COEUR D'ALENE, Idaho — Authorities in Idaho on Saturday arrested 31 people affiliated with a white supremacist group near a pride event after they were discovered in the back of a U-Haul truck wearing riot gear.
The group, called Patriot Front, arrived in Coeur d’Alene and was pulled over by police for a traffic stop, the Idaho Statesman reported.
The men were standing inside the truck wearing khakis, navy blue shirts and beige hats with white balaclavas covering their faces, according to The Associated Press.
“It is clear to us based on the gear that the individuals had with them, the stuff they had in their possession, the U-Haul with them along with paperwork that was seized from them, that they came to riot downtown,” Coeur d’Alene Police Chief Lee White said at a news conference.
All 31 men were charged with conspiracy to riot, which is a misdemeanor, White said. They are expected to be arraigned on Monday, the chief added. Among those arrested was Tom Rousseau, the national leader of the Patriot Front, the Statesman reported.
It is unclear whether the men arrested have attorneys.
Only one of the men was from Idaho, according to the newspaper. The others were from Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Oregon, South Dakota, Texas, Virginia, Washington and Wyoming.
The mass arrest took place near City Park where the North Idaho Pride Alliance was holding its annual Pride in the Park event, according to the Coeur d’Alene Press.
White told reporters that the group was equipped with “shields, shin guards and other riot gear with them,” along with papers he described as “similar to an operations plan that a police or military group would put together for an event.”
Police learned about the U-Haul from a tip, the AP reported. The person told police that “it looked like a little army was loading up into the vehicle” in the parking lot of a hotel, White told reporters.
Police pulled over the vehicle after spotting it soon after receiving the tip.
“I don’t think this would have been as successful had we not had one extremely astute citizen who saw something that looked very concerning to them and reported it to us,” White said.
The Southern Poverty Law Center describes Patriot Front as a “white nationalist hate group” that formed after the deadly “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017.
The group’s manifesto calls for the formation of a white ethnostate in the United States, the Southern Poverty Law Center said.
White said the men arrested are “definitely not” associated with the loosely affiliated group of anti-fascist activists known as Antifa.
“This group is associated with Patriot Front,” White told the Press.
“It appears these people did not come here to engage in peaceful events,” Kootenai County Sheriff Bob Norris told the newspaper.