GETTYSBURG, Pa. – A Maryland Ku Klux Klan group is claiming that they are the primary victims of the ongoing government shutdown. Klan leaders say that the shutdown, which has resulted in the closure of national parks, is preventing them from holding a rally they had planned at Gettysburg this weekend, and will likely end the ensuing race war they hoped to instigate before it even begins.

“At first we were all for the shutdown,” said Richard Preston, leader of the Confederate White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, “because we obviously hate the guy in the White House. But now that we’re unable to express our First Amendment rights and hold a rally for white supremacy at the place where Lincoln gave an address about freedom and equality? That just makes the government look plain insensitive.”

The group, who identify as “white separatists” dedicated to throwing President Barack Obama out of office, were granted a permit to rally at the historic battleground on October 5, but all national parks are closed due to the shutdown.

Preston said that he was sad to see a delay in what he assumed would be an “unprecedented” race war and was disappointed to see that other locations they had considered—such as the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island and Yosemite National Park—had been ruled out for the same reason. “It’s just disappointing,” Preston noted, “because you spend time psyching yourself up to protest against – and hopefully later kill – blacks and Catholics, and all of a sudden there’s a Congress just unwilling to compromise and look past each other’s differences. It’s childish and pathetic.”

Preston also acknowledged that Klan members blamed House Republicans for the shutdown, saying it had put them in the unusual position of having to support President Obama: “Because of this whole thing we don’t know if up is down or left is right. We can still tell black from white though, obviously. That’s never going away.”