THE WHITE NATIONALIST FRINGE JUST TOOK A GIANT STEP CLOSER TO THE CENTER OF THE GOP
“White nationalist, white supremacist, Western civilization—how did that language become offensive? Why did I sit in classes teaching me about the merits of our history and our civilization?” It was this statement that finally got Steve King, the former Iowa Republican, stripped of his committee assignments in the House of Representatives. This wasn’t the first time he’d signaled sympathy for the far right—after all, he’d had a long history of racist, bigoted remarks about immigrants and he’d even retweeted Nazi-sympathizers.
But while racism and the odd white supremacist retweet could be overlooked by the GOP due to his strong following in the midwest, it was King’s full-throated promotion of white supremacy and white nationalism as a virtue that finally proved too much even for the GOP. And so, in 2019, Republicans unanimously voted to remove him from his committee assignments (though he wasn’t removed from the “G.O.P. House conference itself, so he [could] still attend its party meetings”).
Since then, the GOP has been radicalized even further, and at a pace that’s left even some of the most critical political commentators stunned. Three years later, in 2022, and another member of congress, Georgia Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene, stood proudly next to a white supremacist and Nazi-sympathizer, Nick Fuentes, at his America First Political Action Conference (AFPAC), where he later praised Putin and Hitler.
Greene, initially laughed off as part of the lunatic fringe of the GOP, has become a part of its mainstream. Even Republicans admit that her endorsement carries a great deal of weight. In fact, four “Republican operatives” told The Daily Beast that only one endorsement is better than hers. “If you can’t get Donald Trump, you are going to want to have MTG in your back pocket,” said one.
Greene was stripped of her committee assignments as well—only this time, just a couple of years later, the vote did not include the majority of Republicans. Despite her remarks minimizing the Holocaust, questioning 9/11 and school shootings, and calling for violence against Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats, only eleven House Republicans broke ranks and voted with Democrats to relieve Greene of her committees. For those keeping count, 199 Republicans voted against the resolution. Kevin McCarthy, minority leader of the House, blamed the Democrats, calling the vote a “partisan power grab.”
The Gen-Z voice of racism
Before joining his colleague at this year’s AFPAC (via recorded video message), Congressman Paul Gosar of Arizona posted an anime video of himself killing his Democratic colleague Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and attacking Joe Biden with two swords. That was in November 2021. No real consequences from McCarthy and the GOP followed. Gosar was eventually censured and stripped of his committee assignments, with only two Republicans siding with the Democrats.
This wasn’t Gosar’s first experience with AFPAC—he’d participated in person in the past. In total, four elected Republican officials participated in this year’s AFPAC, with Idaho Lt. Governor Janice McGeachin and Arizona state senator Wendy Rogers joining Gosar and Greene. Also speaking at this year’s AFPAC: Steve King.
And while the GOP’s radicalization process has sped up considerably over the past few years, this year’s AFPAC, hosted by Fuentes as a rival event to CPAC, marked another escalation of what—and who—is tolerated in the Republican Party. In fact, as researcher Ben Lorber’s* popular Twitter thread on AFPAC demonstrates, this is a feedback loop: as Fuentes’ groyper movement hastens the radicalization of the GOP, the GOP helps further normalize white nationalism, which may well have a seat at the table going forward.
Video from the conference shows Fuentes complaining that Putin was being compared to Hitler—“as if that isn’t a good thing”—to laughter and cheers from the audience. While many mainstream Republicans have responded to the invasion of Ukraine—including deadly Russian attacks on civilians and press—by employing the Tucker Carlson tactic of “anti-anti-Putin” rhetoric, the attendees of AFPAC didn’t even bother to mask their admiration for the Russian dictator. Shouts of “Putin, Putin, Putin!” could be heard from the crowd during Fuentes’ speech, a sentiment he affirmed.
It’s important to note that he’s not just any right-wing extremist—but the openly-racist, Gen Z voice of the movement, stating, “we want children to be happy and not on drugs, and that’s why we opposed mixed [race] marriages.” In addition, he openly called for the killing of legislators before Jan 6: “What can you and I do to a state legislator, besides kill them? … Although we should not do that. I am not advising that, but I mean, what else can you do, right?”
Daniel Harper, an expert on neo-Nazi subcultures in the US and co-host of the “I Don’t Speak German” podcast describes the dangerous character of Fuentes’ brand like this:
Times are changing, fast
Arizona state senator Wendy Rogers, who spoke at AFPAC via pre-recorded video-message, has publicly stated her admiration for Fuentes on previous occasions. She’s also a member of the far-right “Oath Keepers,” a militia present at the January 6 attack on the Capitol. And just like Fuentes, Rogers has called for political violence—the difference being that she’s an elected Republican official. She’s stated that there were “more gallows needed” for the Right’s political enemies and has called for “more rope and less inflation” on the right-wing site Gab.
And speaking of Gab—another escalation, even by AFPAC standards, was the speech by Gab-founder Andrew Torba. His rant, filled with the language of “spiritual warfare” and extreme religious rhetoric, managed to stand out due to his signaling of “Christian Identity,” a white power theology with a Nazi Jesus who seeks a race war. Now, the dog whistles Torba used might not even have registered for the majority who have no familiarity with this hateful fringe sect—but to those who’ve watched the scene for some time, it was clear.
The use of dog whistles fits into Fuentes’ brand of white nationalism that serves as a bridge between right-wingers and even more fringe factions. According to Harper:
Torba’s rhetoric doesn’t necessarily signal a resurgence of “Christian Identity,” which remains fringe even in these hard-right circles. But its prominent display at AFPAC is, according to Harper, cause for concern:
