Why Kash Patel was in Portland, where agitators demonstrated outside hotel

A swarm of agitators descended on the Oregon hotel where FBI Director Kash Patel was believed to be staying while attending a friend’s funeral over the weekend.

Video circulating on social media shows the crowd shouting as they convened outside the Sentinel Hotel in downtown Portland on Saturday night.

The group arrived to protest what they described as the “weaponization” of the FBI under President Donald Trump’s administration, as well as Patel’s handling of documents stemming from convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, according to FOX 12 Oregon. 

It’s not clear at which hotel Patel stayed.

FBI Director Kash Patel speaks alongside Acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche during a news conference at the Robert F. Kennedy Department of Justice building on April 21, 2026, in Washington, D.C. (Anna Moneymaker)

Sources confirmed to Fox News Digital that Patel and his girlfriend Alexis Wilkins were in town over the weekend to attend a funeral for a close friend.

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A crowd of protesters reportedly used flight data to track FBI Director Kash Patel to the Sentinel Hotel in downtown Portland, Ore., on May 9, 2026. (Rhein Amacher)

Patel helped carry the friend’s casket during the service, sources said. The funeral was scheduled for Saturday and set to take place in Portland, according to an obituary shared with Fox News.

The protesters obtained Patel’s suspected travel itinerary using publicly available tracking data to follow a Department of Justice aircraft believed to be connected to the FBI director, FOX 12 reported.

A crowd of protesters shout outside the Sentinel Hotel in downtown Portland, Ore., on May 9, 2026, searching for FBI Director Kash Patel. (Rhein Amacher)

Demonstrators then reportedly narrowed down the hotel in which Patel was believed to be a guest by observing security measures throughout the downtown area.

“It wasn’t 100% confirmed but very likely he was at the Sentinel,” one protester told FOX 12. “We were there to protest the weaponization of Trump’s and Patel’s FBI to suppress our freedom of speech and freedom of press.”

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Fox News Digital reached out to the Department of Justice, Sentinel Hotel, Portland Police Bureau and FBI for comment.

Fox News Digital’s Kelley Kramer and Mitch Picasso contributed to this report.