(The Post Millennial) A leftist Portland, Ore. business owner who advocated for the city’s destruction during the Antifa and Black Lives Matter riots of 2020 and 2021 announced he is closing his taproom after suffering significant financial losses since that time.
Nat West, the owner of Reverend Nat’s Hard Cider on Southeast 35th and Division Street, who identifies as he/him on social media, is permanently shuttering the doors to his taproom. The taproom’s beverages are a former staple in the progressive city now struggling with surging crime, homicides and business closures following the 2020–21 riots.
“Please smash all my windows if it will be a step toward change,” West said in an Twitter (now X) post in April 2021, nearly a year after the deadly riots started in Portland. For more than 120 days straight in Portland, far-left extremists carried out acts of insurrection against the local and federal governments through firebombings, explosive attacks, looting, arson, gun violence and rampant property destruction.
In response to an individual criticizing rioters for smashing up the Oregon Historical Society in October 2020 at an Antifa direct action, West suggested the museum deserved it.
“Just because you are doing a better job now than you’ve done in the past doesn’t exclude you from a little bit of reckoning. Doesn’t demand it either. But windows are windows,” West wrote.
In March 2022, armed Indianapolis gunman Malik Muhammed was convicted for smashing up the museum and other businesses that night. He was also convicted of multiple charges of attempted murder, unlawful manufacture and possession of a destructive device, unlawful possession of a firearm and other felonies related to his involvement in weeks of rioting. Muhammed was sentenced to 10 years in prison in a sweetheart deal that merged his state and federal prison sentence.
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West also revealed his extremist support for political violence in response to the Portland mayor. In reply to a video speech of Mayor Ted Wheeler denouncing the violent riots during a press conference in June 2020, West wrote: “Protests are effective when they cost money.” After just six weeks of rioting in 2020, city officials estimated that downtown businesses alone suffered about $23 million in damages.
