Hundreds of masked participants in the white nationalist organization Patriot Front marched through sections of Washington, D.C., on Saturday ahead of the city’s planned Independence Day celebrations later that evening.
The group announced on social media that it had deployed to the capital with about 400 members. Photographs taken by Reuters photographers showed large numbers of people dressed in Patriot Front attire aboard D.C. Metro trains.
Video footage circulated on various social media platforms and shared on Patriot Front’s Telegram channel captured the contingent moving toward drummers in the vicinity of the U.S. Capitol. In those clips, participants wore a distinctive uniform of khaki pants and caps, blue shirts, white face coverings and sunglasses.
Many marchers were seen carrying the group’s flag, Confederate flags and variations of the American flag, and at times they chanted "Reclaim America." Around midday, members boarded Metro trains and later disembarked at the New Carrollton station in Maryland, located in Washington’s northeast suburbs.
The Patriot Front is known for a uniformed appearance, face masks and organizing flash mob-style demonstrations. The organization formed in 2017 after the deadly "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, when it split from the Vanguard America white supremacist group that was at the center of that protest, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.
A manifesto posted on the Patriot Front website states, "Democracy has failed this once great nation," and calls for a "hard reset" to "return to the traditions and virtues of our forefathers," identifying those forefathers as European settlers.
Context and observations
Footage and eyewitness accounts show the group using public transit to move into and out of areas near the Capitol. The presence of hundreds of uniformed, masked demonstrators took place in the daytime hours on a national holiday when public events and security concerns are typically heightened.
Implications for public venues and transit
The group’s travel pattern included boarding Metro trains and exiting at New Carrollton, which placed large numbers of marchers into the Washington suburban transit network during midday hours. The activity occurred prior to evening Independence Day festivities planned for the city.
Reporting is based on social media postings by the group, video shared on social platforms, and visual documentation by Reuters photographers.