"There are Thousands Like Him"

News cameras devoured footage of Chris Hasson's arsenal - assault rifles, shotguns, pistols, a sniper rifle, ammo boxes stuffed with rounds and a manifesto of those he was out to slaughter - mainly prominent Democrats and news anchors. This from a 49 year old US Coast Guard lieutenant.

A lunatic, of course. A nutter. A "lone wolf" crazy, had to be. Maybe not. Experts maintain there are thousands of Christopher Hasson's circulating in the ranks of America's white supremists.

What is clear, however, is that Hasson was inspired by others who came before him, and that he is likely very far from alone. 

Hasson is the product of both established traditions within white supremacist circles as well as new developments. He was at once inspired by old ideas and determined to go beyond them to create more havoc than any who had come before him.

The year and a half since the Unite the Right far-right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, ended in mayhem, the death of a protester and political turmoil, has been a rough time for the public facing and ostensibly political arm of the white supremacist movement in America. Those who marched in Charlottesville have to a large degree retreated, fleeing lawsuits, doxxing and personal scandal. Still, while public marches appear to be fewer and fewer, the period since Charlottesville has also been marred by individual episodes of extreme violence, suggesting that the wave of white supremacy that seemed to crest in Charlottesville is not so much receding as just changing in nature.

“I think what we’re starting to see now is people becoming more disheartened and disconnected from mainstream politics,” said Keegan Hankes. 

Hankes is a researcher at the Southern Poverty Law Center monitoring group, and he says they have been following a spike in far-right violence. “We believe we can expect more violence as people become increasingly frustrated and unmoored,” he said. 

Increased violence from far-right activists at a time when the administration is friendlier toward their goals is not without historical precedent, said the University of Chicago historian Kathleen Belew, the author of Bring the War Home: the White Power Movement and Paramilitary America. Belew explained that the far right’s affinity for Donald Trump might mean more violence during his time in the White House, not less. 

“The last time the movement underwent a major revolutionary turn was under the Reagan administration, during a moment of supposedly friendly state power,” she said.

Structurally these groups are evolving into "leaderless resistance" groups. These are individuals or small cells that are not directly tied to a larger movement where they would be easier to detect and monitor.

The fear is that, should Donald Trump be impeached or even defeated in the 2020 presidential election, these resistance groups could goad/inspire each other to violent terrorist attacks. Carl Bernstein addressed this threat a few days ago:



Across the United States, hate crimes have increased over each of the past three years.  The groups most commonly targeted were blacks and Jewish Americans. This is white nationalist bigotry at play, people who think a lot like many of the extremists Andrew Scheer and Dave Tkachuk embraced on Parliament Hill.

Meanwhile, in Britain, pro-Brexit UKIP, Nigel Farage's old bunch, is also taking a turn to the extreme right.

Membership has risen by about 50% over the 12 months from a low point a year ago, rapidly reshaping the party in the image of its leader, Gerard Batten, who describes Islam as “a death cult” and has appointed the anti-Muslim activist Tommy Robinson as an adviser. 

Conversations with more than two dozen current and former Ukip figures, many of them senior, have uncovered an exodus of more moderate senior members and local organisers, hollowing out Ukip’s ability to fight future elections.

...Members of Ukip’s youth wing have posted antisemitic and other extremist messages online, and there has been a rise in the popularity of news websites pushing the party’s message. 

Analysts warn that with Ukip’s poll numbers rising amid the continued deadlock over Brexit there is a danger the party could soon be reinvented as a street movement, becoming the first significant far-right force in UK politics since the demise of the British National party (BNP).

...The Guardian has seen antisemitic messages posted on an unofficial Ukip youth web group, including one saying that life under Hitler was “better than anywhere else on earth”, and another describing Jews as “hook-nosed masters” who control the media. The member involved has since been expelled.

...Of the 24 Ukip MEPs elected when the party topped the polls in the 2014 European elections, only seven remain. 

Insiders say this change has been reflected at local level, with many party organisers leaving. A source at one of Ukip’s former strongholds, Thanet in Kent, called the party operation there “a shadow of what it used to be”. 

But senior members say this has been balanced by an influx of predominantly younger members, many attracted by Ukip’s tie-up with YouTube personalities such as Paul Joseph Watson, from the far-right US conspiracy theory website Infowars.

What's the message for us? For starters, this is a transnational movement and it's here to stay. It is here in Canada. When the cranks take hold, and they always seem to prevail, they're perfectly adept at transforming a political protest movement into something akin to a nascent insurgency.

Justin Trudeau could do the country a great service if he stopped using CSIS and RCMP assets to surveil lawful pipeline protesters and used those limited resources to track a real danger to our democracy.