The Making of A Great America Uprooting the Spirit of Racism

Civil War

Hunting black men to start a ‘race war’

James Harris Jackson went to New York with a Roman sword and an apocalyptic ideology. He stabbed a stranger in the back and left him to die.

The man stumbled into the police precinct in Hell’s Kitchen late one night, staggering toward a tall reception desk painted black and blue. Before the desk officer could ask the man his business, he collapsed on a bench, dripping blood.

When officers pulled up his shirt, they found a series of deep stab wounds in his dark skin. As they struggled to stem the bleeding, they asked the man who had attacked him, but he could only groan. He died minutes later at a Manhattan hospital without saying a word.

Police scrambled to make sense of the March 20, 2017, slaying. A witness had seen the victim tussling with someone on the street half a block away. Surveillance footage showed a young white man with a black coat and neatly parted blond hair fleeing the scene.

But the motive was a mystery. And by the following evening, police still had no leads on the suspect — not even a name.

As two dozen officers gathered in Times Square — nine blocks from the crime scene — at midnight to continue the search, a solitary figure suddenly emerged from the stream of tourists. His flaxen hair was carefully combed.

“I’m the guy you’re looking for,” James Harris Jackson said, calmly slipping off his black jacket and setting it down in front of an officer. “There are knives in that coat.”

For the next five hours, in a videotaped interview that would later be entered into the court record, Jackson proudly told detectives how he had stabbed Timothy Caughman in the back with a Roman-style short sword simply because he was black.

Caughman, the 28-year-old Army veteran explained, was “practice” for a bigger attack in which Jackson aimed to kill as many black men with white women as he could.

“I was looking to get black men scared and have them do reciprocal attacks,” he said, “and inspire white men to do similar things.”

If the detectives really wanted to understand him, Jackson said, they should read the manifesto he had planned on sending to the media.

“The Racial World War starts today,” it began. “God has ordered us to eliminate the Negro races from the face of the earth for the good of all mankind.”

Dylann Roof drove toward second black church after Charleston shooting, prosecutors say

COLUMBIA, S.C. -- The man convicted of killing nine worshippers during Bible study at a black church drove toward a second black church after the shootings, according to South Carolina prosecutors who oversaw the federal case against him.

In court documents unsealed Tuesday, federal prosecutors said they had GPS evidence showing that Dylann Roof exited the interstate and drove toward a church in Summerville, about 30 miles from Charleston’s Emanuel AME Church, after committing the June 2015 slayings. According to the government, Branch AME Church also had a sign that advertised a Wednesday night Bible study…

During trial, prosecutors presented evidence showing Roof had lists of other black churches in his car when he was arrested in Shelby, North Carolina. During a lengthy confession the day after the shootings, Roof told FBI agents he was too tired after the Emanuel killings to carry out any other violence.

The 21-year-old accused of killing nine black churchgoers in Charleston, South Carolina, had been “planning something like that for six months,” his roommate has revealed, as friends recalled Dylann Roof’s tirades against African Americans “taking over the world” and his desire to ignite “a civil war.”

“He said he wanted to start a civil war. He said he was going to do something like that and then kill himself.”

Boogaloo Boys Aim to Provoke 2nd US Civil War

WASHINGTON - In April, three U.S. military veterans in the state of[IT4]  Nevada began plotting attacks on government targets to bring about a second American civil war – what they called the "Boogaloo."

The three men – Army reservist Andrew Lynam, former Navy seaman Stephen Parshall, and former Air Force airman William Loomis – had apparently met on a Facebook group created by adherents to the Boogaloo ideology, according to federal documents.

They were part of a growing online movement of extremists bridling at government lockdowns imposed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

During the coming weeks, the trio, carrying assault rifles and wearing military-style vests, met in the woods outside Las Vegas and attended several “Reopen Nevada” rallies. Their goal: disrupting the U.S. economy and government.

The three men – Army reservist Andrew Lynam, former Navy seaman Stephen Parshall, and former Air Force airman William Loomis – had apparently met on a Facebook group created by adherents to the Boogaloo ideology, according to federal documents.

They were part of a growing online movement of extremists bridling at government lockdowns imposed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

During the coming weeks, the trio, carrying assault rifles and wearing military-style vests, met in the woods outside Las Vegas and attended several “Reopen Nevada” rallies. Their goal: disrupting the U.S. economy and government…

While President Donald Trump and his administration blamed radical left-wing groups like Antifa for stoking violence, to date, out of more than 70 people arrested on federal charges, not a single case has been tied to Antifa. In contrast, federal prosecutors have charged Boogaloo Boys in at least three cases in Nevada, California, and Texas.

The men were arrested on May 30 and indicted last week on federal charges of conspiracy to cause destruction during the protests and possession of a Molotov cocktail. 

The arrests, the first of known Boogaloos, put a spotlight on a shadowy movement. Law enforcement officials say it is one of a handful of radical groups – both from the left and right of the ideological spectrum – that have attempted to advance their cause by exploiting nationwide protests against police violence and government lock-downs of the economy...

Court documents filed in the Nevada case and in the killing of a protective service officer in California reveal how Boogaloo Boys are willing to co-opt practically any anti-government or anti-establishment event – from demonstrations against lockdowns to Black Lives Matter protests – to pursue the goal of bringing about a violent confrontation with the government.  

‘These individuals made an effort to capitalize on both, which shows that it's not really a right or left mentality for these guys so much as anti-government,’ said Katie Paul, a senior researcher at the Washington-based Tech Transparency Project, which has investigated the movement’s activity on Facebook.    

Even before Floyd's death, Paul said, some Boogaloo members sought to take advantage of demonstrations prompted by the killing of an African American jogger, Ahmaud Arbery, by a white father and son in Georgia. 

‘They actually posted [an] article [about Arbery's death] in one of the private Facebook groups and said, is this a recruiting opportunity?’ Paul said. 

Minds are made up about Kyle Rittenhouse, the 17-year-old gunman charged in the killing of two protesters in Kenosha, Wis. Graphic amateur video of the chaotic scene and early reports from authorities tell a partial story, and politics fills in the blanks.

On the left, the suspect is portrayed as the embodiment of today's domestic terrorism threat: A cop-idolizing wannabe militiaman who allegedly traveled across state lines to confront protesters with a gun he was not legally allowed to possess. On the right, the teen's actions instantly were justified as self-defense, the natural end to "Democrat cities" letting radical leftists maraud through the streets.

Extremism researchers say they've watched with alarm as misinformation, sloppy labeling and political divisions shape the public narrative about Rittenhouse. Part of the problem, they say, is that he appears to fall into a hard-to-define category of gunman that's increasingly showing up at protests: the self-styled vigilante.

Mark Pitcavage, senior research fellow at the Anti-Defamation League's Center on Extremism, calls the volunteer gunmen "armed vigilante groups," though he stresses that "group" is a bit of a misnomer because they're often pop-up, local factions without the organization of, say, established militias.

"They're sort of like guys in the neighborhood," Pitcavage said. "And they tend to be culturally conservative. They tend to be right wing. They're not typically extremists, although there's nothing that could exclude some extremists being among them."

Even if they don't fit into a neat extremism category, analysts say, Rittenhouse and armed volunteers like him are still considered dangerous, symbolic of the broader threat of gun violence at protests.

HuffPost, citing data from researcher Alexander Reid Ross, reported that white vigilantes and far-right actors have shown up to oppose Black Lives Matter protests in the United States at least 497 times this year.

Rittenhouse is emerging as the poster boy for that phenomenon. Outraged by the shootings, activists rushed to pin him with various far-right ideologies. Hundreds, probably thousands, of social media posts describe him as a militia member or a white supremacist. Some have referred to him, without evidence, as part of the misogynistic incel movement.

Reporters and researchers across the country are digging into Rittenhouse's background and, so far, they've come up with no clear-cut evidence of ties to antigovernment militias or to the "boogaloo boys," armed men in Hawaiian shirts calling for violent revolution.

Social media accounts linked to Rittenhouse portrayed a police booster aligned with "Back the Blue," pro-cop activism widely seen as a racist response to Black Lives Matter. But as of Friday there was no indication of Rittenhouse's membership or support of groups categorized as traditional hate or extremist groups.

The kind of violence witnessed in Kenosha is straining Americans' vocabulary for what they're seeing. The murkiness of protests – and the growing presence of armed activists on the left – make it difficult to distinguish who's who among gun-toting people at the scene. Do we call them vigilantes? Counterprotesters? Militias? Violent extremists?

A Wave Of White Vigilante Violence

White vigilantes and far-right actors have shown up to oppose Black Lives Matter protests in the U.S. at least 497 times this year, according to data collected by Alexander Reid Ross, a doctoral fellow at the Center for Analysis of the Radical Right. He started gathering data on May 27, two days after police in Minneapolis killed George Floyd, and continued through this week. 

The dataset, which Ross shared with HuffPost, documents a staggering amount of violence directed at protesters by the far-right, including 64 cases of simple assault, 38 incidents of vigilantes driving cars into demonstrators, and nine times shots were fired at protesters. 

All told, six protesters were hit by vigilante bullets in this summer’s violence. Three died from their wounds. 

Ross’ dataset also includes 387 incidents of intimidation, such as people using racist slurs, making threats, and brandishing firearms. 

“There just isn’t really anything to compare it to,” Ross told HuffPost. “I’ve never seen anything like this in my life.” 

The data — which Ross gathered from social media posts, news reports, and the ACLED US Crisis Monitor with help from Political Research Associates and the Institute for Research and Education on Human Rights — includes some harrowing tales of violence. 

A U.S. Army sergeant, who had previously posted tweets about targeting Black Lives Matter activists, shot and killed a protester in Austin, Texas. 

Black Lives Matter protesters marching through a rural part of Bedford County, Pennsylvania, say a white man opened fire on them at night, striking one protester in the face. 

A man in Iowa City, Iowa, allegedly drove his car into a crowd of protesters and, according to a criminal complaint, later justified the attack by telling police the protesters needed “an attitude adjustment.” 

The steady drumbeat of such stories this summer has coincided with story after story of cops and national guardsmen openly supporting or collaborating with fascists and white vigilantes. 

Ross said his dataset includes about two dozen incidents of vigilantes receiving approval or support from law enforcement. A sheriff in Arizona, for example, announced he would form a “civilian posse” to help “suppress lawlessness” during a time of “widespread unrest.” 

In California, a sheriff’s deputy was spotted wearing a “III Percenters” militia patch on his uniform while policing a protest. And in Portland, Oregon, cops let the neo-fascist gang the Proud Boys attack protesters in the streets. 

SETH HERALD / REUTERS Armed members of a militia group gather at Michigan’s Capitol building in April ahead of a vote on the extension of Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s emergency declaration/stay-at-home order due to the coronavirus.

Disturbing images also emerged of police cozying up to far-right activists: A cop in Georgia was photographed fist-bumping an armed militia member, and cops in Philadelphia posed for a friendly photo with vigilantes who roamed the city’s streets with baseball bats. 

Still more stories emerged this summer of cops themselves relishing violence against protesters. 

A police chief in Sioux Rapids, Iowa, was suspended for two weeks after writing a Facebook comment encouraging people to drive their cars through Black Lives Matter demonstrators.

“HIT THE GAS AND HANG ON FOR THE SPEED BUMPS,” he wrote. 

And in Wilmington, North Carolina, three white police officers were fired after being caught on camera using racial slurs while discussing massacring Black protesters.

“We are just going to go out and start slaughtering them fucking niggers,” one officer said. 

“Wipe ’em off the fucking map,” the same officer said. “That’ll put ’em back about four or five generations.”

A report published this week by former FBI agent Mike German, now a fellow at New York University’s Brennan Center for Justice, documented how police ties to “white supremacist groups or far-right militant activities” have been uncovered in over a dozen states since 2000…

Nick Estes, a professor of American studies at the University of New Mexico and author of the book “Our History Is The Future,” remembers listening to the police scanner earlier this summer when the gun-toting militia group New Mexico Civil Guard turned up to harass and attack anti-racist protesters in Albuquerque. 

He said cops could be heard on the scanner referring to this group of vigilantes — founded by a neo-Nazi —  as “heavily armed friendlies.”

A short time later, one of those “friendlies” shot and badly injured an anti-racist protester. 

What’s happening now, he added, is “an intensification of that kind of citizen policing” in response to a growing tide of Black Lives Matter and anti-fascist organizing. 

Steven Gardiner, a research analyst at Political Research Associates, a social justice think tank that monitors the far-right, said there has been a “tremendous increase” in right-wing paramilitary activity this year. It gained momentum, he said, during protests against lockdown measurers meant to stem the spread of the coronavirus. Armed militias circled — and sometimes even entered — state Capitol buildings, showing the often hands-off approach with which governments often treat white vigilantes. 

At Black Lives Matter protests following the police killing of Floyd, disparate paramilitary and vigilante groups — Boogaloo Bois, III Percenters, Oath Keepers, Proud Boys, and white nationalists — became a regular fixture of right-wing counterprotests. 

“If you get counterprotesters showing up who are armed, cops are almost always facing towards the Black Lives Matter and racial justice protesters, not towards the armed counterprotesters,” Gardiner said. 

This, he argued, has created an atmosphere in which paramilitary groups feel emboldened. 

“Going forward, we need to seriously reconsider the permissiveness with which we are allowing armed paramilitaries to roam the streets of our nation’s towns and cities, as if this is normal,” Gardiner said. “There’s nothing normal about this. We don’t want to be living in a war zone.”  

What I have tried to capture in excerpts from the previous articles is that there are groups both on the far-right and others which have no true allegiance, that are trying to ignite America’s next civil war. Both these groups have figured out that the target most ripe for this type of national upheaval is race relations. Dylann Roof thought that the killing of black church members in several churches might start such a war. Kevin Piner, one of the three Wilmington, N.C. officers fired for using racial slurs, was accidentally being recorded when he “predicted Black Lives Matter protests would soon lead to civil war. ‘I’m ready,’ Piner told another officer, adding that he planned to buy an assault rifle.”

One of the statistics cited was that “White vigilantes and far-right actors have shown up to oppose Black Lives Matter protests in the U.S. at least 497 times this year.” The data “documents a staggering amount of violence directed at protesters by the far-right, including 64 cases of simple assault, 38 incidents of vigilantes driving cars into demonstrators, and nine times shots were fired at protesters. All told, six protesters were hit by vigilante bullets in this summer’s violence. Three died from their wounds.” 

It was also noted above that President Trump and his administration continue to blame “radical left-wing groups like Antifa for stoking violence, to date, out of more than 70 people arrested on federal charges, not a single case has been tied to Antifa.” But what if what the president has been misrepresenting to be true actually came true? What if Black Lives Matter and other “radical left” protesters matched the far right’s (III Percenters, Oath Keepers, Proud Boys, and white nationalists) lead and increasingly showed up with weapons? The answer, civil war. Dr. King predicted a similar outcome if the Church, in particular the white Church, in America, did not support his efforts to keep civil rights protests non-violent.

“My Dear Fellow Clergymen:

While confined here in the Birmingham city jail, I came across your recent statement calling my present activities "unwise and untimely."…

You deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations. I am sure that none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes. It is unfortunate that demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham, but it is even more unfortunate that the city's white power structure left the Negro community with no alternative…

You may well ask: "Why direct action? Why sit ins, marches and so forth? Isn't negotiation a better path?" You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent resister may sound rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word "tension." I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth…

I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that the present tension in the South is a necessary phase of the transition from an obnoxious negative peace, in which the Negro passively accepted his unjust plight, to a substantive and positive peace, in which all men will respect the dignity and worth of human personality. Actually, we who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured…

You speak of our activity in Birmingham as extreme. At first I was rather disappointed that fellow clergymen would see my nonviolent efforts as those of an extremist. I began thinking about the fact that I stand in the middle of two opposing forces in the Negro community. One is a force of complacency, made up in part of Negroes who, as a result of long years of oppression, are so drained of self respect and a sense of "somebodiness" that they have adjusted to segregation; and in part of a few middle-class Negroes who, because of a degree of academic and economic security and because in some ways they profit by segregation, have become insensitive to the problems of the masses. The other force is one of bitterness and hatred, and it comes perilously close to advocating violence. It is expressed in the various black nationalist groups that are springing up across the nation, the largest and best known being Elijah Muhammad's Muslim movement. Nourished by the Negro's frustration over the continued existence of racial discrimination, this movement is made up of people who have lost faith in America, who have absolutely repudiated Christianity, and who have concluded that the white man is an incorrigible "devil."

I have tried to stand between these two forces, saying that we need emulate neither the "do nothingism" of the complacent nor the hatred and despair of the black nationalist. For there is the more excellent way of love and nonviolent protest. I am grateful to God that, through the influence of the Negro church, the way of nonviolence became an integral part of our struggle. If this philosophy had not emerged, by now many streets of the South would, I am convinced, be flowing with blood. And I am further convinced that if our white brothers dismiss as "rabble rousers" and "outside agitators" those of us who employ nonviolent direct action, and if they refuse to support our nonviolent efforts, millions of Negroes will, out of frustration and despair, seek solace and security in black nationalist ideologies--a development that would inevitably lead to a frightening racial nightmare.

So often the contemporary church is a weak, ineffectual voice with an uncertain sound. So often it is an archdefender of the status quo. Far from being disturbed by the presence of the church, the power structure of the average community is consoled by the church's silent--and often even vocal--sanction of things as they are.

Perhaps I have once again been too optimistic. Is organized religion too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our nation and the world?

The situations Dr. King faced when he wrote this famous “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” are surprisingly similar to the ones we face today, some 57 years later. He spoke of “constructive, nonviolent tension.” Dr. King sought to use the tension of peaceful protests to address the civil rights issues of his time just as many today have used nonviolent tension “to confront the issue” of police brutality. Dr. King warned his fellow clergymen that “bitterness and hatred” were pushing many blacks to consider violence” because of the “continued existence of racial discrimination.” He said that many black people were turning to more “militant” voices because they had “lost faith in America.” Of greatest concern to Christians, Dr. King said that injustice in America had cause many to repudiate Christianity. Lingering injustice in America had served to widen the racial divide and cause black people to embrace the lie “that the white man is an incorrigible devil.”

We see many parallels today in that many black people have lost faith in the American system of policing. I find it telling, even prophetic, that Dr. King’s letter was written to white clergy to gain their support. I also sense that America’s white clergy today is often a “silent—and often even vocal sanction of things as they are,” “too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our nation.” As an African-American in the body of Christ, I often feel that the white Church is more concerned “with effects” such as demonstrations and even riots but is unwilling to acknowledge and “grapple with underlying causes.” At times I feel pressured by the church to adopt the "do nothingism of the complacent” and dismiss all evidence to the contrary that America’s system of policing is fraught with racial bias, yielding grossly inequitable outcomes for black people.

I don’t think many white Church leaders have the revelation that Dr. King had, which was that the continued existence of racial discrimination damaged the witness of Christianity in America and abroad, that it widened the gap between white and black, and that if white’s condoned or were silent about the blatant racism being exhibited towards blacks that they must all be evil.

What Dr. King saw are the aims of the spirit of racism: destroy America’s Christian witness at home and abroad by showing through racial division and unrest, and through apathy on behalf of the majority that the love of Christ is not stronger than the power of racial difference. That even the power of the indwelling Spirit of God is not greater than racial hatred or the power to only show true, lasting empathy towards members of your own race.

One major difference between our time and Dr. King’s is that there is no powerful black nationalist movement. There is no national “Black Panther” party, no “Malcolm X.” I’m concerned, however, that history is repeating itself with the white Church in America lagging behind other national voices in entertainment, sports, politics, and the media. The white church is too closely aligned with the current Republican party ideology of law and order and the notion that systemic racism is a myth. As long as that is the case, there will be no lasting change produced. George Floyd has already given way to Jacob Blake, and soon there will be others. At some point, a more militant black voice will take the microphone riding on the strength of whatever the next inevitable black tragedy will be.

One of the previous quotes pointed out that our current political and civic leaders have “created an atmosphere in which paramilitary groups feel emboldened.” The article spoke of how “armed paramilitaries” are being allowed to roam the streets,” and warned that we “don’t want to be living in a war zone.”  

All it would take for the civil war, that many of the groups mentioned want to see, is to add a new militant black following to the mix of the inevitable next George Floyds/Jacob Blakes, armed counter-protesters, unsympathetic political leaders, media that praise far-right efforts, and the continued abdication of national leadership by the white Church. Dr. King said that back in his time that his efforts, or the black church’s efforts, to pursue nonviolence were the only thing keeping America from “a frightening racial nightmare.” In this racial nightmare, Dr. King envisioned “many streets of the South flowing with blood.” He envisioned “millions of Negroes” “out of frustration and despair” seeking “solace and security in black nationalist ideologies.” It’s troubling that in a time of despair that the Church in America might not be the first option to seek solace.

Streets flowing with blood, civil war that is what these groups want. It is what the spirit of racism wants.