Flyer advertising KKK rally in Alton is a hoax, police and Klan leader say

A flyer advertising a Ku Klux Klan rally in Alton is a hoax, according to Alton police and the national leader of the Loyal White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan.

A flyer circulating mostly online announced a Friday rally at Fast Eddie’s Fried Chicken in Alton. The restaurant is in a neighborhood with many black residents, according to the Alton Telegraph. The flyer includes an image of President Donald Trump with the words “We are America.”

But Alton Police Chief Jake Simmons said the flyer is a hoax. He said the business owner would not support such an event and that such hoax flyers are popping up in many communities nationwide. A similar flyer caused a large stir in Champaign recently, he said.

“What somebody did, they had way too much time on their hands in their mom’s basement,” Simmons told Fox 2. He told RiverBender that the restaurant owner, Cathy Sholar, called the police as soon as she heard about the flyers and was in tears.

The phone number on the flyer goes to a hotline for the Loyal White Knights, a national white supremacist and anti-Semitic organization modeled after the original KKK and headquartered in North Carolina. Their national leader, Chris Barker, of Pelham, N.C., told the Alton Telegraph his organization has planned no such rally in Alton.

“If we are going to send our members out, they get a permit,” he said. “I hate it when people use our name like that.”

Chief Simmons said his officers would patrol the area just in case.

This story was originally published September 21, 2017 at 11:21 PM with the headline "Flyer advertising KKK rally in Alton is a hoax, police and Klan leader say."