A group of white supremacists marched through Boston over the weekend. Local leaders have denounced the action but members of the Black community say that falls short.
Boston Mayor Michelle Wu and others spoke out Saturday after dozens of apparent white supremacists marched through the city's streets.
The Boston Police Department said it learned around 12:30 p.m. that about 100 protesters had gathered on Congress Street near City Hall Plaza.
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Photos and videos posted to social media appeared to show throngs of protesters marching under the banner of the Patriot Front, characterized by the Anti-Defamation League and the Southern Poverty Law Center as a white supremacist group.
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"To the white supremacists who ran through downtown today: When we march, we don't hide our faces. Your hate is as cowardly as it is disgusting, and it goes against all that Boston stands for," Wu wrote on Twitter.
"I'm outraged and disgusted at the white supremacist group protesting today," added City Council President Ed Flynn in a tweet.
In a longer statement, Flynn referred to the Patriot Front's actions last month at a Pride event in Idaho, where 31 members of the hate group were arrested on charges of conspiracy to riot. Coeur d'Alene Police Chief Lee White said he and his department subsequently received death threats from anonymous callers.
"It is incumbent upon all of us to acknowledge, call out, and disavow the growing extremism and creeping hate in our country wherever we see it," Flynn wrote. "We must always stand with the Jewish community and our communities of color, educate our children about the horrors of the past so that history does not repeat itself, and make clear to all neo-Nazi and white supremacist groups that they are not welcome and will never represent our values."
Revolutionary Spaces, which operates the Old State House, slammed the group for protesting outside the historic site.
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"No place was more central to the birth of our most fundamental democratic ideals than the Old State House," Revolutionary Spaces President and CEO Nathaniel Sheidley said in a statement. "The presence in its shadow of those who would reject these ideals is an important reminder that democracy is fragile and the work of building a society rooted in liberty and justice for all is not finished."
City Councilor At-Large Ruthzee Louijeune said the protesters are "Cowards, all of them. No place for what they're selling in our city."
"This is disgusting. Hate groups have no place in our society," City Councilor Ricardo Arroyo said in a tweet. "Boston is for everyone, recognizes the gift that is our diversity, and will never cower or capitulate to hate."
