Two people in Oregon attacked a man at a bar while he was on a date with his wife — because he was wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat, police said.
Adebisi Okuneye, 23, and Leopold Hauser, 22, were arraigned Monday on third-degree assault charges after Portland police said they beat up victim Luke Lenzner early Saturday at Growler’s Taproom, The Oregonian reports.
Lenzner’s wife told police she encouraged her husband to wear the hat to show his support of President Trump to see what kind of reaction it would generate, according to a probable cause affidavit obtained by the newspaper.
Shortly after they arrived at the bar, the couple got a reaction.
The victim told police Okuneye “got in his face,” prompting him to push her, court documents show.
Hauser then punched Lenzner in the face, the documents show.
Okuneye also got in a punch — and then she and Hauser hopped in a van and drove off, Lenzner’s wife told police.
“I got mobbed by everybody that was in that bar outside,” Lenzner told KPTV. “People came from the inside out – just circled me and my wife … Surrounding me, like literally surrounding me, pushing me.”
Lenzner told the station he was sucker-punched as he tried to stop someone from hitting him and taking off his hat. But witnesses, including a bartender, said Lenzner was the instigator, citing security footage showing him pointing to his headgear as he left the bar.
“B—-, do you like my hat?” Lenzner told Okuneye, she told police, according to the probable cause affidavit.
Lenzner, who told KATU that Hauser broke his nose during the attack, denied ever throwing a punch but admitted taking a “fighting stance” as things got heated.
“The lady asked me, ‘Is that a MAGA hat?’” Lenzner told the station. “Then the next thing I know, she’s running around the corner attacking me, trying to take my hat off.”
Hauser admitted “mean mugging” Lenzner due to his hat during an interview with police, but claimed Lenzner was the aggressor as he tried to stop Okuneye and the man from assaulting each other as “arms were flying everywhere,” he told investigators.
The relationship between Hauser and Okuneye, who were taken into custody after being found together in a van nearby, is unclear, police said.
Lenzner’s wife, meanwhile, said she was proud of her husband for standing his ground at the bar after being verbally attacked over his hat.
“Of course, no one will stand with us and we don’t want a fight but they do,” Leah Lenzner wrote on Facebook.
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