BLACK Lives Matter protesters marched on the home of the Ku Klux Klan Grandwizard, which led to a standoff with armed racists.

Demonstrators were pictured trooping through Zinc, Arkansas on Sunday.




The protest was organized by Bridge the Gap NWA and promoted by Ozarks Hate Watch, attracting BLM protesters from as far away as Branson and Springfield.

It came just days after a video of a man holding a Black Lives Matter sign in Harrison went viral.

Rob Bliss, 31, held the sign outside a supermarket in "America's Most Racist Town."

The KKK's website claims its national headquarters to be in Harrison and national director Thomas Robb uses at least three post office boxes there, The Springfield News Leader reported.

The protesters met at the Harrison police department before traveling in a caravan towards Zinc.

The vehicle reportedly passed signs that read "Turn back," according to photos shared on Ozarks Hate Watch's Facebook page.

Armed men were pictured standing in front of cars blocking a dirt road to the compound.

"Militia blocking the road to the Klan Compound. Too bad they didn't realize we had no intention on going to this compound," a picture caption on the group's Facebook page read.




Springfield protester Sonny Cropper said the drive was worthwhile.

"We came here open for dialogue," he told KY3.

"You know we want to be able to have conservations with people. And we want to show people that this movement can come to a place like this and keep it peaceful the whole time."

Photos captured locals carrying rifles and guarding their front porches – apparently protecting their homes.

There were no reports of violence although Ozarks Hate Watch claimed that a member of the "Press" decided to push a protester.

The group claim that several of the counter protesters are members of the League of South.

The League of the South is a designated hate group with a neo-Confederate ideology, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.

One protester claimed that "some of his family members" were in the KKK.

Branson protester Jason Walker told KY3: "I have a lot of animosity for the klan."

"My grandfather was a Grand Dragon and his son was a part of all this hate. It is not good."

The Ku Klux Klan is a white supremacist hate group that was formed in 1865 after the conclusion of the Civil War.

The Klan mobilized as a vigilante group to intimidate Southern black people during Reconstruction, according to the SPLC

"Although Black Americans have typically been the Klan’s primary target, it also has attacked Jews, immigrants, members of the LGBTQ community and, until recently, Catholics," the SPLC said.

The KKK saw a revival in the 1920s and in the 1960s to fight the civil rights movement.

There are between 5,000 and 8,000 members split among dozens of groups that use the Klan name, according to the SPLC.

Many people are calling for the hate group to be declared a terrorist organization.

"They have terrorized American citizens for the color of their skin and opposing views," reads one Change.org petition.

The petition was launched after the video of George Floyd's death in Minneapolis went viral.






 

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