In October 2025, following a summer of anti-immigration enforcement action protests in Portland, Oregon, an image (archived) circulated online that claimed to show protesters in the city dangling donuts on strings in front of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers.
One popular version of the photo posted on Facebook carried the caption, "Portland Protestors Baiting ICE Agents With Donuts on Fishing Poles Calling it ICE Fishing."
The photo and claim about what it showed also circulated on X (archived), Instagram (archived), Threads (archived) and Bluesky (archived).
Though the image appeared authentic, meaning not generated or edited using artificial intelligence, it did not show anti-immigration enforcement action protests in Portland, Oregon. Postings of the image dated back to at least 2014 (archived) and actually showed a protest in Toronto, Canada. The officers in the video wore a uniform that included the Toronto Police Service badge (archived). Therefore, we find this image to be miscaptioned.
The Toronto Police Service said it could not confirm or comment on "any photo not posted by the Toronto Police."
Though the particular image was not from Portland, other footage that users claimed was recorded in late September 2025 did show protesters at an ICE facility in Portland dangling donuts on strings in front of agents (archived, archived, archived).
Snopes reached out to the presumed recorder of the footage to confirm the recording date and await a reply.
Anti-immigration enforcement protests had been ongoing at ICE's Portland facility since at least June 2025. At the end of September, U.S. President Donald Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced they would federalize 200 Oregon National Guardsmen to protect ICE and other federal agents in the state. Trump claimed days later that Portland was "burning to the ground," referring to ongoing protests.
In response, the State of Oregon sued Trump, Hegseth, Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem and their departments to stop the deployment.
On Oct. 4, 2025, a federal judge temporarily prohibited Trump and Hegseth's plan by granting a temporary restraining order. The lawsuit was ongoing at the time of this writing.
According to news releases by the Portland Police Bureau, the force made 12 arrests in connection with protests at the city's ICE facility between Oct. 1 and 9, 2025. The Multnomah County District Attorney's office, which covers Portland, said it had received 41 case referrals from "mass protests" from the start of January to the end of September 2025.