{"id":5817,"date":"2025-02-06T12:20:19","date_gmt":"2025-02-06T12:20:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/the-proud-boys-vandalized-a-blm-sign-and-now-a-church-owns-their-name\/"},"modified":"2025-02-06T12:20:19","modified_gmt":"2025-02-06T12:20:19","slug":"the-proud-boys-vandalized-a-blm-sign-and-now-a-church-owns-their-name","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/the-proud-boys-vandalized-a-blm-sign-and-now-a-church-owns-their-name\/","title":{"rendered":"The Proud Boys vandalized a BLM sign, and now a church owns their name"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>Far-right <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/politics\/2024-election\/proud-boys-claim-polling-places-trump-ups-violent-rhetoric-election-fr-rcna178386\" target=\"_blank\">extremist group the Proud Boys<\/a> shot to infamy when President Donald Trump told them to &ldquo;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/tech\/tech-news\/proud-boys-celebrate-after-trump-s-debate-call-out-n1241512\" target=\"_blank\">stand back and stand by<\/a>&rdquo; during a 2020 presidential debate. Now they may need to stand by for a new name.<\/p>\n<p>Less than a month before the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, a crowd of hundreds of Trump supporters, including some members of the Proud Boys, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/dc-md-va\/2025\/02\/04\/dc-black-church-proud-boys-name-trademark-rights\/\" target=\"_blank\">gave Washington, D.C., a preview<\/a> of what Trump&rsquo;s &ldquo;big lie&rdquo; would unleash. During a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2020\/12\/12\/945825924\/trump-supporters-arrive-in-washington-once-again-for-a-million-maga-march\" target=\"_blank\">violent demonstration on Dec. 12, 2020,<\/a> members of the Proud Boys vandalized a &ldquo;Black Lives Matter&rdquo; flag belonging to Metropolitan AME Church, a historically Black church. Members of the group <a href=\"https:\/\/www.splcenter.org\/resources\/hate-watch\/proud-boys-destroy-churches-black-lives-matter-signs-during-protest-washington-dc\/\" target=\"_blank\">stole the flag and stomped on it<\/a> while chanting, &ldquo;Whose streets? Our streets.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>The group will have a harder time explaining exactly whose streets they are, because the church now <a href=\"https:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/news\/politics\/2025\/02\/04\/proud-boys-loses-trademark-to-episcopal-church\/78223251007\/\" target=\"_blank\">owns the rights to the Proud Boys&rsquo; name<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>In 2023, Metropolitan AME won a $2.8 million default judgment against the group for its destruction of its sign. After the Proud Boys <a href=\"https:\/\/www.paulweiss.com\/practices\/pro-bono\/news\/paul-weiss-files-new-lawsuit-to-enforce-28-million-judgment-against-proud-boys?id=52131\" target=\"_blank\">failed to pay<\/a>the church pivoted its focus to the group&rsquo;s trademark. Per a ruling this week from Superior Court Judge Tanya M.&nbsp;Jones Bosier, if the Proud Boys want to sell anything bearing the group&rsquo;s name or symbols, they need to get approval from the church.<\/p>\n<p>The Proud Boys&rsquo; involvement in the Jan. 6 attack resulted in former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio&rsquo;s getting sentenced to 22 years for seditious conspiracy. Tarrio was among those to whom Trump <a href=\"https:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/presidential-actions\/2025\/01\/granting-pardons-and-commutation-of-sentences-for-certain-offenses-relating-to-the-events-at-or-near-the-united-states-capitol-on-january-6-2021\/\" target=\"_blank\">issued sweeping pardons<\/a> upon taking office.<\/p>\n<p>Tarrio, 42,&#8221;https:\/\/x.com\/NobleOne\/status\/1886782313742135707&#8243; target=&#8221;_blank&#8221;&gt;called for the judge to be impeached and urged an investigation into the judge&rsquo;s decision. &ldquo;I wipe my a&#8211; with the judge&rsquo;s decision,&rdquo; he said of the ruling, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/dc-md-va\/2025\/02\/04\/dc-black-church-proud-boys-name-trademark-rights\/\" target=\"_blank\">The Washington Post<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Ideally, he won&rsquo;t try getting that on a shirt.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div data-activity-map=\"expanded-byline-article-bottom\">\n<p><span data-testid=\"byline-thumbnail\"><\/span><span data-testid=\"byline-name\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.msnbc.com\/author\/zahara-hill-ncpn1307009\">Zahara Hill<\/a><\/span><span><a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/zaharahill\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span><\/span><\/a><a href=\"http:\/\/www.msnbc.com\/mailto:zahara.hill@nbcuni.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span><\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Zahara Hill is a platforms editor for BLN Digital. She previously worked as a front page editor for HuffPost.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.msnbc.com\/the-reidout\/reidout-blog\/metropolitan-ame-church-proud-boys-trademarks-rcna190864\" class=\"button purchase\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Far-right extremist group the Proud Boys shot to infamy when President Donald Trump told them to &ldquo;stand back and stand by&rdquo; during a 2020 presidential debate. Now they may need to stand by for a new name. Less than a month before the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, a crowd of hundreds of Trump [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5818,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5817","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trump"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5817"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5817\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}