Years before Portland became infamous for months of frequently violent Black Lives Matter protests, the city was known as “Little Beirut” for its raucous anti-war and pro-environmental protests, especially during Republican presidential administrations.
Now, one of the few recognizable figures from that time is returning to Portland with a remarkable story that his 2004 book on the radical Earth Liberation Front was actually the inadvertent result of a failed FBI counterintelligence operation to bring the organization down. Craig Rosebraugh will appear at the downtown Powell’s Books store on Aug. 27 to discuss the recently-released second edition of his 2004 book, “Burning Rage of a Dying Planet: The FBI vs. the Earth Liberation Front.”
“Since the book was first released, I have obtained my 22,000-page FBI file. There was a lot going on that I did not know at the time,” Rosebraugh, 52, told the Portland Tribune.
Rail thin with a shaved head and wire-rimmed glasses, Rosebraugh first emerged as a leading local animal rights protester in the mid-1990s. He was arrested many times during protests for numerous anti-capitalist, environmental, social justice, and anti-war causes, including once where a Portland police officer broke his arm. Rosebraugh’s in-your-face activism was polarizing even within the city’s liberal community. Willamette Week questioned whether he was going too far in a Dec. 3, 1997, cover story headlined, “Saving the World One Cat at a Time.”
That was published shortly after Rosebraugh became the national spokesperson for ELF, a secretive, militant environmental organization that broke laws well beyond civil disobedience in pursuit of its stated goals of protecting the planet. From 1997 to 2003, it took credit for an escalating series of property attacks resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars of damages to animal breeders, genetically-engineered food research labs, timber companies, luxury home builders, ski resort operators, and others. Rosebraugh received and released anonymous communiques from the organization justifying its actions, which law enforcement authorities quickly labeled acts of eco-terrorism.
They also suspected Rosebraugh was more involved with ELF than he said. Because of that, he was constantly surveilled by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, had his home and office repeatedly raided, was hauled before eight grand juries as an uncooperative witness, and was compelled to testify before a congressional committee hearing on terrorism, where he refused to answer their questions.
But Rosebraugh spoke to the press, granting many interviews where he offered his interpretation of ELF’s ideology, based on the communiques and his understanding of the group’s philosophy. As a result, the New York Times labeled him “The Face of Eco-Terrorism” in a Dec. 20, 1998, magazine cover story. He was treated much the same by 60 Minutes, 20/20, The Today Show, PBS Frontline, ABC/CBS/NBC Evening News, Rolling Stone, the Los Angeles Times, USA Today, Newsweek, Time, and The Oregonian.
But, as revealed in his book, Rosebraugh was privately growing increasingly uneasy with ELF’s escalating destructive actions. Although they were designed to prevent anyone from being hurt, many were clearly violent and intentionally intimidating, and the communiques showed no sign that their targets should learn a lesson and change their ways. Rosebraugh officially stepped down as ELF’s spokesperson on Sept. 6, 2001, five days before the 9/11 attacks that increased pressure on any person and organization suspected of being a terrorist in America. As documented in the new prologue, that did not reduce the U.S. government’s attention on him, however.
Instead, in 2002, Rosebraugh was approached by an FBI operative and agent claiming to be literary insiders wanting to publish his story. The first claimed to be a “book packager,” which he described as someone who connects people with interesting personal stories to publishers. No such position actually exists in the publishing world. Nevertheless, they talked Rosebraugh into being paid to write the first draft of his book, then tried to pressure him into rewriting it with additional inside information on the members of ELF that he did not actually know.
After becoming alarmed by the new request, Rosebraugh ended his relationship with the two and refunded their money. He then regained the rights to his manuscript and got it published, not understanding the role the FBI played in its creation. His first book release event was at Powell’s Books on Southeast Hawthorne.
By then Rosebraugh had stopped organizing and participating in public demonstrations. He believes the last one he participated in was a 2003 march to the home of then-Mayor Vera Katz to protest what he felt was the lack of accountability for the Portland Police Bureau’s ongoing targeting of the Black community.
“It’s a frustrating realization to arrive at for sure. One wants to believe they can make a difference, and we are specifically told how to make this difference if we see a problem in society. But the ones telling us how to make this difference are also typically the ones who either have a vested interest in ensuring things don’t significantly change, or they’ve drunk the Kool-Aid and have been convinced this is the only way that change can occur,” he said.
Even the first edition of Rosebraugh’s book is a vital read for anyone interested in the city’s protest history, especially those who lived here during the first Gulf War and the conflicts over logging old growth forests known as the Timber Wars. It opens with a quick tour through the punk scene in those days, where Rosebraugh said he was first radicalized by the overtly political bands that played local clubs. The book also includes his chronology of the ever-changing radical groups in the city, including the Liberation Collective he co-founded that was intended to be a kind of umbrella organization. All are gone now, replaced by others inspired by newer, though related, causes.
Rosebraugh left Portland in 2008 to attend law school at Arizona State University. He is now an attorney and partner in Grit Production, a media company, living in California with a full head of hair. Much of Rosebraugh’s work still focuses on the environmental and social justice causes he first championed, including documentaries covering civil rights and climate change.
“We didn’t call it climate change back then, but it’s more clear now that it is happening, getting worse, and not enough is being done,” Rosebraugh told the Portland Tribune.
In fact, the hottest years on record have all occurred during the past decade, and 2023 was the hottest since 1850. Wildfires are becoming more common in the greater Portland region, and governments are now giving air conditioners to lower income households and repeatedly opening emergency cooling shelters in the summers.
The second edition of the book also includes a new epilogue about how the FBI was eventually able to identify some of those involved in ELF’s attacks, turn them into informants, and bring down the organization.
“Whatever your view of the Earth Liberation Front and its tactics, one thing is certain, the environment is far worse off today than decades ago when the ELF existed. Whether it’s climate change and its many impacts, species extinction, deforestation, plastic pollution, food and water insecurity, air pollution, or soil degradation, life on Earth is increasingly threatened. And as these issues are growing in severity, it is clear that whatever we have done up to this point, and whatever we are doing now to address these problems, is not working,” Rosebraugh writes.
Asked what he considers the greatest accomplishment of his Portland protest days, Rosebraugh said, “Likely being a source of inspiration to others – showing others that it is permissible to stand up for what you believe in, to take action for the greater good and to make the world a better place, and to refuse to give in or give up no matter the consequences when you are fighting for justice.”
His greatest regret is more personal.
“During my time speaking out on behalf of the Earth Liberation Front, I became increasingly reclusive and distrustful of others – largely based on what I had gone through. The FBI/ATF raids at gunpoint on my home and offices, the car chases by the Feds through Portland, the increasing serious death threats I was receiving during that time period, the government’s fairly obvious attempts to infiltrate by having undercover agents getting close to me all worked together to create a state of paranoia and distrust in me toward others. As a result, I believe I likely shut down to others, came off as unfriendly or unsociable at times and likely pushed people away rather than embrace their support or cooperation.”
More information about Rosebraugh and his work is available at craigrosebraugh.com. He will appear at 7 p.m. on Aug. 27 at Powell’s Books, 1005 W. Burnside, Portland.
Local News
Comments / 0