White Supremacy

Medgar Evers's Memory Shows Us Unchecked Violent Rhetoric Will Yield Political Violence

by Claire Potter

"Medgar Evers died at the hands of people whose ideological (and, in some cases, actual) descendants threaten our democracy with violence today."

Trump and DeSantis Two Peas in a White Nationalist Pod

by Clarence Lusane

Any Republican candidate will need to lean in to the politics of white Christian nationalism ascendant on the right; Trump has needed the MAGA movement as much as it's needed him. 

Texas Shooting Highlights Long History of Anti-Black Violence in Latino Communities

by Cecilia Márquez

History shows that there have long been strains of anti-black racism in Latino communities, and that the categories "white" and "latino" are not mutually exclusive. Understanding today's far right requires attention to those details. 

With the New Twitter, the Right Wing Disinfo is Coming from the Top

by Donald Moynihan

"Musk often refers to himself as moderate or independent, but he routinely treats far-right fringe figures as people worth taking seriously—and, more troublingly, as reliable sources of information."

Texas Mall Shooting Raises Question: What Makes a Person of Color Embrace Far-Right Extremism?

NPR's Leila Fadel talks to Daniel Martinez HoSang, a professor at Yale University, about what attracts people of color to far-right violent movements rife with bigotry.

150 Years Ago, the Colfax Massacre Was the Largest Single Attack on Black People's Democratic Rights

by Gwendolyn Midlo-Hall and Keri Leigh Merritt

The horrific explosion of violence in April 1973, as white southerners refused to accept the results of the 1872 election, was the climax of years of federal abandonment of a commitment to protect the rights and lives of Black people, who were left to fight for democracy on their own. 

The Real Story Behind the Expulsion of the Two Black Members of the "Tennessee Three"

by Jemar Tisby

The disproportionate response of the Tennessee House's majority—the expulsion of two Black members for the violation of decorum rules during a gun control protest—echoes the efforts of the so-called "Redeemers" of the Reconstruction era to reassert white supremacy through expulsions. 

Why is a Senate Office Building Still Named for an Unrepentant Segregationist and White Supremacist?

Texas Senator Ted Cruz decried efforts to "sanitize history" and argued that "the journey of the United States has been a steady journey toward freedom" by way of explaining why he did not support removing segregationist Senator Richard Russell's name from a Senate office building. But few Democrats will candidly support change either.

Jefferson Cowie: A Long History of White Grievance Aimed at the Federal Government

A microhistory of one Alabama county suggests that "freedom" has always been imagined by many white Americans to encompass their ability to dominate or exploit others, a vision that has been antagonistic to federal intervention.

There's No Choice But to Fight for a Better America

by Siva Vaidhyanathan

"We often misdiagnose our current malady as one of 'polarization.' That’s wrong. We have one rogue, ethno-authoritarian party and one fairly stable and diverse party."

Trump Keeps Boosting White Supremacists

Post Columnist Greg Sargent discusses Trump's meeting with white supremacist Nick Fuentes as a PR coup for the far right and an affirmation that they are part of Trump's base. 

There are No "Lone Wolves"

Building on the work of Kathleen Belew and others, the Times editorial board argues that recent episodes of racial terrorism are part of a global white nationalist movement. 

This White Supremacist Author Has Quietly Been Un-Canceled by the Right

Sam Francis's 1990s writings have been hailed as a model of the angry white working class politics of Trumpism, but a critic notes that this obscures the deep current of white supremacy that runs through his thinking. Conservatives once pushed Francis out of their movement; is MAGA bringing him back in? 

Belew to Maddow: Fascist Groups are "Nationwide Paramilitary Army"

Kathleen Belew, an expert on white nationalist paramilitary groups, talks with Rachel Maddow about why individual incidents with racist extremist groups should be seen as part of a single, larger groundswell.

Far Right Extremism, Paramilitarization, and Misogyny – Statement of Alexandra Stern to the January 6 Committee

by Alexandra Minna Stern

The alt-right groups represented at the Capitol on January 6 drew organizing power from online communities where grievance politics around race and gender flourished. Key features were heavy doses of irony that gave deniability to violent rhetoric and extreme misogyny. 

The Unity that Follows Tragedy Shouldn't Obscure Buffalo's History of Racism

by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor

The invented image of a "City of Good Neighbors" has been a rhetorical one-way street in Buffalo, with calls for unity gaining more traction than calls for justice or equality. 

The Secessionist Roots of January 6

by Elizabeth R. Varon

"The story of Southern secession provides illuminating evidence that the Jan. 6 insurgency was, indeed, precedented, rooted in long-standing efforts to preempt, delegitimize and suppress Black voting."

"Patriot Front" Plan to Attack Pride Shows Connections of White Supremacy and Anti-LGBTQ Politics

The arrest of neonazis in Idaho who planned an attack on a Pride event echoes a 1937 raid on a Miami gay nightclub by the KKK, says historian Julio Capo, Jr. 

Proud Boys Indictment Charges Attempt to Overthrow Government. Does it Matter?

by Heather Cox Richardson

The charge of seditious conspiracy by a paramilitary organization with close ties to the Trumpian Right is incredibly serious, but will it be met with a shrug?

Another Tragic Eruption of "Great Replacement" Violence

by Glenn C. Altschuler and Stuart M. Blumin

"While the specific targets and methods of spreading this theory may be new, White native-born Americans worrying about being replaced is not. And history demonstrates that the theory has been repeatedly used to legitimize discrimination and deadly violence."