Record from KLCC. Thanks for listening.
This transcript has been edited for clarity.
