Miami’s own homegrown extremist, former Proud Boys national chairman Henry “Enrique” Tarrio, has been indicted on grounds he directed his group during the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol, another indication of the Republican Party’s terrifying tolerance of white supremacy and extremism. And Florida is once again at center stage.
The Proud Boys are a male-only extremist group that promotes far-right ideas and former President Donald Trump. This is the group that gained prominence during the presidential debates when Trump told them to “stand back and stand by.”
Tarrio wasn’t at the U.S. Capitol on the day of the attack and has said in the past that his group played no part in the violence. But let’s be real: He couldn’t go to Washington. He’d been ordered to stay out of the city because he was on bond for a criminal case involving burning a Black Lives Matter banner stolen from a historic African American church in Washington during a pro-Trump rally in December 2020. He later pleaded guilty to burning the banner and attempted possession of high-capacity magazines, offenses that earned him five months in jail.
