For my newsletter this week, I wanted to take a deeper look into Patriot Front, the white nationalist group that made headlines last weekend with huge rallies across Washington, D.C. One photo, taken by a Reuters journalist, displayed a Black woman on the subway surrounded by dozens of anonymous Patriot Front members.
As I read into what happened, it made me think of my years of reporting on far-right extremism. What are they thinking right now? And how has the landscape of far-right extremism and white supremacy changed in the last 10 years?
I opened my phone, searched through my contacts and found “Brien KKK.”
James says he joined the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) in his teens after attending a high school that was “80% Black.” According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, he then co-founded the Vinlanders Social Club, a coalition of regional skinhead groups known for racist violence. He also participated in numerous white nationalist rallies over his multiple decades in the far-right movement. And in the summer of 2011, the Vinlanders held a white power concert, entitled “Plunder and Pillage,” which reportedly drew more than 50 skinheads to Ohio from around the country.
While James no longer considers himself a white nationalist or a skinhead and has since left the KKK, he is still a member of the Proud Boys, a far-right militia group most infamous for being one of the biggest players in the Jan. 6 attacks on the U.S. Capitol.
James makes it clear that the Proud Boys and Patriot Front have different ideologies: The former denies that it is a white supremacist group, for example. Still, both groups have been known to organize and attend protests, often violent ones, against pride and drag events. In this interview with Uncloseted Media’s Editor in Chief Spencer Macnaughton, James offers insight into where far-right extremism in America is today and how those following the ideology view the LGBTQ community.
“UNCLOSETED with Spencer Macnaughton” is a new podcast by Uncloseted Media, an investigative LGBTQ-focused nonprofit news publication. Follow and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.
Host: Spencer Macnaughton
Editor: Izzy Stokes and Laury Peyssonnerie