Police arrest ‘Billboard Chris,’ Christian activist in EU capital for denouncing child transgender treatments

Belgian police arrested a prominent conservative activist and an Alliance Defending Freedom International employee in the European Union capital of Brussels on Thursday while they were displaying signs opposing transgender medical treatment for kids.

Chris Elston, also known as "Billboard Chris," and ADF International official Lois McLatchie Miller were detained by Brussels police while protesting gender-affirming care for children. They were released after several hours and not charged but were instructed to destroy their signs.

"Chris and I were arrested for stating a simple truth in public: no child is born in the wrong body. I called the police because we were being surrounded and felt threatened. But instead of addressing the aggression of the mob, the police arrested us—two people standing peacefully with signs, open to conversation," McLatchie Miller told Fox News Digital.

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"That this happened in the heart of Europe is deeply troubling. If speaking up for children is now grounds for arrest, then our freedom to speak the truth on any important issue is truly in danger," the ADF International employee added. 

Elston, well known for wearing billboards decrying transgender medical treatment for children out in public, stood out in the streets of the Belgian capital alongside McLatchie Miller. Both wore billboards, with the ADF employee's sign reading, "Children are never born in the wrong body" and Elston’s reading, "Children cannot consent to puberty blockers."

According to ADF International’s press release, the signs drew a crowd of onlookers, some of whom got aggressive. 

In a video recorded before their arrest, Elston showed Brussels police forming a ring around him and his colleague to keep onlookers from getting too close. 

"And we have quite a scene unfolding in Brussels, Belgium," Elston said in the recording. "We have been getting incredibly harassed for about the last hour. We’ve remained perfectly calm as always, having conversations about what is the greatest child abuse scandal in modern medicine history."

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Elston continued, saying they were the ones who called the police to protect them from harassment; however, he noted that the officers then ordered them to put away their signs.

"We called the police because a man was harassing and following Lois everywhere she went, trying to stop us from filming. The police have now arrived, and they’ve told me I have to put – and Lois – they’ve told us we have to put our signs away. I have refused. He said I was violating the law. I said, ‘What law?’ He can’t name it," he said.

Elston added that he was told he was going to be arrested, stating, "So I said, ‘That’s fine. Go ahead.’" 

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ADF International’s press release stated the two were eventually arrested and taken to two separate police stations, where they were "ordered to remove their clothes and searched." They were released several hours later.

In a statement, ADF International executive director Paul Coleman ripped Brussels’ government for the action.

"The Belgian authorities not only failed to uphold the fundamental right to speak freely, they turned the power of the state against those who were peacefully exercising their rights at the behest of a mob," he said. 

"This is the type of authoritarianism we challenge in other parts of the world, and it’s deeply disturbing to see it here in the very heart of Europe. While we are grateful our colleague has been safely released, we are deeply concerned by her treatment at the hands of the police in Brussels," Coleman added.

Fox News Digital reached out to the Belgian police for comment but did not immediately receive a response.