THE YEAR IN HATE AND EXTREMISM - AFTER HALF A CENTURY, THE RADICAL RIGHT ENTERS THE MAINSTREAM - Southern Poverty Law Center
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PUBLISHED BY SPRING 2017 // ISSUE 162
THE SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER
THE YEAR IN
HATE AND
EXTREMISM
AFTER HALF A CENTURY, THE RADICAL
RIGHT ENTERS THE MAINSTREAM
PLUS HATE GROUP MAP & LISTING INSIDE
EDITORIAL
Donald Trump, ‘Fake News’ and
the Rise of White Nationalism
BY MARK POTOK
Last December, an armed, 28-year-old North Carolina that 80% of white murder victims in America are killed
man stormed into a Washington, D.C., pizza parlor called by black people. He described Mexican immigrants as
Comet Ping-Pong, bent on investigating rapists and drug dealers, said Muslims should be banned
the stories he’d heard about it being part of from the country, and seemed to encourage violence by
a child sex-slavery ring closely tied to the his supporters against black protesters.
presidential campaign of Hillary Clinton. During the campaign, Trump only weakly disavowed
Before it was over, Edgar Welch had fired a the white supremacists who were electrified by his
shot that harmed no one, but terrified res- candidacy. And once elected, he selected appointees
taurant customers and staff alike. known for their hardline anti-LGBT, anti-Muslim and
“The intel on this wasn’t 100%,” Welch anti-immigrant ideas. Chief among them was Breitbart
sheepishly conceded later. News executive Stephen Bannon, a partisan of right-
That may have been the understatement of the year. wing populism who many observers see as having pro-
The “intel” on what came to be called “Pizzagate” moted white nationalism.
was utterly and completely false. It soon transpired After half a century of being pushed to the very mar-
that Welch had been taken in by a “documentary” he gins of American society, the radical right has entered
watched on the Infowars site of Alex Jones, America’s the political mainstream in a way not even imagined
most unhinged conspiracist and a man who sees the fed- since the 1968 run for the presidency by segregation-
eral government as being the author of almost every ter- ist George Wallace.
rorist attack since 1995. In this issue, we take a look at the state of the radi-
But the most remarkable thing about the whole cal right in America in the aftermath of one of the most
bizarre episode wasn’t that significant numbers of remarkable presidential races in history. According to
Americans are so taken in by Jones’ “fake news” that a the Southern Poverty Law Center’s latest count, the
man like Welch actually begins shooting. What’s gen- number of hate groups in the U.S. remained at near-his-
uinely stunning is that then-presidential candidate toric levels, increasing from 892 in 2015 to 917 last year.
Donald Trump had in late 2015 gone on Jones’ radio That approaches the all-time high in some 30 years of
show, where the future U.S. president pronounced his counting groups, 1,018 in 2011, when hatred of President
interviewer’s reputation “amazing.” Obama on the political right was white hot.
That statement, along with Jones’ claim that Trump These numbers don’t tell the whole story. Increasing
called him personally right after the election to thank numbers of extremists — like Dylann Roof, who was
him for his support and to promise to go on his show convicted late last year of the 2015 murder of nine black
once again, was a reflection of just how far the radi- churchgoers in a bid to start a race war — are lurking
cal right in America has come in recent years. And it on the Internet, absorbing radical ideas without actu-
wasn’t the only such sign. During the campaign, Trump ally ever joining a hate group. Some small proportion
retweeted a white supremacist’s completely false claim of these people, anonymous and invisible until the very
last moment like Roof, go on to kill.
America is at a crossroads. On one hand, the coun-
RETRACTION In the Summer 2015 issue of the Intelligence Report, we try has come a remarkable distance from a past marred
reported that Cathy Brennan was removed in 2012 as liaison to the by slavery, Jim Crow and discrimination against minor-
American Bar Association’s Committee on Sexual Orientation and ities of all kinds. On the other, like most European coun-
Gender Identity. This report was not accurate; Ms. Brennan was not a tries, we are facing a resurgence of racial nationalism
member of this American Bar Association Committee in 2012, having that imperils the progress we’ve made.
served a one-year term from 2008-2009. We deeply regret this error.
Alex Jones may try scrub the evidence of his role
In the same story, we reported that Ms. Brennan “outed [a
in promoting extremism, as he did immediately after
transgender] student to school officials by revealing his female
birth name.” Ms. Brennan disputes this and claims that the student Welch’s attack in the nation’s capital. But it is impera-
published his “female birth name” on his Facebook and Tumblr pages, tive that we remember the Joneses of the world, and that
which Ms. Brennan only became aware of after this person repeatedly we work to identify, isolate and neutralize those who
contacted Ms. Brennan. would make America less than the country it could be. ▲
SPRING 2017 // ISSUE 162
HATE GROUP MAP // HATE GROUP LISTING // ‘PATRIOT’ GROUP LISTING // STARTING ON PAGE 43
O N T HE COV E R
36 The Year in Hate & Extremism
After a half century on the margins of American society, the radical right last year
entered the political mainstream. Recurring strains of racism and other forms of big-
otry, stoked by the effects of globalization and free trade, helped elect a right-wing
populist to the presidency of the United States. Donald Trump’s subsequent appoint-
ment of a raft of hardliners also heartened extremists across the nation.
13 Eye of the Stormer 23 One More Enemy 26 The Kidnapping
In recent months, The Daily Stormer,
a neo-Nazi website run by Andrew
Officials arrested three members of an
antigovernment “Patriot” group called
of Isabella
The 2009 parental kidnapping of
Anglin, has surpassed Stormfront as the the Kansas Security Force last fall,
a 7-year-old girl by a woman who
leading white supremacist forum on the accusing them of forming a subgroup
renounced her lesbian past and took up
Internet. This remarkable development that planned to mass murder Somali
with a radical anti-LGBT group resulted
was propelled by the Trump campaign, Muslim immigrants in Garden City, Kan.
COVER ART BY SEAN MCCABE
last fall in the conviction of a Virginia
a “Stormer Troll Army” set up by Anglin The case highlighted the convergence of
Christian activist. Now, with a civil
to harass his enemies, and Anglin’s the antigovernment movement and anti-
lawsuit in the works, others on the anti-
“click bait” prowess. Muslim hatred.
LGBT right could be implicated in the
international abduction.
Intelligence
Report
INTELLIGENCE REPORT EDITOR
Mark Potok
INTELLIGENCE PROJECT DIRECTOR
Heidi Beirich
ONLINE EDITOR/SENIOR WRITER
Ryan Lenz
DEPUTY DIRECTOR OF INVESTIGATIONS
Laurie Wood
DATA MANAGER 18 Attorney for Aryans
Keegan Hankes Kyle Bristow has a long history with youth-oriented hate groups.
RESEARCH TEAM LEAD Now the lawyer has created a foundation that is poised to
Stephen Piggott become the legal arm of the radical right.
RESEARCH ANALYSTS
Rose Falvey, Evelyn Schlatter,
Sarah Viets
32 The Trump Effect
PROGRAM ASSOCIATE
From the start of his presidential campaign, Donald Trump’s
Karla Griffin
rhetoric encouraged political violence. After his victory,
DESIGN DIRECTOR
Russell Estes
unleashed hatred soared to new highs.
DESIGNERS
Shannon Anderson, Valerie Downes, Michelle Leland,
Sunny Paulk, Scott Phillips, Kristina Turner 63 Picturing Extremism
PRODUCTION MANAGER
The director and a screenwriter discuss their “Imperium,” a new
Regina Collins movie starring Daniel Radcliffe about the FBI infiltration of a
SOCIAL MEDIA COORDINATOR
white supremacist hate group.
Alex Amend
MEDIA AND GENERAL INQUIRIES Heidi Beirich
LAW ENFORCEMENT INQUIRIES Laurie Wood
SUBSCRIPTION REQUESTS Karla Griffin
d e pa r t m e n t s
Southern Poverty Law Center
400 Washington Ave. • Montgomery, AL 36104
(334) 956-8200 • intelligencereport.org
3 Intelligence Briefs
Conspiracy theories produce terror plots; organized misogyny
PUBLISHED BY
THE SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER’S is on the rise; police officers are assassinated by violent radicals;
INTELLIGENCE PROJECT and other glimpses of extremism.
67 For the Record
A sampling of hate crimes and hate group activities from the
second half of 2016 is summarized in state-by-state listings.
SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER PRESIDENT
J. Richard Cohen
SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER FOUNDERS
Morris Dees
Joseph J. Levin Jr.
69 The Last Word
A Klan leader decided to hold a “Victory Klavalkade” to
SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER BOARD OF DIRECTORS celebrate the election of Donald Trump. But in the end,
Alan B. Howard, Chair
Henry Solano, Vice Chair Chris Barker couldn’t make it to his own parade.
Printed with inks containing 27.3% renewable resources
Jocelyn Benson, Bryan Fair, Bennett Grau,
Will Little, Howard Mandell,
James McElroy, Lida Orzeck, Elden Rosenthal,
James Rucker, Ellen Sudow
law enforcement inquiries welcomed
The Intelligence Report is published two times a year by the staff of the Intelligence
The Intelligence Project of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC)
Project of the Southern Poverty Law Center and provided free of charge to law welcomes law enforcement inquiries regarding radical right extremists
enforcement officials, journalists, scholars and others. The Southern Poverty and hate groups. Please direct questions during normal business hours
Law Center is supported entirely by private donations. No government funds are
involved. © 2017 Southern Poverty Law Center. All rights reserved. to Laurie Wood via the SPLC’s general number, (334) 956-8200.
INTELLIGENCE
Briefs E XTRE MISM IN T HE U .S .
[FAK E NE WS]
Tall Tales Spread by Alex Jones Breed Dangerous Plots
On Dec. 4, a 28-year-old North the weather, controls minds and says the U.S. government was
Carolina man bearing a handgun traps souls. Michael Mancil, 30, behind everything from the 1995
and a military-style rifle stormed and James Dryden Jr., 22, both Oklahoma City bombing to the
a Washington, D.C., pizza joint of Douglas, Ga., had amassed an terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Seeds of violence:
called Comet Ping-Pong, deter- arsenal — including AR-15 mil- including the massacres of school- The unhinged claims
mined to “self-investigate” rumors itary-style assault rifles, four children at Columbine and Sandy spread by arch-con-
spiracy theorist Alex
that the restaurant was the cen- Glock handguns, a rifle and more Hook and the Boston Marathon
Jones might be amus-
ter of a child sex-slave ring with than 2,000 rounds of ammuni- bombing, and who claims that ing if they were not so
connections to the Clinton cam- tion, radios and flak jackets — that “Hillary Clinton has personally dangerous. But that
paign. Edgar M. Welch, of Salis- authorities say they planned to use murdered and chopped up and didn’t stop then-pres-
bury, N.C., who fired his weapon to attack Alaska’s High-Frequency raped” children. idential candidate
Donald Trump from
inside the restaurant but injured Active Auroral Research Program Jones, who has been spread-
going on Jones’ radio
no one, later admitted “the intel (HAARP), a large radio transmit- ing fake news and ginning up show, where he
on this wasn’t 100%.” ter cited in numerous antigovern- antigovernment hysteria for praised the “amaz-
Earlier, in late October, two ment conspiracy theories. well over a decade, has recently ing” reputation of his
Georgia men were arrested in con- These two incidents, either of gained new prominence through interviewer.
nection with an alleged domes- which could easily have ended his connection to the Trump cam-
BROOKS KRAFT/GETTY IMAGES
tic terror plot to travel nearly in bloodshed, have one man in paign. As a candidate, Donald
3,500 miles to a former mili- common: Internet personality Trump appeared on Jones’ show Visit intelligencereport.org
for more information
tary research facility in Alaska Alex Jones, an influential and in December 2015, where he on the state of hate
that they believed manipulates prolific conspiracy theorist who told Jones, “Your reputation is in America.
Leah Nelson and Mark Potok contributed. spring 2017 3
INTELLIGENCE BRIEFS
Bullets not ballots: amazing. I will not let you down.”
Among those who Jones claims to have personally
faced charges in
advised Trump in the run-up to
the armed Malheur
National Wildlife the election, and also asserted
Refuge takeover were that a grateful Trump called him
(clockwise from top after his victory and promised to
left) Ryan Bundy, appear on the show again.
Ammon Bundy, Brian
That was before the fake
Cavalier, Pete Santilli,
Shawna Cox, Ryan news item known as “Pizzagate,”
Payne and Joseph which was born on the Reddit
O’Shaughnessy. and 4chan Internet forums and
gained a dubious kind of credibil-
ity when Jones’ Infowars website
began posting videos and articles
pushing it, nearly ended in trag-
edy with Welch’s armed “inves-
tigation.” After an FBI complaint [ A N T IG OV ER N M EN T V IO L EN CE] FBI — was merely an act of civil
showed that Welch had been disobedience, akin to a sit-in, by
watching an Infowars “documen- Acquittal of Bundy civic-minded individuals opposed
tary” promoting the conspiracy to government “overreach.”
theory, Jones scrubbed his site of Militants Further Experts say the Bundys’ inter-
most of its Pizzagate content in an
apparent effort to distance himself
Emboldens Radicals pretation of the Constitution flies
in the face of nearly 200 years
from the fallout of this particu- A federal jury stunned court of legal precedent, including the
larly toxic lie. watchers on Oct. 27 by deliver- Property Clause, which delegates to
His contrition, if that’s what it ing a not guilty verdict for Ryan Congress the power to make “need-
is, apparently ends with Pizzagate: and Ammon Bundy and five other ful Rules and Regulations respect-
Infowars still teems with gro- defendants charged in connection ing Territory or other Property
tesquely misleading headlines with the armed, 41-day-long take- belonging to the United States.”
and conspiracy theories about over of Oregon’s Malheur National “We have 175 years of consis-
vaccinations, a supposed Obama Wildlife Refuge. tent interpretation of the Property
“scorched earth” policy, and a Despite guilty pleas from a Clause and then we have the
coup allegedly being plotted number of other individuals Bundys,” Michael Blumm, a law
by Democrats. arrested in connection with the professor at Oregon’s Lewis &
Jones is not alone. The mar- occupation — including Bundy Clark College who specializes in
ket for fake news is crowded, “bodyguard” Wesley Kjar’s June public lands, told High Country
and likely to get more so under 23 admission that “I agreed to News. “Which is more persuasive?”
the leadership of a president who occupy the Malheur National The Bundy brothers know
said in December, “The whole Wildlife Refuge as part of an the answer to that question.
age of [the] computer has made armed political protest against Emboldened by their acquittals,
it where nobody knows exactly federal power” — the jurors felt they have already threatened fur-
what’s going on,” and whose sur- the government failed to prove ther action. “The government
rogate, “journalist” Scottie Nell that the militants had conspired should be scared,” Ryan Bundy
Hughes, claimed, astonishingly, to impede federal workers from told The Washington Post in early
MULTNOMAH COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE/HANDOUT VIA REUTERS/FILE PHOTO
that “there are no such things, doing their jobs. November. Discussing his opposi-
unfortunately, anymore, as facts.” Instead, they apparently were tion to an Obama administration
Facts do, in fact, exist. But with persuaded by the defense argu- plan to create a national monu-
social media platforms and search ment that the armed occupa- ment on federal land abutting the
engines making only the feeblest tion — which disrupted life in the Bundy ranch, he said: “Read the
of efforts to identify and marginal- rural corner of Oregon for over Declaration of Independence. It
ize false content, a president who a month, inconvenienced locals, says right there that if the gov-
is all too happy to exploit the fear menaced federal employees, and ernment becomes abusive, it’s
uncertainty engenders, and con- led to the death of LaVoy Finicum, our right and our duty to abolish
spiracists like Alex Jones continu- a spokesman for the group who that government. If the govern-
ing to propagate lies, reality seems was shot while reaching for a gun ment won’t restrain itself, what-
likely to lose out. during a confrontation with the ever happens is their own fault.”
4 splc intelligence report
The government will have a casual misogyny and alleged sex- see the value in fat women who
second crack at the Bundys in ual assault (“grab them by the don’t take care of themselves, and
February, when, together with pussy”) energized an explicitly neither should you.”
their father Cliven, the brothers sexist element within the noxious Matt Forney, a racist blogger
will face a Nevada federal jury in “Alt-Right” movement. who claims women secretly want
connection with the armed 2014 Though he is best known for to be “raped” and “beat[en],”
standoff over government efforts to his white nationalism, Alt-Right endorsed Trump because, as he
stop the elder Bundy from illegally personality Richard Spencer has wrote on Oct. 26, “Trump is show-
grazing cattle on federal land. The made it clear that women, too, ing the world that not only is the
brothers have already staked out a would be marginalized in his emperor naked, his dick is the size
defiant position, refusing to leave fantasy world. During the first of a clit.” He was apparently refer-
their holding cells to attend a pre- presidential debate of 2016, he ring to mainstream conservatives
trial hearing in December. tweeted that “[w]omen should who he sees “cuckolds” who have
No matter what happens, the never be allowed to make foreign sold white people out.
Bundy family has made its mark. policy. It’s not that they’re ‘weak.’ With misogynist Alt-Right
Washington State Rep. Matt Shea To the contrary, their vindictive- personalities on the rise, day-to-
(R), a longtime antigovernment ness knows no bounds.” Female day acts of anti-woman violence
activist who claimed credit for citizens of his ideal white “ethno- took on new significance. At the
averting a massacre at Malheur state,” he told The Washington University of Arizona on Sept. 20,
by sending a confrontational Post, would stay at home and pro- Dean Saxon, a street preacher best
gun-rights activist to the ref- duce offspring. known for “slut-shaming” women
uge to meet with the occupiers, And, according to Mother and hollering “You deserve rape,”
in December pre-filed a bill that Jones, Spencer dismisses the idea
would drastically restrict the abil- that Trump’s alleged history of
ity of state natural resource agen- forcing himself on women, kiss-
cies to acquire and manage public ing and groping them without
land in Washington. their consent, constitutes sex-
And the GOP’s 2016 platform, ual assault. Indeed, he seems to
widely criticized for lurching endorse rape, writing, “At some
right on nearly every major issue, part of every woman’s soul, they
includes language demanding want to be taken by a strong man.”
that Congress “immediately pass Then there’s Stephen K. Bannon,
universal legislation providing a chief White House strategist, who
timely and orderly mechanism presided over far-right Breitbart
requiring the federal government News — which he called a “platform
to convey certain federally con- for the alt-right” — when it fea-
trolled public lands to the states.” tured headlines like, “Birth Control
Makes Women Unattractive and was arrested and banned from Stephen Bannon,
[MI SOGYNY] Crazy” and “Would You Rather campus for a year for allegedly now a top advisor to
Donald Trump, is one
Your Child Have Feminism or kicking a woman in the chest.
Woman Hatred, Cancer?” It also carried endless On Oct. 13, Fox Business host
of those who led the
resurgence in ver-
anti-feminist pieces by Alt-Right Lou Dobbs “doxxed” Jessica Leeds,
Fueled by Presidential arch-troll Milo Yiannopoulos, who retweeting a post that included the
bal attacks on women
and feminists that has
Campaign, on the Rise wrote in August, “In terms of female
happiness, women’s liberation was
address and phone numbers of
the 74-year-old, who alleges that
afflicted the nation in
recent years.
Much has been made of the rise probably a mistake.” Trump sexually assaulted her on a
in racist and xenophobic rhet- Misogyny, in other words, is plane in the early 1980s.
oric, anti-Muslim attacks, and making a comeback. And on Dec. 9, a California
anti-Semitic trolling in the wake Celebrating Trump’s victory, judge sentenced to eight years in
of Donald Trump’s ascent, and self-declared “neo-masculinist” prison — the maximum — Alex
rightly so. But just as Trump’s Daryush Valizadeh (alias “Roosh Smith, a professional “pickup art-
promises to build a wall on the V”) wrote: “I’m in a state of exuber- ist” who, together with a fellow
REUTERS/CARLO ALLEGRI
U.S.-Mexico border, block Muslim ance that we now have a President pickup “instructor” and a “stu-
immigration, and restore “law and who rates women on a 1-10 scale dent,” gang-raped a woman who
order” have emboldened nativists the same way we do. … The presi- found out how she was attacked
and racists, so has his history of dent of the United States does not from Smith’s online profile.
spring 2017 5
INTELLIGENCE BRIEFS
[OBI TUARI E S ON TH E FA R RI GH T] the mid-2000s, was patrolling the wrote or co-authored is called The
border with the Alabama Minute- Conservative Case for Trump.
Sunrise, Sunset: Five man Support Team. The “III Per- Charles Weisman, a Christian
cent” term, which he helped coin Identity publisher and promoter
Leading Extremists and popularize, supposedly refers of anti-Semitic conspiracy theo-
Dead in 2016 to “at least 3% of American gun
owners” — those who “will not
ries, died on Oct. 8.
He was in his early
The story of 2016 was one of disarm, will not compromise and 60s. Weisman, a
right-wing extremists ascendant. will no longer back up at the pas- self-proclaimed
But even as young racist radicals sage of the next gun control act.” scholar who traf-
gained attention and influence, “When democracy turns to tyr- ficked in the sort
important members of the gener- anny, the armed citizen still gets of conspiracy theories that fea-
ation that preceded them passed to vote — with his rifle,” wrote ture clandestine rabbinical coun-
away. Among them: Vanderboegh, who participated sels plotting a Jewish takeover of
Victor Thorn, an antigovernment in and applauded the 2014 armed the planet, subscribed to a ver-
conspiracy theorist and “Clinton standoff between Nevada rancher sion of the anti-Semitic theology
researcher,” died on Aug. 1. He Cliven Bundy and government called Christian Identity, which
was 54. Thorn was officials. “Any grasping would-be holds that Jews are a cursed peo-
a Holocaust denier tyrant who ignores that truth does ple intent on destroying the white
and anti-Sem- so at his own peril.” race. He ran Weisman Publica-
ite whose books Phyllis Schlafly, ultraconservative tions out of a suburb of Minneap-
included The Holo- anti-feminist, antigovernment olis, Minn., selling over 90 titles,
caust Hoax Exposed, conspiracy theorist and anti- including his own works and anti-
9-11 EVIL: Israel’s Central Role in gay agitator, died Semitic classics such as the forged
the September 11, 2001 Terror- on Sept. 5 at the Protocols of the Learned Elders of
ist Attacks, and a trilogy “expos- age of 92. Schlafly Zion, which purports to reveal a
ing” Bill and Hillary Clinton, as entered the pub- secret plan by Jewish “elders”
well as numerous articles for the lic sphere in the plotting world domination. “My
anti-Semitic, conspiracist Ameri- 1950s by denounc- beliefs are grounded in the truths
can Free Press (AFP). Though AFP ing communism, opposing limits I’ve found out in my study, my
reported that Thorn’s family and on nuclear testing, and gunning research,” he told City Pages of
friends described his death as a for a constitutional amendment Minneapolis in 2015. “The biggest
FACEBOOK (THORN); AP IMAGES/ ELAINE THOMPSON (VANDERBOEGH); REUTERS/HYUNGWON KANG (SCHLAFLY); YOUTUBE (WEISMAN); CHICK.COM (CHICK)
suicide, his death was immedi- to prevent the president from farce in the world [is that Jews
ately seized upon by AFP eulogists negotiating international trea- are] God’s chosen people.”
and others as further “proof” that ties. A devout Catholic, she mobi- Jack Chick — prolific cartoonist
the Clintons make a habit of “mur- lized conservative women in favor and founder of the anti-atheist,
dering” their enemies. of public school prayer after the anti-gay, anti-Muslim, anti-Mor-
Michael Brian Vanderboegh, anti- Supreme Court banned it in the mon and anti-
government militia activist and 1960s and became a household Catholic Chick
co-founder of the extremist Three name in the 1970s, when her Publications — died
Percent movement “Stop ERA” movement success- on Oct. 23 at the age
who once mailed fully derailed the Equal Rights of 92. Chick, whose
the editor of this Amendment for women. Her cartoons warning
magazine a realis- grass-roots movement, oppos- against various evils including
tic-looking plastic ing feminism, modern liberalism, homosexuality, Satanism, Hal-
human skull, died and cultural changes in American loween, freemasonry, evolution,
Aug. 10 at the age of 64. Vander- society, eventually morphed into infant baptism, Harry Potter, and
boegh, who bragged that he had the Illinois-based Eagle Forum, the children’s fantasy game Dun-
been on the “enemies lists of a far-right group espousing var- geons and Dragons have been
the last THREE White Houses,” ious conspiracy theories includ- described as “a form of religious
appeared on the national anti- ing the claim that there is a secret pornography,” was a World War II
government scene during the plan to merge Canada, Mexico and veteran and one-time theater stu-
1993 siege of the Branch David- the United States. In 2016, despite dent who claimed to have been
ian compound in Waco, Texas. her age and failing health, Schlafly converted during his 1948 hon-
He associated with the right- endorsed Donald Trump for pres- eymoon. Famously disinclined to
wing militia movement, and by ident. The last of the 20 books she be photographed, he used images
6 splc intelligence report
E XT RE MI S M I N T H E MA I N ST R E A M
to great effect, spreading his fire-
and-brimstone interpretation
of Christian Scripture through “It is a melting pot of 3rd world miscreants and
accessible black-and-white comics ghetto thugs.”
known as Chick Tracts. His best- —Florida assistant state attorney KENNETH LEWIS, in a June 12 Facebook post that
selling tract, “This Was Your Life,” resulted in his being fired, describing downtown Orlando hours after an Islamist radical
shows the angel of death review- murdered 49 people at an LGBT nightclub there
ing a man’s sinful path, then shows
the man being cast into hell. “This is now war. Watch out Obama. Watch out black
lives matter punks. Real America is coming after you.”
[ONLINE EXTREMISM] —Former U.S. Rep. JOE WALSH (R-Ill.), who later deleted the July 7 tweet he sent hours
after five Dallas police officers were murdered by a black sniper
Social Media
Platforms’ Anti-Hate “[T]he shooter was a martyr.”
—Former Miss Alabama KALYN JAMES, who in 1993 became the first African American to
Efforts Inch Ahead win that title, in a July 10 Facebook video praising Micah Xavier Johnson, who was killed by
a police robot after murdering five Dallas police officers
Google aspires “to organize the
world’s information and make it
universally accessible and useful.”
“Where did any other subgroup of people contribute
Facebook’s mission is to “make the more to civilization?”
world more open and connected.” —U.S. Rep. STEVE KING (R-Iowa), who in a July 18 interview with MSNBC also suggested
that “white people” have contributed more than other “categories of people”
Twitter, while occasionally bill-
ing itself as “the free speech wing
of the free speech party,” pro- “My culture is a very dominant culture. And it’s
hibits “hateful conduct,” telling imposing, and it’s causing problems. If you don’t do
users: “You may not promote vio- something about it, you’re gonna have taco trucks on
lence against or directly attack or
threaten other people on the basis
every corner.”
—Latinos for Trump founder MARCO GUTIERREZ, warning of the dangers of Mexican
of race, ethnicity, national origin,
immigrants in a much-mocked Sept. 1 appearance on MSNBC
sexual orientation, gender, gender
FACEBOOK (LEWIS); BILL CLARK/ROLL CALL/GETTY IMAGES (WALSH); JARED SISKIN/PATRICK MCMULLAN/GETTY IMAGES (JAMES); REUTERS/MARK KAUZLARICH
identity, religious affiliation, age,
disability, or disease.” “The majority of those people in these situations that
(KING); YOUTUBE (GUTIERREZ); MIKEWADEFORCONGRESS.COM (WADE); AP IMAGES/CLIFF OWEN (HOTZE); TWITTER (SHOEBAT); FACEBOOK (TAYLOR)
In December, all three com- are shot are on the way to jail.”
panies, together with Microsoft, —Henrico County, Va., Sheriff MIKE WADE, a GOP congressional nominee who later lost, in
announced an ambitious plan to an Oct. 20 comment shrugging off concerns about police shootings of black men
curb the online spread of extrem-
ism through the creation of a joint “Think of them like termites. They get into the wood
industry database of “content that
of the house and they eat away at the very moral
promotes terrorism” — a move
that has been widely interpreted fabric of the foundation of our country.”
—Conservative Republicans of Texas president STEVEN HOTZE, claiming to a crowd on
to mean that the companies will
Oct. 29 that homosexuality was introduced to America by Soviet premier Nikita Kruschev
focus on propaganda created by as part of a plot to “create moral anarchy in our country”
jihadist terrorist groups like the
Islamic State.
Yet when it comes to tackling “Holding up that faggot flag, it’s unforgivable to me,
right-wing extremist content and it’s unforgivable — and in an ideal society, people like
hate speech, the companies seem Mr. Trump would also be put to death.”
mysteriously helpless. —Anti-LGBT activist THEODORE SHOEBAT, reacting on Oct. 30 to Donald Trump’s holding
Twitter is probably the worst up an “LGBTs for Trump” rainbow flag
offender: Despite explicitly
banning “accounts whose pri- “I’m tired of seeing a Ape in heels.”
mary purpose is inciting harm —Clay County, W. Va., Development Corporation Director PAMELA TAYLOR, in an early
towards others on the basis of November Facebook post about Michelle Obama that cost her her job and also led to the
these categories,” it has done resignation of Clay Mayor BEVERLY WHALING, who wrote approvingly on the post
remarkably little in the way of
spring 2017 7
INTELLIGENCE BRIEFS
enforcement. In late November, past is precedent, these Whac-A- The gunman, New York-born
it won applause from progres- Mole efforts are unlikely to sig- Omar Mateen, was shot and killed
sives when it strengthened report- nificantly reduce the spread of by police. The son of Afghan immi-
ing tools and banned numerous hate online. grants, Mateen was a former secu-
“alternative right” accounts that As Elon University communica- rity guard who had twice been
pumped out racist, anti-Semitic, tions professor Jonathan Albright, investigated by the FBI for pro-
anti-Muslim and misogynis- who studies the spread of online fessing interest in radical Islam.
tic content, most notably that of hate, told The Guardian, promot- The 29-year-old, who had a wife
prominent white nationalist ers of hateful false information and young son, dreamed of work-
leader Richard Spencer. “have created a web that is bleed- ing in law enforcement, but was
But in December, Spencer’s ing through on to our web. This expelled from a training program
account was back up, and it isn’t a conspiracy. There isn’t one run by the Florida Department of
emerged that Twitter had only person who’s created this. It’s a Corrections, in part for making off-
banned him for violating a policy vast system of hundreds of differ- color comments about bringing a
that prohibits individuals from ent sites that are using all the same weapon to class. He lost another
running multiple accounts with tricks that all websites use. They’re job as a security guard after claim-
overlapping uses. (The social sending out thousands of links to ing connections to both Al Qaeda,
media platform has not restored other sites and together this has a Sunni group, and Hezbollah, a
the account of Milo Yiannopoulos, created a vast satellite system of Shiite organization and avowed
an Alt-Right “troll” whose vicious rightwing news and propaganda enemy of Al Qaeda. His first known
online attacks even Spencer that has completely surrounded pledge of loyalty to the Islamic
acknowledged as “harassment.”) the mainstream media system … State came during a 911 call the
Facebook and Google, mean- like an organism that is growing night of the attack, less than three
while, have done little to coun- and getting stronger all the time.” hours before he was killed.
ter the use of their platforms to Indeed. Even as Reddit, a Though Mateen’s terrorist
spread hateful, false “informa- major platform for online hate, bona fides bordered on fantasy,
tion,” from conspiracy theories announced that it would ban the carnage he inflicted was all
accusing various minority groups some of its most vicious users, too real. Survivors of the massacre
of plotting against America to Andrew Anglin, neo-Nazi editor at Pulse, which was particularly
Neo-Nazi Andrew websites promoting Holocaust of the viciously racist online Daily popular among Latino members
Anglin has led his
“Troll Army” in some
denial and false “facts” about Stormer, was rallying his follow- of the Orlando LGBT commu-
of the more vicious Islam, LGBT people, women, ers for their next attack. Urging nity, suffered inside the club for
online attacks seen Mexicans and others. Facebook’s them to create “fake black person upwards of three hours as Mateen
in recent years. But hate speech policy, as leaked accounts,” he wrote: “We wish to murdered their friends and held
he is far from alone to the German newspaper create a state of chaos on twitter, them hostage. He was killed dur-
among haters who
are increasingly
Süddeutsche Zeitung, prohibits among the black twitter popula- ing a SWAT raid around 5 a.m.
using social media to attacks on individuals based on tion, by sowing distrust and sus- Racists, anti-LGBT activists
intimidate and harass their race, national origin, reli- picion. … Chaos is the name of and other extrem-
their enemies. gion, or sexual orientation, but the game.” ists wasted no
seemingly permits attacks on time in celebrat-
religions and nationalities more [ IS L A M IST T ER RO R] ing the slaughter.
generally. And a recent report by Michael Hill,
The Guardian found that Google’s 49 Murdered at Mateen
president of the
autocomplete function, which neo-Confederate League of the
predicts what people mean to Orlando Club, and South, a theocratic, anti-black
ask when they start typing, filled
in “evil” after a user typed “Are
Extremists Celebrate group with fantasies of becom-
ing a paramilitary organization,
Jews” and “Are women.” Orlando, Fla., became the site of proclaimed: “In a free & inde-
The platform altered the deadliest mass shooting by a pendent South, Islam would be
these particular autocom- single gunman in U.S. history, and banned, Muslims deported, and all
DAILY STORMER (ANGLIN); DMV(MATEEN)
plete answers following the deadliest terrorist attack on mosques closed down. The own-
The Guardian’s article, and U.S. soil since 9/11, when a man ership of firearms, including mil-
appeared to take steps to who proclaimed allegiance to the itary grade, would be encouraged
assure that the top results Islamic State killed 49 people and for all Southern citizens.”
no longer included wounded 53 at Pulse, a popular gay Andrew Anglin, editor and
hate sites. But if nightclub, before dawn on June 12. publisher of the neo-Nazi website
8 splc intelligence reportDaily Stormer, hoped the attack on July 8 to the nightmarish news progressive philanthropist George
signaled “the start of the terror- that a sniper had assassinated five Soros had engineered the shoot-
ist/faggot civil war.” Dallas police officers who were ings to provoke a race war. Arch-
Timothy Buchanan of BarbWire, providing security at an other- Islamophobe David Horowitz
an anti-gay website, blamed LGBT wise peaceful Black Lives Mat- claimed that Johnson was “in
people for provoking the attack: ter protest. effect” acting as the “military
“Flaunting gross immorality and Six other individuals were wing” of the Black Lives Matter
defiant wickedness that is hid- wounded in the shooting, and movement, and demanded that
eous, odious and wretched to an the shooter, 25-year-old Micah the latter be declared a domestic
overwhelming majority of people Johnson of Mesquite, Texas, was terrorist organization. Stewart
is a foolish and dangerous course killed by a police robot in the early Rhodes of the radical antigov-
of action.” In a bizarre showing of hours of that summer day. ernment Oath Keepers called on
moral empathy with Mateen, he Johnson was an Army vet- his group to “unite and coordi-
continued: “Those who come to eran and black nationalist sym- nate in mutual defense against
the United States from other cul- pathizer who reportedly told this orchestrated campaign of
tures — some of which are infinitely police that “he was upset about Marxist terrorism.”
more moral than our own — are the recent police shootings” and While extremists bloviated,
going to be offended and repulsed “wanted to kill white people, real and threatened attacks on
by the rampant depravity that has especially white officers.” After police across the country con-
become a defining characteristic of being discharged while under tinued. In Tennessee on July 8,
our culture.” investigation for sexual harrass- one woman was killed and three
Steven Anderson of the Faithful ment, he gravitated toward black others, including a police offi-
Word Baptist Church in Tempe, nationalist hate groups includ- cer, were wounded by a black
Ariz., put it like this: “The good ing the racist, anti-Semitic New Army veteran who reportedly
news is that there’s 50 less pedo- Black Panther Party, the Nation explained his indiscriminate
philes in this world, because, you of Islam, and the Black Riders shooting attack by saying he
know, these homosexuals are Liberation Party. was angry about police violence
a bunch of disgusting perverts Extremists wasted no time against black Americans. Officers
FACEBOOK (JOHNSON); TRADYOUTH.ORG (PARROTT); TWITTER (JONES); AP IMAGES/PHELAN M. EBENHACK (HOROWITZ); AP IMAGES/JOURNAL INQUIRER, JARED RAMSDELL (RHODES)
and pedophiles.” Another pastor, in co-opting Johnson’s act of in Missouri and Georgia were
Kenneth Adkins, who runs three domestic terrorism for their own wounded by gunfire the next
churches in Georgia and who was purposes. A handful of black day, though the shooters’ motives
arrested in August on charges of nationalists endorsed Johnson’s were unclear.
molesting a boy under the age of 16, actions. Black Riders Liberation A few days later in Detroit,
tweeted that the victims got “what Party leader Lakesia Washington four black men, including one
they deserved.” And in a widely posted an “R.I.P.” message for who called Johnson a “hero” and
circulated video, Pastor Roger Johnson on the group’s Facebook another who wrote, “It’s time to
Jimenez of Sacramento’s Verity page, where another member wage war and shoot the police
Baptist Church told his congrega- called him the “Nat Turner of first,” were arrested for alleg-
tion, “The tragedy is that more of Our Time.” edly threatening on Facebook to
them didn’t die. The tragedy is— On the other side of the racial kill police. Exploiting a trag-
edy: Extremists (from
I’m kind of upset that he didn’t fin- extremist spectrum, Matt Parrott, And on July 17, 29-year-old
top) Matt Parrott,
ish the job.” co-founder of the Traditionalist Gavin Eugene Long, a black man Alex Jones, David
Youth Network and Traditionalist from Kansas City who in 2015 Horowitz and Stewart
[ANT I - P OL ICE VIOLEN CE] Worker Party — racist white filed documents declaring him- Rhodes all tried to
groups that were involved in a self an antigovernment “sover- use a black sniper’s
Officers Murdered bloody fight during a protest in eign citizen,” shot and killed three
July murder of five
Dallas police offi-
Sacramento, Calif., that left sev- Baton Rouge police officers and
Across U.S. in Wave eral stabbed and wounded — pre- wounded three others.
cers to make wildly
dubious claims about
of Extremist Violence dicted “race war.” And so did
numerous posters on racist online
As the anti-police attacks and
threats continued sporadically
race war, Black Lives
Matter, and “Marxist
terrorism.”
A nation roiled by a vicious and bulletin boards throughout the fall, with inci-
protracted presidential campaign like Stormfront. dents in Massachusetts, Colorado,
and shocked and saddened by Right-wing Maryland, Alabama and else-
graphic evidence of the deaths of conspiracy the- where, police and pundits strug-
multiple unarmed black men at orist Alex Joes gled to make sense of the violence
the hands of police officers, woke Johnson claimed that and chart a path forward. Some
spring 2017 9INTELLIGENCE BRIEFS
departments spoke of falling back on July 31 in Cleveland, Ohio. shot. And Indiana Monroe, 29, was
on military training, while oth- Erykah Tijerina, 36, was found shot to death in Newport News,
The price of hate: ers planned to have officers work dead in her El Paso home on Va., on Dec. 21. Before she was
The wave of appar- in pairs at all times. Dallas police Aug. 8; police suspected foul play. buried, her long hair was shorn
ent murders of
chief David Brown, a black man Rae’Lynn Thomas, 28, was shot and she was dressed in a suit.
transgender or gen-
der-nonconforming who rose to national prominence and beaten to death, allegedly Each of these apparent homi-
women continued in in the wake of Johnson’s attack, by her mother’s ex-boyfriend, in cide victims was either transgen-
the second half of retired in October but urged aspir- Columbus, Ohio, on Aug. 10. der or gender-nonconforming.
2016 (pictured from ing police officers, especially peo- Lexxi T. Sironen, 43, was Most were trans women, and most
top left in same order
ple of color, not to “quit on me” and found dead Sept. 6, in Waterville, of those, black trans women, who,
as the story at right).
to “[f ]inish what you’ve started.” Maine. T.T. Saffore, 27, was found according to Mic.com, constituted
dead, her throat slit, in Chicago’s 72% of transgender homicide vic-
[TRA NSGE NDE R VI C TI M I Z ATI ON] West Garfield Park neighborhood tims since 2010. Together with 14
on Sept. 11. Crystal Edmonds, 32, others murdered in the first half
Transgender Hate was shot to death in Baltimore on of this year, these 13 are victims
Sept. 16. Jazz Alford, 30, of North of trend that made 2016 the dead-
Murders Hit New All- Carolina, was also shot to death, liest year on record for transgen-
Time High at a Birmingham, Ala., motel on
Sept. 23.
der people.
These deaths, which due to
The horrific list just keeps growing. Brandi Bledsoe, 32, was found inaccurate and incomplete report-
Deeniquia Dodds, 22, died on dead with a bag around her head ing almost certainly constitute
July 13, nine days after she was shot on Oct. 8, in what Cleveland police only a fraction of the actual toll
in the early morning hours of July suspect was a homicide. The body of transgender people murdered
4 near her Washington, D.C., home. of Sierra/Simon Bush, 18, was last year, took place against the
Dee Whigham, 25, was robbed and found in a creek near Idaho City, backdrop of a prominent pub-
stabbed to death near Biloxi, Miss., Idaho, on Oct. 22, under what lic conversation about transgen-
on July 23, while in town for the police termed “suspicious cir- der rights. Progressive activists
Gulf Coast Black Rodeo. cumstances.” Noony Norwood, had been demanding that trans-
Skye Mockabee, 26, was found 30, died Nov. 6 in a Richmond, gender people be allowed to use
dead of an apparent head wound Va., hospital, the day after she was facilities aligned with their gender
BLOTTER UPDATES ON EXTREMISM AND THE LAW
JULY 7 JULY 11 JULY 20 SEPT. 14
A federal indictment was An Arizona judge sentenced Criminal summonses were A Gresham, Ore., man and the
unsealed that charged seven former border vigilante Chris issued for white nationalist girlfriend who allegedly egged
members of the Latino gang Simcox to 19½ years in prison Matthew Heimbach and two him on, shouting “Get him,
Big Hazard with firebomb- on two counts of child moles- other men who were filmed baby!” as he plowed across
ing four apartments in Los tation and one of furnishing shoving a black protester at a several lanes of oncoming
Angeles’ Boyle Heights neigh- pornography to a minor. A for- March rally for Donald Trump traffic and struck and killed
borhood in an effort to chase mer schoolteacher, Simcox, in Louisville, Ky. The three a black teenager, pleaded not
black people out. The May 12, 55, rose to national promi- were charged with harass- guilty to first degree intimi-
2014, attacks were only the nence in the early 2000s as ment with physical contact dation charges, a hate crime,
latest attempt by Latino street co-founder of the Minuteman for their attacks on Shiya in a Multnomah County court-
gangs over some two decades Project, a nativist extremist Nwanguma, a University of house. Russell Courtier, 38,
to drive blacks out of certain group that patrolled the U.S.- Louisville student. Heimbach, and Colleen Hunt, 35, had
southern California neighbor- Mexico border. He had been a 25-year-old who heads already pleaded not guilty to
hoods. Carlos Hernandez, 31, in prison since 2013, when he the racist and anti-Semitic murder in the death of Larnell
the suspected leader of the was arrested for molesting Traditionalist Youth Network Bruce, 19. Courtier is alleged
recent conspiracy, allegedly the 5-year-old daughter of a and Traditionalist Worker to be a member of the racist
told fellow Big Hazard gang neighbor and his own daugh- Party, had bragged online prison gang European Kindred.
members that the bombings ters, ages 6 and 4, although about the assault, but com-
would “get the niggers out of charges involving the young- plained after his arrest of fac- OCT. 18
FACEBOOK
the neighborhood.” est were later dropped. ing a “political prosecution.” A 32-year-old Joplin, Mo.,
10 splc intelligence reportidentity, which social conserva- public venom, the Mic.com report Texas A&M, telling them that
tives responded to by ginning up concluded, they will remain easy “America, at the end of the day,
fears of malevolent perverts lurk- targets for violence and murder. belongs to white men. … Our bones
ing in toilet stalls. are in the ground. We own it. At
A study by Mic.com, a progres- [C AM PUS E X TRE M I SM ] the end of the day, America can’t
sive news site, revealed that law exist without us. We defined it.”
enforcement and victims’ families White Nationalists Identity Evropa, founded in
are often hesitant to identify vic- March 2016 by 30-year-old Cal
tims as transgender people, often Work to Make Inroads State Stanislaus student Nathan
referring to trans women as gay
men or using gendered pronouns
at U.S. Colleges Damigo, hit the ground running
over the July 4 weekend, when
to describe non-binary individu- Emboldened by a presidential can- supporters posted fliers promot-
als. Despite strong evidence in didate who embraced their ideas ing “European identity and sol-
many cases, no homicide of a with a nudge and a wink, and idarity” in 17 cities. Damigo is a
transgender person has led to a electrified by his victory, white former Marine corporal who dis-
hate crime conviction since 2009, nationalists in 2016 fanned out covered his inner white nation-
a problem Mic.com attributed and spread their message of fear alist by reading the work of
at least in part to judicial bias and loathing among the nation’s Holocaust-denying ex-Klansman
and prosecutors’ failure to fully young people. David Duke while serving five
accept victims’ gender identities. Richard Spencer, 38, of the years for armed robbery (while
Many police departments were National Policy Institute, capi- drunk, he put a gun to the head of
working to do better. Washington, talized on his newfound status as a cab driver he thought was Iraqi
D.C., and Detroit now have ded- the man who coined the term “Alt- and stole $43).
icated LGBT police units, and Right” to take his hateful message Addressing a class at Cal State
other cities are working to train to campus. In addition to numer- Stanislaus, Damigo called himself
police to be more sensitive to ous high-profile media appear- an “identitarian” — a reference
transgender issues. But as long as ances which he used to shill his to a racist European movement
transgender people remain eco- suit-and-tie brand of racial hatred, — and rejected terms like “rac-
nomically and socially marginal- on Dec. 6 he addressed a crowd ist” and “supremacist” as “anti-
ized, semi-acceptable targets of of 400 (including protesters) at white hate speech.” His group,
m a n w h o b u r n e d d ow n o rd e r t o st o p t a rg e t i n g OCT. 28 NOV. 4
a Joplin mosque on Aug. Latinos, federal prosecutors The FBI arrested a mem- An Arizona judge sentenced
6, 2012, and attempted to in Arizona charged Maricopa ber of the violent, neo-Nazi an 18-year-old Tucson man
do the same to the town’s County Sheriff Joe Arpaio Vinlanders Social Club at a to eight years in prison
Planned Parenthood clinic with criminal contempt of motel in Valdosta, Ga., and and a lifetime of proba-
the next year, was sentenced court, a misdemeanor. Arpaio, returned him to West Palm tion after he was convicted
to more than five years in whose department in 2011 Beach, Fla., on federal charges of terrorism and conspir-
federal prison and ordered was found to systematically related to a murder-for-hire, acy charges for plotting to
to pay $701,971 in restitution. discriminate against Latinos, attempted drug possession bomb a Department of Motor
Jedediah Stout, 32, told offi- built a national reputation with intent to distribute, Vehicles building. During
cials that he opposed Islam with his bellicose nativist and robbery. Adrian “Skitz” the probe, Mahin Khan
and abortion. The mosque fire rhetoric, disregard for civil Apodaca, 44, was arrested after instructed an undercover
he set not only destroyed the rights, publicity stunts like undercover FBI agents set up FBI agent to build homemade
building, but also consumed forcing inmates under his their own fake white suprem- grenades that Khan planned
donations made by mosque supervision to wear pink acist gang and befriended to use to incite an upris-
supporters during the holy underwear, and formation of him, conducting a five-month ing on behalf of the Islamic
month of Ramadan. a “Cold Case Posse” to inves- sting operation during which State. Khan had previously
tigate President Obama’s cit- they secretly recorded his expressed interest in attack-
OCT. 25 izenship. Arpaio, who first boasts of having “killed a lot ing a local Jewish commu-
Saying the 84-year-old law- took office in 1993, lost his of people” and leaving “a trail nity center.
man willfully defied a judge’s re-election bid in November. of dead hookers.”
spring 2017 11INTELLIGENCE BRIEFS
offensive. Best known for being “take a stand” against “globalist
banned from Twitter after orches- traitors” who are “destroying your
trating a storm of online hatred race and heritage through open
against a black female comedian, borders, affirmative action, and
Yiannopoulos — who seems to Marxist ‘political correctness.’”
view misogyny and neo-Nazism TheRightStuff, a blog founded
as witty affectations — makes his in 2012 that created the “paren-
whose fliers have appeared at doz- campus appearances as miserable theses meme” in which Jewish
ens of campuses across the coun- as possible. During a December people are targeted for online
try as part of its “#ProjectSiege,” appearance at the University of harassment by trolls who iden-
is a reimagining of the now- Wisconsin, Milwaukee, he mocked tify them as Jews by putting triple
defunct National Youth Front, a transgender woman, showing her parentheses around their names,
the youth arm of the white photo and name on screen. hopes to spark “dialogue among
nationalist American Freedom Amplifying the efforts of these a disparate and edgy right-wing.”
Party, which Damigo also led. headline personalities are youth The Southern Poverty Law Center,
Hate on tour: Alt- Members must be of “European, groups like American Vanguard which tracked report distribu-
Right personalities non-Semitic heritage.” and TheRightStuff, both of which tions of white nationalist, KKK
spreading venom Where Damigo and Spencer have posted fliers at dozens and anti-Semitic posters and fli-
on campus include are smooth-talking and slick, of campuses. ers on campus, found that Identity
(clockwise from top
left) Richard Spencer,
Milo Yiannopoulos, 33, a third American Vanguard, founded Evropa, American Vanguard, and
Nathan Damigo and rising young Alt-Right personal- in 2016 and based in Southern TheRightStuff were behind the
Milo Yiannopoulos. ity, is flamboyant and deliberately California, urges white men to majority of incidents. ▲
April 29, 2016
In the 24 hours after her profile of
Melania Trump was published in GQ
magazine, Julia Ioffe, whose family
LINDA DAVIDSON/THE WASHINGTON POST VIA GETTY IMAGES (SPENCER); TWITTER (DAMIGO); DREW ANGERER/GETTY IMAGES (YIANNOPOULOS); YOUTUBE (IOFFE)
fled anti-Semitism in Russia a quarter
century ago, was bombarded by a
series of incredibly vicious online
messages and images. They included a cartoon of a Jew being
murdered, a photo of a concentration camp victim with Ioffe’s face
superimposed, and another of a lampshade with her face on it —
an obvious reference to the myth that the Nazis used the skin of
Jewish victims to make lampshades. The torrent of abuse — which
included an anonymous caller who played a Hitler speech over the
phone and a series of threats — followed Melania Trump’s sharp
criticism of Ioffe’s relatively mild story as “yet another example
of the dishonest media and their disingenuous reporting.” But
it mainly stemmed from a post by neo-Nazi Andrew Anglin on
his site The Daily Stormer that ran under the headline, “Empress
Melania Attacked by Filthy Russian Kike Julia Ioffe in GQ!” In it, he
urged followers to “go ahead and send her a tweet and let her know
what you think of her dirty kike trickery. Make sure to identify her
as a Jew working against White interests, or send her a picture with
the Jude star from the top of this article.” Anglin has made a vile
sport of sending his “Stormer Troll Army” after his enemies — a
professor at the University of Missouri, a Nintendo employee, an
anti-racist in Montana and others. Ioffe filed a police report on the
day after Anglin’s post, but it was not known if a criminal case is
being pursued against anyone involved.
12 splc intelligence reportYou can also read
