The FBI on Thursday arrested three suspected neo-Nazis who had planned to travel with firearms to Richmond, Va., to participate in a protest against gun control measures proposed by the state legislature’s newly-seated Democratic majority.

Federal officials took the three men into custody in connection with a probe into the white supremacist group The Base, charging them with several federal crimes in Maryland, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Maryland announced.

Officials said one of the three, Patrik Mathews, a former soldier in the Canadian army, entered the U.S. illegally. Mathews, a trained combat engineer, was discharged from the Canadian military after his white supremacist ties came to light, The New York Times reported.

The others charged include Brian Mark Lemley of Elkton, Md., and Newark, Del., and William Garfield Bilbrough IV of Denton, Md., according to the U.S. Attorney's office.

The complaint accuses Lemley and Mathews of transporting a firearm and ammunition with intent to commit a felony and it charges Lemley and Bilbrough with allegedly transporting and harboring aliens and conspiring to do so.