Some members of the neo-nazi cult Patriot Front are finally facing charges for planning to storm an Idaho Pride event this June — but does their punishment fit the attempted crime?
Idaho police pulled over a U-Haul en route to a Pride in the Park event after an anonymous tipster witnessed the Patriot Front members loading up inside.
The caravan of 31 uniformed men armed with riot gear and smoke grenades inside were all zip-tied, unmasked, and arrested for conspiracy to riot.
Though the men were all originally charged and held on just over $300 bail, only six will now be facing the charges in court.
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Related: Patriot Front member’s mom tells him to find new home after Pride arrest
In addition to only affecting a fraction of the planned rioters, the crime they’re charged with is only a misdemeanor. The charge carries a maximum sentence of a fine and five years in prison.
While police intervening on behalf of the queer community is a nice surprise, the fact is that most of this violent militia gathered from across the country to target an LGBTQ+ event is being let off largely scot-free, with just a handful of them facing low-level sentencing.
The planned descent on the Idaho Pride event was just one of many attacks on queer events this past June; while legislators railed hard against queer people as “groomers“, right-wing Proud Boys tried to break up Drag Queen Storytime events across the country.
Related: White supremacists destroyed a Pride mural. The video they made got them arrested.
Two of the aforementioned Patriot Front members were also recently arrested for defacing a mural dedicated to Pride in Olympia, Washington; they were taken in after their own recording of the event was discovered by police.
In addition to these two, four other Patriot Front members are allegedly being investigated for participating in defacing the mural.
As light as the punishment may be for the group’s conspiracy against unarmed citizens in Idaho this June, it’s nice to know that some legal protections for queer people are still in place.
