White Supremacists Deface Pulse Mural at Orlando LGBTQ+ Center

A mural honoring the 49 lives lost at the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting -- where Latinx LGBTQ+ people were targeted by a mass shooter -- was defaced last week with a sticker from a white nationalist group.

The sticker was removed Thursday from a wall of The Center, Orlando's LGBTQ+ aid organization; it reportedly covered the center of a mural honoring the Pulse victims and emblazoned with #OrlandoStrong.

The racist group referenced by the sticker is known as Patriot Front, which arose following the violent 2017 white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va., according to Orlando Weekly. The Southern Poverty Law Center considers the Patriot Front a hate group. Patriot Front's mission is remaking America as solely a white Christian heterosexual nation.

The Weekly reports Patriot Front has recently been active in central Florida, distributing racist propaganda in various locales.

Around the same time the sticker was placed on the mural, The Center reported its phone lines had been cut.

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