Salon.com > Neo-nazi

Rightist group National Alliance weakening

Sun, 03 Feb 2013 20:00:00 +0000

In a growing campaign to embarrass and oust the chairman of the once influential National Alliance (NA), California member Jim Ring, widely seen as the real leader of the notorious neo-Nazi group, has resigned in order to “save the organization from going into complete obscurity.”

Ring quit last October but his self-described “drastic and surprising action” is only coming to light now with the posting by white supremacist bloggers and websites in recent days of his long and well-written combination resignation letter, call to arms and job application.

Ring, of Sacramento, puts himself up as “the necessary replacement’’ of the much-maligned chairman, Erich Gliebe, the successor to the group’s founder, William Pierce, who died in 2002.

“Instead of having a measure of respect for us,” Ring writes, “our enemies, and consequently potential prospects, see us or more specifically the chairman, as a “laughing stock.’”

Boy who shot neo-Nazi dad is convicted of murder

Mon, 14 Jan 2013 20:02:00 +0000

Two years ago a 10-year-old California boy shot his father, a neo-Nazi, at point blank range in the head. On Monday, the child, now 12, was convicted of second-degree murder and could remain in jail until he is 23-years-old.

The boy's father, Jeff Hall, was a regional leader of the National Socialist Movement and, the court learned, brought his son up in a household plagued with violence and abuse. Although the judge determined that the boy shot his father with premeditated intent, the trial focused on whether the boy could possess moral agency. In neo-Nazi a household, in which a child learns that it is acceptable to abuse and kill perceived threats, can this child be expected to understand "right" from "wrong?"

As the LA Times reported, "Public Defender Matthew Hardy focused on the boy's abusive home life, where gunplay and neo-Nazi gatherings were commonplace. Witnesses testified that Hall beat his son repeatedly, often in drunken or drug-addled rages."

According to the AP, "The boy said in a videotaped interview with police that he didn't think he'd get in trouble because he saw an episode of Criminal Minds in which a child killed an abusive father and wasn't arrested."

Greek neo-Nazi party sets up New York office

Mon, 24 Sep 2012 19:42:00 +0000

Greek neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn has opened up an office in New York, the Greek Reporter reported this week.

According to Golden Dawn New York's website (which prominently features the group's Swastika-like symbol):

The Golden Dawn New York Chapter stands in support of the ideas and goals of the Golden Dawn Party in Greece, who received over 400,000 popular votes in the 2012 elections and currently has 18 representatives in the Greek parliament.

The Golden Dawn is the only political party in Greece that unapologetically stands for the sovereignty, security, and dignity of the Greek people.

The party intends to reverse decades of unlimited third world immigration which has brought crime, unemployment, disease and possibly terrorism to the once peaceful Greek cities.

Neo-Nazis’ lethal border patrol

Mon, 10 Sep 2012 22:02:00 +0000

The mountains near here rise as jagged and unforgiving obstacles on the horizon for immigrants and smugglers who cross the border by moonlight and make their way northward along the foothills, stopping in the cypress groves for rest. It’s a natural passage and the easiest route to travel.

But it was also here, on April 8, that a group of what was described as four white men wearing camouflage opened fire on a packed truck carrying immigrants illegally into the country, killing two of them. The victims, Gerardo Perez-Ruiz from the central Mexican city of Toluca and another man believed to be from Guatemala, were part of a group of 20 to 30 immigrants driving through a remote desert wash near Eloy when the group of gunmen suddenly appeared.

According to statements provided by five surviving immigrants, the gunmen yelled, “Alto!” — “Halt!” — as the truck neared, then fired their weapons before disappearing without another word into the pre-dawn darkness.

Immigration sparks domestic terrorism threat

Sun, 19 Aug 2012 15:00:00 +0000

Experts who monitor domestic terrorism know that extremist movements, groups, and individuals are influenced by controversial, often polarizing, national issues. Historically, right-wing extremists have taken strong stances on the issues of gun control, the right to life (abortion debate), same-sex marriage, and multiculturalism, among a host of other national issues. The debate surrounding the topic of illegal immigration appears to have trumped all other national issues for right-wing extremists today. For the white supremacist movement, this is not a new or emerging issue.

Historians have noted a strong correlation between large migrations of foreigners to the United States and increased acts of violence against immigrants. For example, riots and violence erupted in Philadelphia in the mid-1800s following a large influx of Irish Catholic immigrants. The KKK peaked in the 1920s with approximately five million members, at the time lessening its focus on African-Americans and shifting its attention to Catholic and Jewish immigrants. In Texas, during the 1980s, a Klan group systematically harassed and attacked Vietnamese fishermen in an effort to put them out of business and drive them from the town.

Daryl Johnson: I tried to warn them

Fri, 17 Aug 2012 18:15:00 +0000

In November 2011, I read an opinion article in Michigan's Muskegon Chronicle, which was called “Upcoming Election Year Should Put Voters on Guard for False Reports.” It focused on new information related to a sensitive intelligence report from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security called “Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Radicalization and Recruitment.” The editorial’s observations were of particular interest to me: As the senior domestic terrorism analyst working at DHS from 2004 to 2010, I was the primary author of the report in question.

The DHS report, released on April 7, 2009, served as a warning to law enforcement concerning the resurgence of right-wing extremism in the U.S. The report was immediately leaked by an unknown individual who obviously took offense with its findings.

Roger Hedgecock, an ultra-conservative “shock jock” based in Southern California, admitted to receiving the official intelligence report from an anonymous individual. By April 12, 2009, Hedgecock had pushed the report into the public domain using his radio program as well as an article he published in World Net Daily (a conservative “free press” media outlet based in Medford, Ore). Hedgecock wrongfully claimed the DHS report demonized veterans and classified all conservatives as potential terrorists.

Spotting white supremacists

Wed, 08 Aug 2012 14:00:00 +0000

My favorite necklace when I was a child was a tiny, intricate Celtic cross. My godfather gave it to me the day of my christening. I wore it as often as my mother would let me, all through childhood. The thin gold chain got too small for me right around the time I was outgrowing public displays of Catholicism. I never consciously decided not to wear it anymore; it seemed as though I shed it by design, like baby teeth.

Imagine my surprise a few years ago, when I first started researching my book, and I found the Celtic cross as the very first image in the ADL's online database of "general racist symbols." The text responsibly notes that the cross "is used widely today in many mainstream and cultural contexts. No one should assume that a Celtic Cross, divorced from other trappings of extremism, automatically denotes use as a hate symbol."

FBI: Right-wing terror is real

Tue, 07 Aug 2012 11:45:00 +0000

When Homeland Security director Janet Napolitano released a report in April 2009 identifying right-wing extremists as a threat to the country, conservatives howled. The general sentiment was expressed by Michelle Malkin, who declared the report a “piece of crap … propaganda … an Obama hit job.” Jonah Goldberg complained that the DHS report failed to stick “to the practice of describing these groups with more specificity and without the catchall, ideologically loaded descriptors.” Well, now that we have learned the murderer of six people at a Wisconsin Sikh temple was a well-known white supremacist, conservatives might want to consider reexamining their claims that terrorists don’t exist on the right side of the political spectrum.