I been meaning to do an article about the Riot Ribs/BLM Ribs split but I kept getting sidetracked with other things so here's gonna be a quick rundown in thread form from what I remember after talking to most of the people involved before and after the split. https://twitter.com/FancyJenkins/status/1316453705290452993

Many of the people involved have asked for anonymity for their own protection so I'll be referring to many of the organizers vaguely but here's the deal.

Riot Ribs started July 4th when Lorenzo decided to go out and grill ribs for the protesters out at the Justice Center.

The very next day, some other folks offered to help out, and Riot Ribs was born, though they didn't officially adopt the name for a few more days.

D'Anthony was there from about July 6th or 7th and according to several accounts, sexually harassing femmes basically from the get.

Nobody really knew how to address the harassment, so it continued. Essentially what I was told was "we're doing good work, no one wants to jeopardize that work by causing drama, so it went unchecked until it absolutely couldn't anymore"

A little less than a month after Riot Ribs started, after they had had donated in the ballpark of $375k, Riot Ribs said they were no longer accepting donations, and D'Anthony started hanging signs with his personal cashapp on the tents.

When told to take them down, he began making threats of violence. Everyone knew at this point that he carried a gun, as he had flashed it several times at different points. He also was said to carry several thousand in cash tips he had stolen in his boot.

Riot Ribs lasted from start to finish, just about a month. After that most of the original organizers, many of them houseless, had left under threat of violence from D'Anthony. Several of them fled the state and Revolution Ribs was born, driving out to other cities protests.

The official statement from Riot Ribs said they purchased "sprinter vans" for Revolution Ribs, this wasn't strictly accurate, as sprinters are a specific make of van. They really purchased different makes, all used, and for much cheaper than sprinters go for.

After the original organizers fled, the tents feeding people at the Justice Center kept on using the name Riot Ribs for a little while, despite the public statement that Riot Ribs had disbanded. It took them a week or two of public outcry to officially decide to stop using that.

I was never able to speak to D'Anthony. When I went down to the Justice Center in late August, he hadn't been seen or heard from for five days, according to his right hand guy, JP, who told me that they were going by "BLM Ribs" at that point.

JP was my last interview when I was working on this article. He denied that the kids who were seen attacking people out there had anything to do with them, despite several accounts that D'Anthony was paying the kids to "work security" for them.

The day that the organizers fled, one of them was attacked by the kids, and suffered a bloody nose. They've since told me that D'Anthony and at least one other of the BLM Ribs have made death threats to them and led them to believe they offered the kids $10k to kill them.

Most of the Revolution Ribs folks have since come back to Portland, and at the time of my interviews in August, all but one of the vans was returned to Portland to aid in various mutual aid groups here locally, after public outcry about donations being sent out of state.

Depite the wishes of the BLM Ribs folks, none of the Riot Ribs money went to them, and much of it was doled out to other mutual aid efforts here locally, with an amount being held in reserve to pay taxes on their large income.
Transparency was always a big focus for Riot Ribs.

I'm sure I'm leaving some things out, and I'll be adding to this thread as I remember, or am reminded. Feel free to ask questions if you have them, I was in close contact with the Riot Ribs folks from the first time I interviewed them for @villageportland https://villageportland.com/2020/07/12/community-support-at-chapman-square/

And I've stayed close to many of them since then. If I can't personally answer questions, I know who to ask to get answers.

Several of the accounts from organizers and people on the ground have said that D'Anthony did pay those kids to intimidate and attack people. https://twitter.com/anarchistvibes/status/1316464958478053376?s=20

It has been demanded of me that I add some things to this thread so.

@hailbop1993 reached out to me from an alt account @direct_pdx, because I blocked her months ago for being homophobic in my replies, and demanded to know why I was silencing her in this thread.

We spoke for a while, and she said she'd like me to add to this thread that "it is an opinion piece and I am not unbiased"

She proceeded to insult and belittle me while making claims against the other folks who organized Riot Ribs with no evidence to back them up.

She also asked that I clarify that I did not reach out to her during my interviews. I did in fact reach out, but as I was just told, her phone was stolen and she didn't respond because she simply didn't have access to it.

This thread is not about her though, it's about the violent split between Riot Ribs and BLM Ribs, which I reported faithfully to the best of my ability.

She says she will reach out Monday with more information, and should she do this I will update the thread again at that time.