Texts between Joey Gibson, the leader of the far-right group Patriot Prayer, and Portland police Lt. Jeff Niiya have been criticized by officials in Oregon's largest city.
The mayor also said the texts "appear to cross several boundaries" and "raise questions about whether warrants are being enforced consistently and what information is being shared with individuals who may be subject to arrest."
The Portland Police Bureau said Friday that Niiya has been removed from the rapid response team during the investigation and that officials would hold a community listening event next week.
"It is imperative that we come together to hear people's concerns and ideas," Outlaw said in a statement.
The release of the texts come a week after the city introduced a resolution condemning white supremacy and alt-right hate groups.
Gibson's Patriot Prayer, based in the Portland suburb of Vancouver, Washington, says it is not a white nationalist organization and believes in gun rights and defending the Second Amendment. Its rallies, however, have drawn interest from white supremacists and white nationalists, and has led to police using pepper spray and flash-bang grenades to break up the brawls with counterprotesters.
The Portland police has been criticized for its use of force against counterprotesters.
Gregory McKelvey, an organizer with the activist group Portland's Resistance, was previously arrested by officers at a demonstration and said the department already gives the appearance of being against counterprotesters because they often face them when they line up, while putting their backs to the far-right groups.
"I don't think it would be beyond anybody's imagination that police might want to have a friendly correspondence with right-wing organizations to collect information. However, it crosses a line when you're tipping off those organizers to when new leftist organizations are being formed, to where leftist protesters are or how its members can avoid arrest," McKelvey said. "I've attended these rallies and I've never been tipped off."
In one text exchange from December 2017, Niiya asked Gibson about one of his members, Tusitala Toese, who had been involved in fights at rallies and had a warrant out for his arrest on a disorderly conduct charge.
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