Bay Area LGBTQ community members and supporters Thursday condemned an incident last weekend at the San Lorenzo Library, where authorities say members of an extremist group disrupted a Drag Queen Story Hour event with homophobic and transphobic slurs.

“This hate has reached Alameda County, and we must push it back,” said Harris Mojadedi, a Union City LGBTQ advocate. “We have to work together in tandem. Now is that moment.”

The comments came as representatives of the Alameda County Library system vowed to press ahead with another Drag Queen Story Hour event next week elsewhere in the Bay Area — even as they reported being targeted with myriad additional anti-LGBTQ messages on social media in recent days. The San Lorenzo Library also received at least one phone call Wednesday from someone referring to Saturday’s event and vowing “we will be back,” which was reported to the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office, said Cindy Chadwick, county librarian.

“We have reason to believe this is not done. But we’re not going to back down to it,” Chadwick said. “We believe intolerance has no place at the library. And we have to show people who are intolerant and want to shut down others access to these programs that they won’t win.”

The comments came as LGBTQ advocates and the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office reported a spike in vitriol over social media since Saturday’s incident, while sheriff’s investigators continued poring over evidence in the case to determine whether any arrests should be made in the story hour’s disruption.

On Thursday, U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell met privately with several members of the local LGBTQ community, library staff, Fremont’s mayor and local law enforcement officers at the library to gauge their concerns after Saturday’s incident. The performer targeted Saturday was not in attendance, the congressman’s spokeswoman said.

Swalwell noted that the Proud Boys — who have been implicated in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the nation’s Capitol — and other far-right extremist groups have targeted Pride events across the nation this month. In Idaho, for example, more than 30 members of a different extremist group were arrested after authorities said they were planning to disrupt a Pride parade while equipped with riot gear.

“They’re now targeting people in every community,” Swalwell said. “And we must now guard against that.”

It all comes after at least five apparent members of the Proud Boys — many wearing shirts emblazoned with the image of rifles that are popular with the far-right extremist group — barged into the San Lorenzo Library on Saturday and disrupted a Drag Queen Story Hour event, threatening the performer with “very aggressive and violent” homophobic and transphobic slurs, according to Lt. Ray Kelly of the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office.

The men called the performer, Panda Dulce, a number of slurs, including “tranny,” “pedophile” and “it” and “totally freaked out all of the kids,” the performer wrote on Instagram after the incident, adding that “they got right in our faces. they jeered. they attempted to escalate to violence.”

Reading later finished

Dulce was briefly forced to flee safety to one of the library’s back rooms, authorities said. However, Dulce later returned afterward to finish the reading for several preschoolers and kindergartners.

Dulce declined an interview request Thursday.

On Thursday, sheriff’s Lt. Ray Kelly said investigators have identified the men who disrupted the event — all of whom live in the Bay Area, but not in Alameda County.

No arrests have been made, Kelly said, because investigators still were trying to determine whether what happened Saturday was a crime or protected free speech. He added that the Sheriff’s Officewas working with the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office, which will make the final determination on whether to file charges in the case.

“These cases, as simple as it sounds, when you get down to some of these constitutional issues, you have to figure out where does the free speech stop and where does the criminal behavior begin,” Kelly said.

California hate crime laws pertain only to the punishment that a judge can render upon sentencing, said Eugene Volokh, a professor of First Amendment rights at the UCLA School of Law. Authorities first must decide whether Saturday’s event constituted a crime — for instance, disrupting a lawful meeting — before prosecutors could consider filing a sentence enhancement that classifies the case as a hate crime.

Still, simply spewing vulgar language — even if it demeans another person’s sexual identity — isn’t in itself a crime, he said.

One such law that detectives are reviewing is whether the men annoyed or harassed children, which is a misdemeanor, Kelly said.

The San Lorenzo Library on Thursday announced that it plans to host Pride events at least once a month for the next year, after Alameda County Supervisor Dave Brown contacted the library system and offered to pay for the events using his district office’s funds.

“We won’t be intimidated by anyone,” Brown said in a phone call to Bay Area News Group after the event.

Still, members of the East Bay LGBTQ community said they shuddered at the thought of the men involved in Saturday’s incident not being charged. They noted a spike in anti-LGBTQ rhetoric on social media in the days since the story hour was disrupted.

“My hope is that this instance of hate is called for what it is: a hate crime,” said Mojadedi, the Union City LGBTQ advocate. “The intention was to come and destruct and to spread fear. This was targeted at an LGBTQ+ safe space, in a welcoming and inclusive place.”