Racism, Bigotry Nothing New In Southwest United States
When people think of racism, they think deep south, they think Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, South Carolina. Truth is that the southwestern United States has long been a breeding ground of some of today’s most dangerous white supremacists.
Take Blake Masters, a far right, trump endorsed Republican candidate for U.S. Senate from Arizona. Masters said that “black people” are the cause of gun violence in America.
“It’s gangs. It’s people in Chicago [and] St. Louis shooting each other. Very often, you know, Black people, frankly,” Masters said, “Democrats don’t want to do anything about that.”
Masters is just the latest racist to come out of the Grand Canyon State. Remember Sheriff Joe Arpaio, the mother of all Arizona xenophobes and racist profiling extreme who was convicted of criminal contempt of court for denying a judge’s order to stop traffic patrols that allegedly targeted immigrants. Arpaio was later pardoned by trump. Arpaio ran for U.S. Senate in 2018 and lost. He later ran for sheriff of Maricopa County in 2020. He lost again.
Racism has been a large part of Arizona’s DNA ever since the U.S. came out on top in the Mexican-American War and seized what would become Arizona, setting the stage for the ongoing bigotry toward Mexican-Americans. At the same time, many members of indigenous nations in the state had either been slaughtered, or had died of disease, or had been confined to “reservations” and have also been subjected to decades of bigotry.
Arizona may not look like the deep south but the former Arizona Territory, referred to as Confederate Arizona, was an organized incorporated territory of the Confederate States that existed from Aug. 1, 1861 to May 26, 1865. The state was the sight of one significant Civil War battle on April 15, 1862, fought at Picacho Pass between 13 men from Company A, 1st California Cavalry (Union) and 10 Arizona Rangers (Confederacy).
Many people in the Arizona Territory were pro-slavery, with business connections in southern states, from which some had migrated. In addition, the territory lay below the old Missouri Compromise line of demarcation between slave and free states.
Soon after the 2017 white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va., the Ku Klux Klan focused recruiting in New Mexico. The KKK posted a message on their website saying that while their history in the state is limited, New Mexico’s location is a target for immigration problems. The message said the Klan was in New Mexico to recruit members “who want to safeguard the American way of life.”
In 2013, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) identified two Ku Klux Klan cells, two anti-Muslim groups, a skinhead group and an anti-Semitic group in New Mexico and a Klan cell in Colorado. The Klan cells were the Loyal White Knights of the Klu Klux Klan in Eckert, Colo. and two chapters of Loyal White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan in Silver City, N.M.
Oklahoma, site of the infamous Tulsa race massacre in 1921, is home to the United White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan in Shawnee; United White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan in Oklahoma City; and United White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan in Tulsa.
The SPLC defined a hate group as an organization with “beliefs or practices that attack or malign an entire class of people, typically for their immutable characteristics.” In 2017, the SPLC named a number of hate groups in the southwest including.
Arizona: ACT for America is the nation’s largest anti-Muslim organization, which has organized rallies in support of trump. Also, Alliance Defending Freedom, American Border Patrol, American Vanguard, Bomb Islam, Faithful Word Baptist Church, Family Watch International, Forza Nuova, Free American, Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints, Israel United In Christ, Nation of Islam, National Socialist Movement, Soldiers of Odin, The Daily Stormer, United Families International, US Border Guard, and Vinlanders Social Club.
Colorado: ACT for America, Aryan Strikeforce, Brother Nathanael Foundation, Colorado Alliance for Immigration Reform, Family Research Institute, Generations With Vision, Israel United In Christ, MSR Productions, Nation of Islam, National Socialist Movement, Pray in Jesus Name Project, The Scriptures for America Ministries, Soldiers of Odin, Team America Political Action Committee, The Daily Stormer and Wolves of Vinland.
New Mexico: Aggressive Christianity, a militaristic Christian fundamentalist new religious movement founded in 1981 by James and Deborah Green. In 2018, its leaders were sentenced to prolonged prison terms on charges of sexual abuse.
Oklahoma: Aryan Nations Sadistic Souls Motorcycle Club, Israel United In Christ, Israelite Church of God in Jesus Christ, Israelite School of Universal Practical Knowledge, Nation of Islam and Windsor Hills Baptist Church.
Wyoming: National Socialist Movement and Wolves of Vinland, a white nationalist and racist group that uses white nationalist symbols such as the swastika. Also, the Bayou Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, with chapters in Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, and other areas of the Southern U.S.
The Colorado Klan of the 1920s had its racist and anti-Semitic elements, but its primary targets were recent Roman Catholic immigrants, especially Italians. KKK-controlled legislators introduced proposals such as firing all Catholics and Jews on the University of Colorado faculty, and outlawing the use of sacramental wine (which was still allowed under Prohibition). They also pushed to abolish state-sanctioned boards and commissions, and replace them with Klan members.
In the 1920s, Denver blacks attempted to integrate some neighborhoods, and several houses were bombed. There were no arrests but members of the Klan were suspected.
In the early 20th century, the Klan was active in campaigning for various elected officials in the southwest. The Klan dominated much of Colorado politics, even claiming then-Gov. Clarence Morley a member. Morley was the Klan’s handpicked candidate who tried to ban the Catholic Church from using sacramental wine and attempted to have the University of Colorado fire all Jewish and Catholic professors.
Rice W. Means, an American war hero elected in 1924 as a Republican U.S. Senator from Colorado, was the directing head of the Ku Klux Klan in the state.
Lawrence C. Phipps had support from the Klan in his successful bid for U.S. Senate from Colorado, where he served from 1919 to 1931.
William Bliss Pine was the Republican U.S. Senator from Oklahoma from 1925 to 1931. Bliss was a member of the Klan and received Klan support at a time when many Klansmen identified with the policies of the Southern Democrats and crossed party lines for the first time.
The most sensational accusation about the Klan involved a secret FBI internal from May 1964 that noted that an informant told the FBI that the Klan said it “had documented proof that President Johnson was formerly a member of the Klan in Texas during the early days of his political career.” The “documented proof” was not provided.
The memo, that was made public in 1993, noted that “Ned Touchstone, editor of ‘The Councilor,’ (a Louisiana newspaper), has been identified by a confidential informant as a member of the original Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. The source advised that in December 1963 that Touchstone claimed that the Klan had accumulated documented proof that President Johnson was formerly a member of the Klan in Texas during the early days of his political career.”
The Southern Poverty Law Center noted that far right hate groups were active in promoting and soliciting new members. There were 14,587 reports nationwide, the majority of 13,175 from the Patriot Front.
The Patriot Front is a white supremacist, neo-fascist hate group that split from the neo-Nazi organization Vanguard America after the Unite the Right rally in Virginia in 2017. According to the Anti-Defamation League, the group generated more than 82 percent of the racist, antisemitic, and other hateful propaganda tracked by the ADL in the United States in 2021, with 3,992 incidents and distribution in every state except Hawaii and Alaska.
As of April 27, 2022, the Southern Poverty Law Center identified 242 incidents in Arizona, including dissemination of 213 public fliers, 22 campus fliers and seven banners. The Patriot Front was identified in 186 of the situations.
In New Mexico, there were 33 incidents including 32 public fliers, with 31 from the Patriot Front.
In Oklahoma, there were a total of 253 reports, including 211 in public, 37 on campuses and five banners. The Patriot Front was responsible for 187 reports.
In Utah, there were 296 total reports with 264 public and 19 on campuses with the Patriot Front in the lead with 268.
Nevada had 83 total reports, with 68 public and 13 on campuses and the Patriot Front again the busiest with 41.
Wyoming had 94 total reports, with 80 public, nine campus and five banners. The Patriot Front was responsible for 51 reports.
Some of the most strident, far right wing candidates come from southwestern states. One is Republican Kari Lake, running for Arizona governor. Lake, a longtime Arizona news TV anchor with no political experience, has demanded that election officials “decertify” the election results, to give the 2020 presidential victory to trump. Lake is backed by trump, election conspiracists Mike Lindell and Michael Flynn and Capitol riot-linked Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz. Lake has called for Democratic Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, who is also a gubernatorial candidate this year, to be imprisoned for unspecified election crimes.
Another is Mark Finchem, a trump-backed Republican candidate for Arizona secretary of state. Finchem attended the “Stop the Steal” rally ahead of the Jan.6, 2021, Capitol riot and has also espoused QAnon-linked conspiracy theories and been linked to extremist groups.
A third far, far right winger is Ron Watkins, a GOP candidate for Congress from Arizona. Watkins has long been a prominent QAnon conspiracy theorist who has pushed the most bizarre conspiracy theory alleging that a cabal of liberal Satan-worshipping pedophiles are running a global child sex-trafficking ring and plotting against trump.
In Wyoming, state Sen. Anthony Bouchard is running to unseat Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo. Bouchard has suggested executing White House chief medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci.
Self-described “lifetime member” of the anti-government Oath Keepers, Wendy Rogers is running for reelection to the Arizona State Senate. She has supported Nick Fuentes, a white supremacist leader and organizer and is among the shrillest voices in the 2020 election-denial movement. On Dec. 5, 2021, Rogers tweeted, “The fake group called Patriot Front that marched on DC with US flags and shields with masks on are Feds. Probably the same Feds who were at the J6 event checking their watches.”
In November 2021, Neil Kumar, a Republican candidate for Congress from Arizona, attended a conference organized by American Renaissance, a white supremacist publication. During the conference, Kumar posted an image of himself posing with white supremacist Peter Brimelow, founder of the racist and anti-immigrant website VDare.
Abraham Hamadeh, a Republican candidate for Arizona Attorney General, tweeted on Dec. 27, 2021, “The corrupt media, deep state, the establishment, and even the COURTS worked to rob President Trump and the American people in November 2020. We will never forget — or forgive…”
And on Dec. 6, 2021, Josh Barnett, the congressional candidate from Arizona, tweeted, “You do understand that the underlying reason why we are experiencing the pain we are experiencing is because of a stolen election, right?”
Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., has a long history of extreme and often unsupported statements. On the floor of the House, he claimed that hundreds of thousands of fraudulent votes were cast in Arizona in 2020, although a dozen lawsuits and a $4 million audit sponsored by the Arizona Senate uncovered only a handful of illegal votes. He was censured by Congress last year for posting a cartoonish video showing him attacking and beheading a fellow congresswoman and attacking President Joe Biden.