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3 men seen putting up white supremacist stickers in Lincoln Park
A confrontation was captured on cellphone video in Lincoln Park, as angry residents chased a group of men putting up stickers for the white supremacist group "Patriot Front."
CHICAGO - A confrontation was captured on cellphone video in Lincoln Park, as angry residents chased a group of men putting up stickers for the white supremacist group "Patriot Front."
That same extremist group has been causing trouble recently in other cities as well.
"So, this is the first sticker I saw on this pole where it says ‘No Turn on Red,’" said Andy Krupp of Lincoln Park, pointing to a street sign at the corner of Clark and Fullerton.
Krupp and his wife were enjoying a stroll through Lincoln Park Saturday afternoon when they noticed a group of three young white men slapping stickers on signs and light poles.
"I walked towards the stickers and saw that they were part of a well-known racist group," Krupp said. "My reaction is, I was outraged."
So angry in fact that Krupp pulled out his cellphone and began to follow the men while giving them some advice.
"Get out of here you Nazis," Krupp is heard yelling at the men in the video. "Get out of here. Get the (bleep) out of Chicago, Nazis! Patriot Front is not welcome!"
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Patriot Front is a white supremacist group founded in 2018 that recently made headlines when 31 members were arrested in Idaho and charged with planning to violently disrupt a gay Pride celebration.
"Patriot Front at its base level is a white supremacist organization that believes America was gifted to them and them alone," said Morgan Moon, an investigator for the Anti-Defamation League who tracks the Patriot Front.
Moon said even though they only number several hundred nationally, the extremist group requires members to pass out propaganda to make themselves look bigger.
"Part of their strategy is to intimidate or show their outsized influence. They want to seem bigger than what they really are. This is both for intimidation but also for recruitment purposes," Moon said.
But Krupp was hardly intimidated. He said he decided to follow the group and yell at the men because he needed to stand up to hate.
"I was about as angry as a human being could be. How could I as a Jew living in Chicago turn a blind eye to this kind of hatred? I think everybody needs to stand up to hatred when they see it," Krupp said.
Krupp followed the men for several minutes as they zig-zagged down residential blocks. The chase ended when another man jumped out of his car and joined in.
"I followed them for a number of blocks, yelling at them, ‘Get out of our neighborhood, no Nazis are welcome in our neighborhood. This is Lincoln Park, we have no tolerance for hate or Nazis. Chicago has no tolerance for hate or Nazis.’ And they ran away, we ran them out," Krupp said.
Within minutes, word of the Patriot Front sighting had spread on social media, and Lincoln Park residents organized to remove all the stickers.
Remarkably, Krupp says he hopes to one day talk to those he chased.
"If they want to sit down and express to me why they're so angry, why is there such hate, I'd be more than happy to talk to them. We can all be redeemed. We all have to live together," Krupp said.
There are also reports on social media of Patriot Front propaganda popping up in other Chicago neighborhoods over the weekend, including Logan Square and on Michigan Avenue near Lake Street.