Police in Huntington Beach, California, arrested former Minnesota Vikings punter Chris Kluwe after he spoke out at a city council meeting to protest a library plaque that references President Donald Trump’s MAGA movement.
Kluwe’s arrest came Tuesday after his timed remarks to the all-Republican city council came to a close and he stepped toward the seven-member body to engage in what he called an act of “peaceful civil disobedience." Kluwe, an outspoken LGBTQ+ advocate and staunch Trump critic, was one of several residents at the meeting who took issue with the plaque they challenged as a “propaganda statement,” the New York Post reported.
A viral video shows Kluwe delivering his remarks before a group of law enforcement officers quickly stepped in to take down the eight-year Vikings veteran, who was then dragged out by his arms and legs.
“Unfortunately, it’s clear that this council doesn’t listen, so instead I’m gonna take my time to say what MAGA has stood for these past three weeks,” Kluwe told council members. “MAGA stands for trying to erase trans people from existence. MAGA stands for resegregation and racism. MAGA stands for censorship and book bans.”
Kluwe went on to call say: “MAGA is profoundly corrupt, unmistakably anti-democracy and is explicitly a Nazi movement. You may have replaced a swastika with a red hat, but that’s what it is.”
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As a crowd cheered behind him, Kluwe added that he would then “engage in the time-honored American tradition of peaceful civil disobedience.”
A council member can be heard yelling “Get out!” as Kluwe is arrested and carried out while some attendees cheered.
Kluwe, a Philadelphia native, “was cited and released after he spent four hours in custody on Tuesday,” according to the New York Post.
He later told the OC Register that his protest was directed more toward the general public than the city council.
“This was done not with the intention of changing the council’s mind, because I don’t think those minds can be changed,” Kluwe told the publication. “It was done so that people who are watching and people who will watch understand that this is important enough to get arrested for. That it’s important to stand up and speak truth to power and to do so in a way that other people can emulate.”
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