Trump supporter accused of terrorizing Juneteenth celebration with MAGA stickers and racial slurs

An apparent supporter of former president Donald Trump is facing hate-crime charges for the second time in five years after he crashed a Juneteenth celebration in North Carolina.

Russell Thomas Langford, 41, allegedly drove through Cardinal Park in Moore County where hundreds had gathered on June 19, waving his middle finger and hurling racial slurs at the crowd, according to a report from the Fayetteville Observer.

After discharging a firearm nearby, Langford returned to the park and tossed Trump bumper stickers out his window as he drove through, according to police. He also backed into a gate post, causing damage, as he left.

The incident was first reported to police by Cardinal Park manager Mitchell Capel, who is Black. Capel's father founded the park and was the first Black person to serve on the local town council.

"I never thought in a million years that I'd still be fighting the same battles that my father and our ancestors fought," Capel told the newspaper, adding that he felt compelled to report the incident because it was a hate crime.

Langford is charged with ethnic intimidation, injury to personal property and littering.

A former Army Reserve major, Langford was previously arrested for threatening to kill two Muslims outside a mosque in 2016, in a case that made national headlines.

"According to a news release from the Department of Justice, on June 14, 2016, Langford followed a member of the Masjid Al Madina Mosque in Hoke County home and back to the mosque, threatened to kill two Muslim members on the mosque premises, and pointed a firearm at one of them," the Observer reports. "The Hoke County Sheriff's Office said deputies found 'several firearms, ammunition and additional weapons' in Langford's Chevy Tahoe parked outside the Masjid Mosque and witnesses reported the Tahoe was at the mosque when someone left packages of bacon outside."

Langford was sentenced to three months of eight months of home confinement and three years of probation after pleading guilty to obstruction by force or threat of any person exercising their religious beliefs.