“Heritage Not Hate” and White Nationalist Networks

On August 15, 2020, racists and the far-Right vow to rally at Stone Mountain outside Atlanta.  

An earlier alert discussed the upcoming rally and Stone Mountain Park’s history. We noted how two projects promoting the August 15 rallies – Protect the South and American Patriots USA – have their roots in neo-Nazi organizing. Both projects now try to build broader alliances through coded messaging.

We also mentioned the “Defending Stone Mountain” call to action from leaders of the Confederate States III% militia (CSIII%). CSIII% is a nominally non-racist far-Right group. In this update, we focus on these “Defending Stone Mountain” organizers and their ties to white nationalist networks. 

At the end of this update, we discuss a new white supremacist project from a long-familiar face who is also trying to agitate around the Confederate carvings on Stone Mountain.

“Heritage Not Hate”

The “Defending Stone Mountain” Facebook event is operated by a couple in Arkansas, Debbie Guin (“Dab Demere”) and Rodney Huffman. They claim to have been provided a permit for August 15 by Stone Mountain Park. A Facebook page for the couple, “Dab Demere/Rodney Huffman, Cs/hnh”, provides their affiliations: the CSIII% militia and “Heritage Not Hate” (HNH). Each of these projects has a separate private Facebook group. Under different titles, the “CS III% Recruiting page” was formed in November 2016 and “Heritage Not Hate main page” was created in January 2018. Guin and Huffman are listed as administrators for both groups. There is significant overlap between the two Facebook groups.

“Defending Stone Mountain” has claimed to be a show of opposition to the “Not Fucking Around Coalition” (NFAC), an armed Black militia that protested in Stone Mountain on July 4. However, the organizers of “Defending Stone Mountain” have a broader agenda against Black protest. For example, Guin posted to her Facebook page in June with an image referring to Black Lives Matter as “Burn Loot Murder”. Guin then commented: “The BLM is no better then [sic] the KKK. […] BLM want to wipe the white race out”. When one of her contacts replied that “The blacks are worse [than the KKK]”, she liked the comment.

Portraying Black anti-racist protest movements as violently racist and white people as under attack is classic racism. However, by pretending that the shrinking Ku Klux Klan sets the limits of actual white supremacy, Guin claims her group is not racist. This strategy provides mainstream cover while still attracting the support of more virulent racists. Little more than two weeks after these comments, Guin launched the “Defending Stone Mountain” event page which soon gained white supremacist interest. Recent commenters on that event page include Randall Wiley Smith, a Georgia former member of the Southern White Knights of the KKK who more recently helped lead the short-lived “Aryan Nations Worldwide”.  

The “Heritage Not Hate” private Facebook group maintained by Guin, her fiancé, and some helpers has a membership list that includes unambiguous white nationalists. This is despite HNH administrators asking for hate group members to identify themselves when joining. HNH leaders Guin and Huffman, plus at least one other HNH administrator, are personally connected to white nationalists on Facebook. The overall pattern of connections suggests affinity between “Heritage Not Hate” and the white power scene, with clear bridges between the two.

(a)    Amanda and Charles Eli Belcher

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Amanda (maiden name Lawson) and Charles Eli Belcher of Tennessee are well-connected white nationalists who have promoted the fractured Aryan Nations (AN). Charles Belcher, who goes by “Eli Belcher” online, joined the HNH Facebook group in June 2018, while his wife Amanda was added to the group by HNH leader Debbie Guin in March this year. Both the Belchers are also connected to another member of the HNH admin team named Chuck Steiner. 

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In Tennessee, there is a white prison gang named “Aryan Nations”, whose name stems from the earlier white supremacist group of the same name. Two of Amanda Belcher’s Facebook profiles have posts stating: “114%”. This is short for the first and fourteenth letters of the alphabet, or A.N. for Aryan Nations. This code is used by the Tennessee gang. The Belchers are linked to obvious white prison gang members on their social media.

However, there are clear links between the Belchers and a faction of the original Aryan Nations, rather than the prison gang named in tribute. Five years ago, a secondary account for Charles Belcher was connected to a leader for one AN faction, Morris Gulett. Charles Belcher also advertised the Gulett AN faction on Facebook the same year. This January, Charles Belcher was Facebook friends with the now-deleted “Windel Winkler” account for Shaun Winkler. Winker is a longtime white supremacist who once operated the “Aryan Nations Knights” Klan group of Gulett’s AN. Shaun Winkler’s wife, Shealyn, was connected on the VKontakte (VK) social networking site to Amanda Belcher, but Amanda Belcher’s account has now been removed for violating VK’s terms of service. 

At the time of writing, the original AN is in disarray. Individuals claim its legacy, yet all major factions have collapsed. The Southern Poverty Law Center, which compiles an annual “Hate Map”, listed no Aryan Nations groups in its most recent 2019 report. Although the Belchers may have ties to the Tennessee prison gang, they also have historic ties to the better-known white supremacist group. Amanda Belcher’s online boasts of “AN” affiliation suggest that she sees herself as continuing the white supremacist group’s efforts, hoping for a revival.

(b)    Charles Edward Lincoln

Charles Edward Lincoln III is a disbarred former attorney in New Orleans, Louisiana. Over the last several years, Lincoln has become increasingly vocal in efforts to preserve Confederate monuments. Lincoln is also embedded within the white nationalist movement. In 2017, Lincoln appeared on broadcasts for The Daily Kenn, a racist website. Lincoln spoke at 2018’s “Unite the Right 2” in Washington, DC, the sequel to the violent 2017 rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. 

In early 2019, white nationalists tried to hold a rally at Stone Mountain, but their permit was denied by the Park and their organizing collapsed. Lincoln covered this failure in video broadcasts featuring the rally’s organizers, John Michael Estes and Michael Carothers (AKA Michael Weaver), who had fallen out with each other. In 2019, Lincoln was also listed as the Treasurer for the National Committee of the American Freedom Party, a white nationalist and antisemitic party. By the end of the year, Lincoln was replaced. Lincoln traveled to speak at a far-Right rally in Dahlonega, north Georgia, in September 2019. The rally was hosted by Chester Doles, whose involvement in the white power movement spans decades. Lincoln and Doles have kept in contact since the Dahlonega rally.

Lincoln appears in both the Confederate States III% private Facebook group and the “Heritage Not Hate” main group. He is friends on Facebook with “Defending Stone Mountain” organizers Debbie Guin and Rodney Huffman, as well as a third HNH administrator, Chuck Steiner.

Heritage and Hate

The web of associations we have traced suggests that white nationalists are closely following the “Heritage Not Hate” scene. Through friendships on Facebook and by joining the HNH private group, they express sympathy and support. 

Heritage Not Hate organizers may not know every detail of their online associates’ histories and agenda, but this likely would not matter. For example, CSIII%/HNH leader Debbie Guin is Facebook friends with Joseph Slonecki of Pennsylvania. Slonecki’s Facebook cover image is propaganda about “diversity” being forced on white countries and is unmissable by anyone connected to him. HNH admin Steiner is also friends with Slonecki. The numerous threats in the (HNH-alligned) CSIII% private group about shooting Black Lives Matter protesters further suggest that these groups are petri dishes for racism.

In mapping the links between HNH and white nationalists such as the Belchers and Lincoln, our point is not that we know these individuals’ plans for August 15^th. Rather, our view is that HNH is intertwined with active white nationalists and provides a welcoming space for them. As a result, white nationalists will surely bring their crowd on the day. This would be the case even without other projects that have clear white power ties – such as “Protect the South” and “American Patriots USA” – also promoting August 15^th.

The map of relationships also shows how close the CSIII%/HNH “Defending Stone Mountain” organizers are to one planner for 2019’s “Rock Stone Mountain II” white power rally. That white nationalist rally was announced for Stone Mountain on Superbowl Saturday, 2019, but fell apart before the day. 

The organizer in question is Michael Carothers, also known as Michael Weaver. Carothers operates the racist White Information Network blog. For several years, Carothers was a member of the National Alliance, a neo-Nazi group. He continues to support the National Alliance’s politics if not the current state of that organization. Carothers was a Rock Stone Mountain II spokesman and publicist. In our previous article about August 15, we noted that Carothers W.I.N. blog recently alluded to further protest at Stone Mountain.

Until recently, Carothers seemed to be two degrees removed from the CSIII%/HNH organizers, since he was not in direct contact but rather connected to other white nationalists that kept in contact with the HNH leaders. Carothers, however, has now befriended “Defending Stone Mountain” organizer Rodney Huffman on Facebook. We know that this is a recent development because “Michael Weaver” still appeared in Huffman’s “recently added” Facebook friends in late July. 

Both Carothers and Charles Lincoln are close to Chester Doles, the founder and leader of American Patriots USA, which is also calling for August 15 rallies on Stone Mountain. Carothers has known Doles for two decades, from the time Doles led the Georgia unit of the National Alliance. Last year, Carothers served as a behind-the-scenes networker and promoter for Doles’ September 14 rally in Dahlonega. Carothers was a member of American Patriots USA starting from its first meeting in December, although the organization now claims he has stepped away. Chester Doles is banned from Facebook but was connected with both Carothers and Amanda Belcher on VKontakte until those two had their accounts blocked for violations of VK’s terms of service.

“Monumental Patriots”

HNH also features another familiar face.

In mid-July, John Michael Estes joined the “Heritage Not Hate” private group operated by Guin and Huffman. Estes is the white supremacist who organized the “Rock Stone Mountain” rally at Stone Mountain in April 2016 with help from Klansman Gregory Todd Calhoun. Estes also spearheaded the later “Rock Stone Mountain II” attempt.

Estes’ only post in HNH so far has been to promote his new Facebook page, “Monumental Patriots” which started in late June. The page is unmistakably Estes’ work, continually repeating the same slogan about white replacement that Estes used to promote his racist rallies. The “Monumental Patriots” page stokes antisemitism, shares white nationalist content, and celebrates the founder of the American Nazi Party as a “great man.” The page features half a dozen posts about Stone Mountain, including complaints about John Bankhead of the Stone Mountain Memorial Association. Estes has not yet called his page’s followers to join the August 15^th protests or directly addressed the upcoming rallies, although he highlighted the July 4 NFAC protest at Stone Mountain as evidence that the Park was bowing to “communists”. 

Estes would not have joined Heritage Not Hate unless he was interested in HNH organizing and hoped to politically gain from it. When Estes shared a “Monumental Patriots” post dog-whistling the theme of white genocide to the HNH private group, nobody there raised an eyebrow. 

Conclusion 

Debbie Guin and Robert Huffman are behind a main call for far-Right protests at Stone Mountain on August 15^th. They are affiliated with the Confederate States III% militia as well as “Heritage Not Hate”. HNH is a misleading name, since the couple amplify racism and are closely intertwined with the white nationalist scene. August 15^th has also been promoted by different projects, which have their own ties to white nationalism.

Stone Mountain’s Confederate carvings are a tribute to white supremacy and a focal point for racist organizing. Under the perverse banner of “Heritage Not Hate”, the CSIII%/HNH organizers have issued a call to action that begs for white nationalist participation. When white supremacist movements are helped to recruit and grow, they leave terror in their wake. They must be opposed strongly and from the start. 

This article supplements our earlier overview of far-Right organizing for August 15. For information on anti-racist community responses on the day, see the FrontLine Organizations Working to End Racism (FLOWER) coalition. Please spread the word in your place of worship, political organization, or community group and show up on August 15^th.

If you have further information on the far-Right organizers mentioned in this report, please get in touch.