A member of the Proud Boys wearing a t-shirt that reads "death to liberals" stands with other Proud Boys in Freedom Plaza during a protest on December 12, 2020 in Washington, DC.STEPHANIE KEITH/GETTY
An estimated 200 members of far-right group the Proud Boys attended Saturday's "Million MAGA March" in Washington D.C. to protest Donald Trump's loss in the 2020 election. Mixing with church groups who urged the faithful to participate in “Jericho Marches” and prayer rallies for the defeated president, the Proud Boys contingent wore combat fatigues and ballistic vests, carried helmets and flashed hand signals used by white nationalists.
To stir the volatile pot at the rally, Proud Boys leader Henry “Enrique” Tarrio Jr. posted photos on social media outside the executive mansion on Saturday and falsely claimed he had been officially invited to the White House.
“Last minute invite to an undisclosed location,” wrote Tarrio in a caption accompanying a photo of the main entrance to the White House. “Wow … I’m in awe. #Trump2020.” The photo was posted on Tarrio’s Parler account. In truth, he had been at the White House on a public tour.
(Daniel Politi. “Proud Boys Leader Suggested He Was Invited to White House. He Was on a Public Tour.” Slate. December 12, 2020.)
Of course, Proud Boys and their opponents – or other people – engaged in scuffles during the day. One clip during the march shows a man lying on the ground kicking and trying to defend himself as a number of people described in a tweet as Proud Boys dogpile on him and attack. Some can be seen throwing punches and beating down on the man.
At the end of the video, the man, who was being followed by others and called names, says: "This is what Proud Boys do."
Another video shared depicts a group of men labeled as Proud Boys in a tweet attempting to grab various LGBTQ and Black Lives Matter flags from counter-protesters and put them in garbage bags. One of the members from the group seemingly threatens the person filming him, saying: "You wanna go down the road and talk about it?"
More clips from the protest show packs of Proud Boys marching and chanting, "F*** Antifa." Other videos captured them putting on stickers randomly with the acronym "POYB [Proud of your boy]" on various public places.
(James Crowley. “Videos Show Scuffles Between Proud Boys and Others During 2nd Million MAGA March in D.C.” Newsweek. December 12, 2020.)
Enrique Tarrio
Who is Enrique Tarrio? Now age 36, he grew up in Little Havana in Miami. Tarrio identifies as an Afro-Cuban, and he owns an online Miami T-shirt business, known as the 1776 Shop – an outlet for right-wing merchandise.
In 2004, when he was 20 years old, Tarrio was convicted of theft. He was sentenced to three years of probation, community service, and ordered to pay restitution. In 2013, Tarrio was sentenced to 30 months (of which he spent 16) in federal prison for rebranding and reselling stolen medical devices.
Tarrio went on to become a fourth-degree member of the Proud Boys, a distinction reserved for those who get into a physical altercation, after punching someone who is believed to be an antifa member in the face in June 2018. That year Twitter removed Tarrio's account, amongst others related to the Proud Boys, citing how platform policy prohibited accounts related to violent extremist groups.
(Jane Coaston. “The Proud Boys explained. Vox. October 15, 2018.)
After Tarrio confronted and shouted expletives at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in Coral Gables in late 2018, the chairman of the Miami-Dade Republican Party apologized and Senator Rubio compared the disruptors to the "repudiation mobs Castro has long ago used in Cuba."
(David Smiley, Nora Gamez Torrez, and Kevin G. Hall. “Proud Boys try to assimilate into Florida GOP as Trump denies knowing extremist group." Miami Herald. October 2, 2020.)
Tarrio is also the Florida state director of the grassroots organization Latinos for Trump. He began a run for Congress for Florida's 27th district in 2020, but withdrew before the Republican Party primary. I
(Jessica Lipscomb. "Local Douchebag Announces 2020 Congressional Run.” Miami New Times. November 1, 2019.)
Enrique Tarrio is a close friend of Roger Stone. The Proud Boys have provided security for him. In October 2020, Stone told the Miami Herald he was suing the newspaper over an article detailing Facebook’s decision to kick him off its platform after spotting “inauthentic behavior” in sites boosting Stone and the Proud Boys.
Proud Boy History
Canadian writer Gavin McInnes is the founder of the Proud Boys. McInnes, who co-founded Vice before leaving the media company in 2008, is now famous for the outlandish antics and bigotry he performs as an online talk show host. He uses slurs like “nigger” and “faggot,” once described transgender people as “gender niggers” and “stupid lunatics” and maligned Muslims as “stupid” and inbred. He has been pictured wearing a neo-Nazi band’s T-shirt, has a tattoo associated with that band, is chummy with white supremacists, writes for white supremacist websites and likes to throw up Nazi salutes. He also regularly incites his Proud Boy followers to commit violence. “Fighting solves everything,” he has said.
(Christopher Mathias. “The Proud Boys, The GOP And ‘The Fascist Creep.’” HuffPost. October 17, 2018.)
McInnes left Vice Media in 2008. He then moved to what he calls the “New Right,” which he seemed to define as a combination of “Western chauvinism” and social and political libertarianism or perhaps libertinism (for example, he has written extensively on how women want to be “downright abused” and that he had to stop “playing nice” and begin “totally defiling the women I slept with” to get more women to have sex with him).
Jane Coaston, Senior Politics Reporter at Vox reported …
“His (McInnes) shift to the far right also included espousing anti-Muslim sentiments ('the Muslim world is filled with shoeless, toothless, inbred, hill-dwelling, rifle-toting, sodomy-prone men') and an embrace of anti-Semitism and anti-Israel sentiments, including a video he made for the far-right Canadian outlet Rebel Media initially called '10 Things I Hate about Jews' (or as he would later tweet, '10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT THE GODDAMN MOTHERFUCKING JEWS!'). He’s also argued that historically, perhaps Jews 'were ostracized for a good reason.'
“These videos, and some of his others, earned him a host of new fans, including David Duke (former grand wizard of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan). And though McInnes has attempted to push aside accusations of racism (which he argues doesn’t exist), he has written for both Vdare and American Renaissance, the latter the publication of the 'race-realist, white advocacy organization' New Century Foundation.
(Jane Coaston. “The Proud Boys explained. Vox. October 15, 2018.)
In 2018, under President Donald Trump, McInnes was invited to speak at the Metropolitan Republican Club. Scholars of fascism said this shows Republicans’ increasing ease with what is essentially the militant, fascist wing of their party.
In a since-deleted video (November 2018) – two days after the Guardian exclusively revealed that the FBI had categorized the Proud Boys as “an extremist group with ties to white nationalism – McInnes said, “I am officially disassociating myself from the Proud Boys. In all capacities, forever, I quit,” adding, “I’m told by my legal team and law enforcement that this gesture could help alleviate their sentencing,” referring to the Proud Boys who were facing legal problems.
(Jason Wilson. “Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes quits 'extremist' far-right group.” The Guardian. November 22, 2018.)
The Proud Boys were officially launched online in September 2016, on the website of Taki’s Magazine, a far-right publication for which white nationalist Richard Spencer once served as executive editor. The group has been described as an amalgamation of “a men’s rights organization, a fight club, and a hate group” – one that loves Donald Trump, hates Muslims (and Jews and trans people), but permits nonwhite membership.
(Jane Coaston. “The Proud Boys explained. Vox. October 15, 2018.)
In their magazine, members who win fights are celebrated with the slogan “They fucked around. They found out.” And in the age of concerns about “civility” and growing worries about political violence, the Proud Boys, who believe violence is “a really effective way to solve problems,” are more interested in fighting antifa.
As Jared Holt at Right Wing Watch said, “The Proud Boys have been the right wing’s enforcers in the streets against those who dissent against them.”
As we all know now, during a presidential debate in September, Trump was invited to condemn white supremacist, militia and far-right groups, and particularly the Proud Boys, by opponent Joe Biden. Trump responded by telling the Proud Boys to "stand back and stand by."
Enrique Tarrio responded to Trump's remarks with enthusiasm and pride “Standing by sir,” replied Tarrio on Parler, a social networking service launched in 2018 that is popular among conservatives.
The Continuing Threat
With their insane charges that Democrats stole the 2020 Presidential Election, Trump and his Republican supporters have unleashed right-wing terrorist groups on America. A new report on U.S. political violence found White supremacists and other right-wing extremists accounted for two-thirds of domestic terrorist attacks and plots so far in 2020,
The CSIS analysis largely aligns with warnings from federal law-enforcement agencies. The Department of Homeland Security said in a recent report that white supremacists are among the top deadly threats facing the U.S. Among “domestic violent extremists,” White supremacists carried out half of all deadly attacks – eight out of 16 – in 2018 and 2019, and those attacks resulted in 39 of the 48 deaths, that report said.
The report comes amid rising concern in Congress about domestic terrorism, and two weeks after authorities announced stopping an alleged plot involving private militia members to kidnap Michigan’s governor.
The Southern Poverty Law Center cites this Proud Boy description:
“Their disavowals of bigotry are belied by their actions: rank-and-file Proud Boys and leaders regularly spout white nationalist memes and maintain affiliations with known extremists. They are known for anti-Muslim and misogynistic rhetoric. Proud Boys have appeared alongside other hate groups at extremist gatherings like the "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville.
“Indeed, former Proud Boys member Jason Kessler helped to organize the event, which brought together Klansmen, antisemites, Southern racists, and militias. Kessler was only “expelled” from the group after the violence and near-universal condemnation of the Charlottesville rally-goers.”
And, just yesterday, December 12, 2020, in Washington D.C., Proud Boys protesters viciously attacked a couple ... beating on them as they tried to escape. Members of the far-right group burned a Black Lives Matter banner, and the vandalism and violence escalated as the night wore on.
In all, 23 people were arrested. Four people were taken to the hospital with stab wounds. Two cops were also injured and taken to the hospital. Blood is on the hands of Trump, his Republican minions, and sadly, the religious right, whose unguided Trump “prayer rallies” have turned into congregations of hateful subversives threatening American democracy.
Donald Trump’s Proud boys got the message loud and clear. “The fight has just begun.”
“I’m not exaggerating at all. I saw an interview that the influential Evangelical broadcaster Eric Metaxas gave to the populist activist Charlie Kirk this week, in which he boldly claimed that patriots must fight 'to the last drop of blood' to preserve Trump’s presidency, and that those who disagree are the same as Germans who stood by and did nothing to stop Hitler.
"In the same interview, Metaxas said it doesn’t matter what can or can’t be proven in court, he knows, and we know, that the election was stolen. When Kirk, who is very sympathetic to Metaxas, asked him what he thought of where the cases stood, Metaxas blithely claimed that he is 'thrilled' to know nothing about them."
– Rod Dreher, Senior Editor of the American Conservative
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