Every country has its ignorants. Though from what I can see, most Portuguese use the term Americano/Americana which is correct.
I don’t believe that most Portuguese would use the term North-American, as that makes no sense. The USA, Mexico, and Canada are all North-American so using that to refer to people from the United States is illogical nonsense. I have faith that the Portuguese people are smart enough on the whole to know that the United States is not the only country in North America. Like I said that would be like saying the demonym for Portuguese specifically is “European”, it would make no sense.
If you insist, you can call them North-Americans, but understand that you are also referring to the people of Mexico and the people of Canada. If you try to assign all of North America to the US, you will only be pissing them off (As you’ve experienced today), and it reflects poorly on you and your country.