Before Torchy’s incident, group in Nazi gear escorted out of Fort Worth gun show
A group dressed in Nazi gear were escorted out of the Original Fort Worth Gun Show on Saturday, according to Fort Worth police.
The next day, a group of Nazi-clad people returned to the gun show at Will Rogers Memorial Center. One was cited by police for disorderly conduct. It was the same afternoon that people dressed in similar Nazi paraphernalia were seen at the Fort Worth Botanic Garden and a Torchy’s Tacos in the medical district.
Sgt. Jason Spencer said that police cannot say for certain whether all the Neo Nazis were the same group, including some who also protested at a Dallas church Sunday. But based on the timeline and locations, Spencer said, police believe the people escorted out of the gun show Saturday were the same swastika-wearing people who ate at Torchy’s off West Rosedale Road on Sunday afternoon. Video from the restaurant went viral on TikTok.
Andra Bennet, a spokesperson for city of Fort Worth events, said in an email that the group was present at the Will Rogers Memorial Center on both Friday and Saturday. They were wearing swastikas, handing out flyers and “impacting ingress and egress” to the exhibit hall, Bennet said.
“A few of these individuals were in the public concourse of the building on Saturday, and were asked to move outside when their activity created chaos and congestion around the event entrance into the exhibit hall,” Bennet wrote. She added that there were only two or three people in the group on Saturday.
On Sunday, about 10 similarly dressed people returned to the Will Rogers Memorial Center, Bennet said, but did not enter the building. Police monitored their activity, according to Bennet, because gun show attendees had complained about their “disrespectful behavior.”
Spencer, the police sergeant, said that on Sunday police charged one member of the group with disorderly conduct. The police report for that citation was not immediately available.
>> BREAKING NEWS <<
Today's other top stories in Fort Worth:
• ‘Unacceptable:’ Deadly shooting on Fort Worth ISD campus leaves parents stunned, angry
• Driver in crash that killed pregnant woman in Fort Worth is on the run, police say
• Fort Worth ISD faces fed investigation over gender equity in athletics, girls rugby
Get free alerts when news breaks.
Spencer said that there have been “a very small handful of incidents” involving similar flyering in the last few months, although it’s mostly been small numbers of flyers left on vehicles.
The past weekend’s incidents were more blatant.
In addition to the disturbances at the gun show, a group in Nazi gear protested outside a Dallas church on Sunday morning.
A similar group also showed up at the Fort Worth Botanic Garden on Sunday afternoon and left an estimated 250 flyers on vehicles in the parking lot, according to garden President Patrick Newman. The garden’s staff removed the flyers after visitors told them what had happened, and there do not appear to have been any interactions between the group and garden visitors or staff.
Newman denounced the group and said the Botanic Garden is “a garden for all.”
The group seen at Torchy’s in the Medical District were wearing clear Nazi gear including a swastika armband and a death’s head sweatshirt. Videos taken by Jessica Gregorio and posted on TikTok quickly went viral. Gregorio said she was disappointed that the Torchy’s served the group and upset that no other diners said anything to them.
After the Star-Telegram posted an article about the incident Tuesday morning, Torchy’s Tacos released a statement denouncing the group.
Spencer said that the police were not called for either the garden incident or the Torchy’s incident. He said, too, that police walk a fine line when dealing with this type of situation, because they also have to take into account the group’s freedom of speech.
But, he said, police will respond when called into such incidents, and they will cite groups or individuals who are creating a disturbance. He noted that groups or individuals can be asked to leave private property at any time.
In addition to the Neo Nazi incidents, Fort Worth was visited by a well-known white supremacist and anti-Semite on Friday. The Texas Tribune reported that Nick Fuentes went the Fort Worth-area headquarters of Pale Horse Strategies, which is a conservative consulting firm headed by former state Rep. Jonathan Stickland.
Some lawmakers, including House Speaker Dade Phelan, have denounced Stickland and demanded that other legislators return funding they received from him or his Defend Texas Liberty PAC. The Texas Tribune reporting, and the demands to return funding, have kicked off fierce arguments among Texas Republicans.
