If you appreciate the Mercury's interesting and useful news & culture reporting, consider making a small monthly contribution to support our editorial team. Your donation is tax-deductible. You can also subscribe and have our papers delivered!
Good Morning, Portland: 🎶 "I can't think what's making this feeling be / Showing the tea that's inside of me / And now you've started singing / Red lady, you're just fine." 🎶 Happy Friday, friends. Let's get to the news!
IN LOCAL NEWS:
- The Mercury’s Winter Guide 2025 is out in print now and starting to trickle out on our website. As the weather changes for the worse, no, the worst, you might be thinking about changing up how you commute. But you don’t have to. It’s possible to keep pedaling and stay dry (carefully around the leaves, please) by taking a few notes from our Taylor Griggs, a year-round bike commuter and intrepid reporter. Main takeaways: Fenders, footwear, lightweight rain jacket. There’s a lot more here, including where to find the non-negotiables at a good price.
- Portland is back! Or, was it ever gone? The honorable Wm. Steven Humphrey has more here:
Noticed how the same people who once declared "Portland is DEAD" are suddenly jumping on the "Portland is BACK, bay-bee" bandwagon? Mercury editor Wm. Steven Humphrey has, and spends a smooth 800 words *giving them hell.* (It's part of our annual "Winter Guide" in print and on the streets NOW.)
— Portland Mercury (@portlandmercury.com) November 21, 2025 at 7:06 AM
[image or embed]
- Mayor Keith Wilson put the international housing expert Helmi Hisserich on leave three weeks ago with no specific reason given, and now she has resigned, according to OPB. City officials and a number of housing advocates around the world were confused by the move, considering Portland could certainly use some housing to address its homelessness crisis in the long term. In her resignation letter, Hisserich added a little bit of context (and a stark warning): “Portland’s homelessness crisis is a direct result of an inadequate housing supply and siloed single-focus thinking that pits pro-housing advocates against those focused on tenant rights. With the rapidly eroding social safety net, Portland’s homelessness crisis is likely to worsen.” We’ll keep that in mind.
- This week’s City Council meeting got a little wild when not one, not two, but three demonstrations took place outside before the meeting. Anti-ICE and Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO) members clashed with Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) members outside. Then a right-wing streamer showed up to throw pro-Trump and transphobic bombast into the mix. And that was just the beginning. Things got contentious inside the chambers too as multiple people were expelled from the meeting. Read here about the drama and a proposal that could be one tool in slowing the Trump deportation machine locally.
- Breaking news: Landlords Now Accepting Cash For Rent
An Oregon pilot program giving cash to homeless youths sees a staggering reduction in homelessness. The program gave participants $1,000 cash payments each month for two years, and at the end of the project's first phase, 91% of participants reported being in stable housing.
— Street Roots (@streetroots.bsky.social) November 20, 2025 at 6:35 PM
[image or embed]
- Were you out late at Revolution Hall last night, listening to Seattle songwriter Dean Johnson’s gorgeous tunes? Or, do you need some music recommendations as the nights get cold? His new album, I Hope We Can Still Be Friends, came out on Saddle Creek in August, and he spoke with The Stranger’s Audrey Vann before visiting Portland last night. He says the songs have a mean streak, and there’s something delicate and vulnerable about the record too. Check out the full interview here and buy a record if you dig.Â
IN NATIONAL / INTERNATIONAL NEWS:
- In what is definitely not a metaphor for anything at all, a fire broke out at the COP30 conference in Brazil on Thursday, leading to evacuations and leaving 13 people with smoke inhalation injuries. The 30th annual United Nations conference to address climate change was disrupted on its second to last day, but people were allowed to return to other areas and continue working to seriously combat the world's greatest threat, they promise. This years' COP30 was sponsored by large agriculture businesses like Bayer, which is big into pesticides that are responsible for mass deforestation. Other hits include Senar, an offshoot of one of Brazil's largest agribusiness lobbyists, and the Indian pesticide manufacturer UPL. By sponsoring the COP30, companies would garner “visibility” and “image gain” from their “association with companies committed to the changes needed to address… climate change,” according to a draft contract. (AKA "greenwashing.")
"No, really. It's fine."
- Yesterday, Trump said on his social media platform that Democrats were engaging in “seditious behavior, punishable by death” after six lawmakers released a video saying troops could and should refuse unlawful commands. Asked if President Unlawful Commands wanted to execute members of Congress, press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the real trouble here is not the president’s response, but what brought him to respond this way. Oh, ok, two can play that game. What brought the lawmakers to release a video saying troops should refuse orders that violate the law and the Constitution? Was it… (see below). The Military Law Task Force has an FAQ on it here.
- Today in "How the Hell is This Even a Thing?"
The US Coast Guard on Thursday issued a memo that reclassifies swastikas and nooses as “hate symbols,” in a rapid about-face after facing intense scrutiny for a previous policy change which downplayed their display as merely “potentially divisive.” https://cnn.it/48syNPR
— CNN (@cnn.com) November 21, 2025 at 8:00 AM
[image or embed]
- President Donald Trump reaaallllyyy wants the National Guard deployed indefinitely in US cities. But unfortunately for him and fortunately for Americans who just want to live and move freely about their neighborhoods, those pesky courts keep telling the Guard to stand down. Days after the Department of War officially ordered troops to leave Portland and Chicago, a judge has ruled Trump has to end the National Guard presence in D.C., saying the deployment was unlawful. That’s five big Ls for the big boss—every city he sent troops to. I, for one, am getting a little tired of winning!
- On that note, have a good weekend, winners! And please tip your bartenders and baristas.
     View this post on Instagram           Â
