Portland driver Adam Haner believes he was attacked because he is white
The driver kicked unconscious during a mob attack in Portland says he has previously marched in support of Black Lives Matter — and believes he was only targeted because he is white.
“I wasn’t trying to do anything but get a drink,” Adam Haner told KATU of the vicious attack that started outside a 7-Eleven and left him with head wounds, three broken ribs and two black eyes.
“I wasn’t the enemy, I’ll tell you that. I was just the guy standing there, and I was white, evidently,” he said of his brutal attack by BLM protesters.
While he was not part of the ongoing protests in Portland, Haner told KPTV that he had previously marched in BLM protests.
“I was for that. I’ve had cops beat me up before. I was for their cause,” he said.
The one-time firefighter — who is refusing to watch the viral video of his attack — said his natural instincts kicked in when he saw a trans woman whom he did not know getting robbed and beaten.
“I just seen something going on there, and I tried to get in the middle of it — and it just directed the fire towards me,” he told the station. “Their whole chaos came right at me.”
He insisted that he said nothing offensive — but both he and his girlfriend, Tammie Martin, were immediately set upon by the mob, who started calling them white supremacists for no reason.
“All I remember saying very vividly was, ‘This isn’t your enemy — this isn’t who we’re trying to fight,'” he insisted.
Martin — who was also attacked in the initial confrontation — said the videos prove Haner was trying to get out safely without hurting anyone.
“He was honking his horn and revving his engine to get people off his truck — he didn’t want to hurt nobody,” she told the station, saying she was also bruised after being wrestled to the ground and battered.
Haner said his power steering belt came off as he drove away — forcing him to crash as he tried to make a turn.
“Before I even got my door open, somebody was yanking me out and I hit the ground,” he told KPTV.
“I remember vaguely being on the ground and trying to call her,” he said of his girlfriend.
“Then I don’t remember anything. And then two days later I wake up” covered in tubes in the ICU, he said.
But he insisted he is not “seeking vengeance” against the suspect in his attack, named by police as 25-year-old former security guard Marquise Love.
“I’m sure karma will take care of him in whatever way it needs to … I hope he learns something,” he said.
He also insisted he would once again step in to help a stranger in need “once I’m fully recovered.”
“That’s who I am. If I see something wrong, I’m going to be the person to say something,” he said, adding that his instinct to “go in and help people” is what made him become a firefighter.
“Me helping people is just my nature,” he told KATU.
The attack — and ongoing riots and protests — has changed his opinion of the city he loves, however.
“Getting a drink at a 7-Eleven in Portland, Oregon, is a different story than it was two months ago,” he told WKBN.