we may be covering something different and even though law enforcement officials who go based on the tip from a community member, they re human beings. half the calls have been threatening their lives. yeah. and this is where we are. and you know, i m glad frank and nick brought up the point that social media is making it easier for these folks to be community without having to actually be together. the scary part is they go from exercising their free speech on social media platforms or maybe secretly meeting and then gathering in places in order to disrupt community. think about this. coeur d alene, idaho, i had no idea that they had a gay pride anything in idaho, let alone coeur d alene, and yet these guys that we re looking at in the back of a u-haul, getting set to disrupt a peaceful
so, really complicated stuff. it certainly isn t any time soon by our lawmakers. and so this is what it looks like without a solution. law enforcement, who picks up the phone when we call 911, this is what happens to them. this is about the death threats. coeur d alene police chief lee white spoke to reporters monday saying his department has fielded 149 calls in the aftermath of the arrests. 50% of the calls have been praise from the community, and the other 50% who are completely anonymous who want nothing more than to scream and yell at us and use some really choice words offer death threats against myself and other members of the police department merely for doing our jobs, white said. i don t like to say this, but the bad guys are winning, jonathan capeheart. their speech can t be hindered or tracked or reined in. it s leading to violence. this was a thwarted attack. as you said, the next one may not be thwarted.
a u-haul full of dudes. reporter: a swarm of extremists who idaho police say came to riot. 31 suspected white nationalists zip tied and arrested, blocks from a pride festival. these people want violence for us. and we don t want violence for anybody there was at least one smoke grenade, multiple shields reporter: coeur d alene police saturday discovered the crowd crammed in a u-haul after a 911 caller described seeing a little army at a local hotel with slogans like reclaim america on their shirts police charging all 31 with conspiracy to riot, noting they planned to swarm several parts of coeur d alene and carried paperwork similar to an operations plan that a police or military group would put together they travelled in from states across the country, allegedly united by white nationalism. they appear to be affiliated with the group patriot front. who is patriot front? patriot front is a
white supremacist group, anti-semitic, racist and homophobic to the core. reporter: experts say the group formed following 2017 s deadly unite the right rally in charlottesville, virginia tonight, police in idaho working with the fbi. why coeur d alene, idaho? white supremist movements has deep roots in idaho sometimes they ll choose small towns less security, easy to show up, less resistance reporter: amid pride month, events on edge, knowing one small town may have dodged a violent confrontation. still to come, how babies are helping researchers unlock the mysteries of obesity
group that had a compound about 15 miles north of coeur d alene. they even in the past, this goes back over 20 years ago, had even a couple parades in coeur d alene over the years. and with the help of the southern poverty law center, we were able to shut them down and completely obliterate any evidence of the arians in our area. and the importance of that is that the community pulled together and you would find in some business a slogan that said something like, idaho is too great for hate or idaho, the human rights state. we were trying to recognize at that time and still recognize that everyone has a right to be who they wish to be and we need to honor that and respect that.