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Proud Boys trolled for smoke bomb at empty Kmart in Portland

A group of Proud Boys members and left-wing Antifa demonstrators reportedly engaged in a conflict in Portland during the rally

Right-wing supremacists Proud Boys were badly trolled by liberal social media users after their latest political faux pas at an abandoned Kmart building in Portland. A group of Proud Boys had gathered for a rally in the parking lot of the closed supermarket on August 22, when one of them accidentally set off a smoke bomb. The mishap, which was considered hilarious by many, eventually led to the scattering of their own followers and other gatherers. The video of the incident quickly went viral on Twitter, sparking a laughter riot. Meanwhile, a clash has been reported between the Proud Boys and Antifa protesters in Portland.

Proud Boys, a far-right extremist group are notorious for participating in the Capitol riots in January 2021 and partakes in scattered political violence quite often. In February 2021, the group was listed as a terrorist entity by the Canadian government, alongside Al-Qaeda and ISIS. "Based on their actions, each group meets the legal threshold for listing as set out in the Criminal Code, which requires reasonable grounds to believe that an entity has knowingly participated in or facilitated a terrorist activity, or has knowingly acted on behalf of, at the direction of, or in association with such an entity," Canada's Public Safety Minister Bill Blair had stated at the time. 

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A group of Proud Boys members and left-wing Antifa demonstrators reportedly engaged in a conflict that spilled onto Northeast 122nd Avenue in Portland on Aug 22. According to Oregon Live, around 300 left-wing activists gathered at Tom McCall Waterfront Park on Aug 22, to protest the pre-planned rally by Proud Boys.

The two groups later confronted each other and things escalated from verbal altercation to physical fights. Bats, paintball guns, and even wooden spears were used during the clash. There are also reports of fireworks and tear gas being used. No reports of injury have been confirmed so far, though quite a few cars were damaged as per video footage. 

A similar clash took place in Portland exactly one year ago, where federal authorities had to intervene to stop the clashes. 

What did the Proud Boys do at KMart?

Proud Boys soon climbed up the Twitter trends for all the wrong reasons on Aug 22. "The Proud Boys held a rally today at a closed KMart parking lot in Portland and just to show us how bright they are, they threw a smoke bomb and gassed themselves," a user trolled on Twitter. 

Another user joked, "Uh oh, the Proud Boys have managed to overthrow an abandoned KMart & smokebomb themselves in the name of the master race. Tune in next week as they storm Bavarian Pretzel & huff paint thinner..."

"Good grief! It's a Kmart. Did they think it was a KKKmart?" a third user wrote.

In another viral photo, a few members of the neo-fascist gang can be seen hanging a banner from the abandoned Kmart, emblazoned with the words, "Free our political prisoners." They are believed to be referring to the Capitol rioters currently in custody. Many Twitter users ridiculed the group for the same, pointing out that political prisoners were not being held at an old grocery outlet.  

"Are their prisoners trapped inside the closed Kmart?" one person joked, while another wrote, "Never accuse the proud boys of understanding the assignment - they dropped a banner in the giant empty Kmart parking lot they’re already standing in, to an audience of only themselves? DIRECT ACTION"

"An abandoned Kmart parking lot is the perfect metaphor for the ideology on display here," wrote one user. 

Proud Boys member Tusitala 'Tiny' Toese said that they had relocated their rally from the originally planned location to avoid clashes with left-wing protesters. “We relocated the rally to avoid the altercation and the violence between us and the people on the left, but if they do show up here, we’re going to defend ourselves,” he said.