Tracking and Countering the Far Right since 2016
The FrontLine Organizations Working to End Racism (FLOWER) coalition is organizing to oppose the August 15th far-Right and racist rallies at Stone Mountain outside Atlanta.
For more information, visit the FLOWER website. Also see the coalition’s Facebook and Twitter for updates.
See you on the 15th!
Update 7/19/2020: The III% Security Force, an Islamophobic far-Right militia headed by Chris Hill, yesterday reversed its earlier position and stated it will rally at Stone Mountain on August 15th.
On August 15, 2020, far-Right demonstrators will rally at Stone Mountain Park outside Atlanta. The August 15 rally, held at the birthplace of the modern Ku Klux Klan, is being promoted and partially organized by figures tied to neo-Nazism and the white supremacist movement. Although some organizers claim to represent “Heritage Not Hate”, a closer look at who is mobilizing shows that August 15 will bring an influx of racists to the surrounding community.
Over the course of two years, Ethan Edward Jones of Cartersville, Georgia has gone from posting racist memes on the internet and fantasizing about the Confederacy, to membership in the white nationalist League of the South (LOS) and writing regularly for racist Southern secessionist websites. Jones is currently in his final year at Woodland High School in Cartersville. He is not only a prolific propagandist, urging others to join LOS, but he celebrates violence by white supremacists. Since Jones is now an adult and is deeply entrenched within the white nationalist movement, we are publishing this information to alert those around him.
For months, white supremacists promised to rally on February 2nd – the Saturday before the Super Bowl – at Stone Mountain Park outside Atlanta. Despite having hyped their rally since September, their rally completely unraveled in the days leading up to the event. Different “Rock Stone Mountain II” organizers gave different accounts of the collapse. On the 2nd, approximately 150 anti-racists held a celebration march in the community of Stone Mountain, which culminated in burning a Klansman in effigy. Stone Mountain Park – the would-be site of the white supremacist mobilization – was closed for the day, which the Park had abruptly announced the evening before. On Saturday, lines of police in full riot gear waited in formation just behind the closed-off pedestrian gate to the Park.
We have covered white supremacist planning for “Rock Stone Mountain II” since October of last year, when we provided not just an overview of the scheduled event, but also profiled twelve people who had signed up as “going” on Facebook. As we stressed from the beginning, “Rock Stone Mountain II” was an explicitly white nationalist rally, whose initial two leaders were neo-Nazi John Michael Estes and the Georgia Grand Dragon for the International Keystone Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, Greg Calhoun. Both these figures were involved with the first “Rock Stone Mountain” at Stone Mountain Park in April 2016, which was outnumbered almost ten-to-one by counter-protesters and met with fierce resistance.
If the “Rock Stone Mountain II” organizers were hoping to do better than their 2016 event, it soon became apparent that they faced steep challenges. In early November, the Stone Mountain Memorial Association – which operates Stone Mountain Park – announced that it would not grant a permit for “Rock Stone Mountain II”. (The Park permitted and protected the initial “Rock Stone Mountain” white power rally of April 2016.) In addition, a coalition of anti-racists – operating under the name FrontLine Organization Working to End Racism, or F.L.O.W.E.R. – was organizing mass opposition to the Klan-/neo-Nazi event, vowing to show up and confront the white supremacists on the day. Continue reading “Victory: The Collapse of “Rock Stone Mountain II””
On the day before the Superbowl, February 2nd, Klansmen and neo-Nazis plan to hold a “Rock Stone Mountain II” rally at Stone Mountain Park outside Atlanta. We have written about this white power event extensively since it was announced, providing an overview of the blatantly white supremacist rally, highlighting racists listed as “going” on the Facebook event page, and covering Stone Mountain Park’s denial of a permit for the rally. Stone Mountain Park’s decision has not deterred the “Rock Stone Mountain II” organizers. Here, we provide updates on “Rock Stone Mountain” organizing since the Park issued their decision in early November.
Continue reading “Updates on February 2nd “Rock Stone Mountain II” White Supremacist Rally”
Citing safety concerns and potential disruption to services at their Park, the Stone Mountain Memorial Association has denied a permit to the “Rock Stone Mountain II” white power rally advertised for February 2, 2019. However, at the time of writing Rock Stone Mountain organizers have not publicly canceled their event. Since it is possible that the event’s Klan and white supremacist organizers may try to proceed without a permit or make other plans for the day, we are still asking all anti-racists and community allies to be ready to respond on February 2.
In denying the permit for February 2, 2019, the Memorial Association cited anti-racist protest at the park during the initial “Rock Stone Mountain” of April 2016. Continue reading “Permit Denied to White Supremacist “Rock Stone Mountain II” Rally”
Is the upcoming “Rock Stone Mountain II” rally about “resistance to communism” as its current Facebook event page claims, or is it an overt white supremacist gathering? This article highlights a dozen individuals who marked themselves as “going” to the “Rock Stone Mountain” event outside Atlanta, which is scheduled for February 2nd, 2019. Although there is no guarantee that everyone listed will attend, looking at those who plan to show up gives a clear indication of the rally’s white supremacist and extreme-Right character.
We used two Facebook “going” lists for Rock Stone Mountain II for this article. First, we used the list of people who said they were “going” on the current Facebook event page. We also downloaded the “going” list for an earlier Rock Stone Mountain II event page, which was eventually deleted by Facebook. We used this earlier list as a source for the last few names discussed in this article.
Listed as “Going” on the Current “Rock Stone Mountain II” Facebook Event
John Michael Estes is the primary organizer for “Rock Stone Mountain II”, just as he was for the first “Rock Stone Mountain” in 2016. We have already discussed Estes’ worldview in an earlier article written before the first Rock Stone Mountain rally. Estes is a white supremacist who was radicalized by ordering books from the Aryan Nations while in prison. Estes has since that time moved through a variety of white power circles, from racist “Christian Identity” religion (which believes that whites are God’s true chosen people) to racially-charged versions of Odinism. Continue reading “Who Are the White Supremacists Attending February’s “Rock Stone Mountain II” Rally?”
Summary: Since the end of 2017, the fascist/white supremacist organization Patriot Front has distributed thousands of flyers throughout Metro Atlanta and placed a significant number of stickers and posters throughout the region. Patriot Front’s mission is to rebrand neo-Nazi and white supremacist belief as American patriotism. Patriot Front formed as a splinter group from Vanguard America, after someone linked to Vanguard America murdered a protester at last year’s “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia – a bloody event which led to a reversal of fortune for organized white nationalists in the US. Although Patriot Front’s existence has been short, the organization has been growing. Political violence is at the center of Patriot Front’s apocalyptic vision of national rebirth from the ashes of “failed” democracy. In Georgia, the heart of Patriot Front is someone who goes by the name of “Chris GA” in online Patriot Front discussion. Through conducting additional research on “Chris GA” we have identified him as Lawrenceville, Georgia resident Aaron Christopher Krueger. This identification was further verified through surveillance on Krueger’s Lawrenceville address.
Introduction
On April 21, 2018, the National Socialist Movement (NSM) held a small rally at the Greenville Street Park in Newnan, Georgia, 45 minutes southwest of Atlanta. The NSM’s application to use the Park — accepted by the City of Newnan for $50 — stated that the Nazi organization would bring fifty to a hundred participants for its white power rally. This was expected to be one of the largest displays of open white supremacists since the bloody “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia last year. In the end, the NSM attracted approximately half its minimum projected attendance and was protested by several hundred. To create conditions for the NSM event to take place, the entire City of Newnan was militarized, with approximately 700 police from various agencies swamping the City, mobilizing a large number of military surplus vehicles, then brutalizing and arresting anti-racist protesters. We are proud of the anti-racist protesters in Newnan on Saturday. Both “antifa” and other anti-racists continued to protest even as police pointed guns at them for no apparent reason, and repeatedly charged into the #NoNaziNewnan anti-racist assembly to violently arrest demonstrators. Further, the large organized presence from the Black community in Coweta County — visible directly across the street from the Nazi rally — was inspiring. The NSM event flopped. Anti-racists and anti-fascists have much to be pleased with from the 21st, despite the fresh instances of repression which we must now address. State displays of force such as we witnessed in Newnan seem increasingly likely as anti-fascists move forward in the South. The same is probably true throughout the US. In our conclusion, we will briefly discuss ramifications of this changed strategic situation.
