Orlando’s Kia Center is facing heat over video footage posted to social media over the weekend of some idiot raising high a swastika flag at a Duel Arena Mixed Martial Arts event Saturday night.
Video shared by the Facebook page Combat Antisemitism and a post on Reddit shows a white man in a black T-shirt holding a large red flag with a black-on-white swastika symbol. Footage shows the man appears to have been later confronted by Kia Center staff and escorted out of the rambunctious crowd. It’s not immediately clear how long it took for staff to intervene.
“We do not condone or approve the messaging during Saturday’s event and the flag was removed once we saw it on display,” a spokesperson for Orlando Venues, the city department that oversees Kia Center operations, told Orlando Weekly.
The city is required to operate its venues in accordance with federal, state and local laws and regulations, the spokesperson added, “which do not allow us to make booking decisions based on the content or viewpoint of an event.”
It’s unclear how the flag got past security — and Orlando Venues did not directly respond to an inquiry about this or provide an explanation for how it could have happened.
The Kia Center, a city-owned sports and entertainment venue formerly known as the Amway Center, has a strict bag policy, allowing only small clutches sized at 4.5″ x 6.5″ x 1″ or less.
The Kia Center also prohibits “prop or toy weapons of any kind” and signs with “indecent or derogatory comments/images, political statements or commercial references,” as well as clothing or costumes “featuring offensive language, inappropriate material or that disrespect another culture.”
Florida Rep. Anna Eskamani, D-Orlando, criticized the antisemitic display in an Instagram post: “It’s disgusting, and another reminder of how prevalent extremism is in our society and the responsibility we all have to combat antisemitism, racism, white supremacy, and more.”
“A woman security guard immediately worked to rip down this symbol of hate — gratitude to her and others who booed,” added Eskamani, who is currently campaigning to become Orlando’s next mayor, come 2028. “We cannot normalize this. Ever.”
A woman in a gray suit jacket with dark hair is seen in video footage from Saturday night confronting the man. It’s not immediately clear from video footage — and there was no confirmation from the Kia Center — whether the woman was a staff member of the facility.
The flag-waving occurred during a Duel Arena combat sports event headlined by Mike Perry and Dillon Davis. The event also featured a match between Ben “King” Azoulay and Paul “Gypsy Crusader” Miller, a known far-right extremist associated with neo-Nazi imagery including swastikas.
In 2021, Miller — a Florida man who has called for a “race-based civil war” — was sentenced to 41 months prison time, followed by three years’ supervised release, for illegal possession of firearms. According to USA Today, Miller ultimately spent less than two years in lockup after being released in January 2023.
Although the identity of the man waving the swastika flag Saturday night is unclear, this isn’t the first time swastikas have been embraced by local neo-Nazis — or those who simply travel to Orlando to make a point.
Neo-Nazi demonstrators in recent years, some of whom have allied themselves with right-wing politicians like Donald Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, have waved Nazi flags outside Disney World. At least a couple of Nazi demonstrators were arrested in 2023 after hanging a swastika banner over I-4.
More recently, Orlando’s Knight Library — a college bar near the University of Central Florida — hosted Braden Peters, an underage, far-right influencer known as “Clavicular” who earlier this year performed Nazi salutes and chanted Nazi slogans at nightclubs in Miami.
That’s before he was arrested on an unrelated misdemeanor battery charge shortly after facing an investigation by state authorities over shooting a dead alligator in the Florida Everglades — a potential crime caught on video and shared widely on social media.
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