Over 100 masked members of Patriot Front marched throughout Washington DC and rallied outside the Capitol with a police escort Saturday night before leaving in U-Haul vans.

The group was led by Thomas Rousseau, a self-avowed “fascist” who led the white nationalist group Vanguard America at the 2017 rally in Charlottesville before splitting off to form Patriot Front.

Antifascist groups called for a fast response to “defend DC” but very few counter-protesters arrived.

The group flies American flags distorted to include a fasces in the place of the 50 stars.

A handful of antifascist accounts posted “urgent” messages attempting to form a quick-reaction counter-protest, but only a few arrived.

Patriot Front marched through the National Mall, filming themselves as they passed locations like the WWII and Lincoln memorials with a roving police perimeter surrounding them.

They ultimately crossed the Arlington Memorial Bridge into Virginia.

After crossing into Virginia, about half of the “Patriot Front” members loaded into U-Haul moving trucks and were driven away.

The remaining 75 or so members stood in a shield formation behind a police line. Officers detoured traffic in the area & closed one side of the bridge.

It wasn’t until more than an hour later that another or one of the earlier U-Hauls came to pick up the remaining “Patriot Front” members who had been standing still surrounded by cops until then. Only about half of them fit, leaving 30-40 more standing on the side of the road.

Officers circled their vehicles around the remaining 30-40 Patriot Front members and let traffic begin again.

Totaling more than three hours after reaching their exit point, a U-Haul picked up the remaining members from the side of the road at Arlington National Cemetery.

This was Patriot Front’s second flash march in Washington DC in as many years.

In February 2020, the group also marched through Washington DC, where it was opposed by a small group of organized antifascists, who yelled at them across a police line.