Roxanne Hartline: A large Nazi flag hung in the corner of a classroom in a high school in Bakersfield, California, in 2019
Teachers are increasingly under attack from extremist groups and government officials, who accuse them of “indoctrinating” children or express anger over coronavirus prevention policies. These sustained disinformation campaigns have led to harassment and threats against teachers, and as a result many educators are leaving teaching altogether.
While these external extremist pressures are creating significant challenges for American teachers and school boards, there is also an internal threat to students, albeit on a smaller scale: American teachers who hold white supremacist and anti-government ideologies and who may have explicit ties to extremist groups.
This is not to suggest that any significant segment of the 6.1 million teachers and professors in the U.S. are indoctrinating their students into white supremacist or anti-government ideologies on a grand scale. But given their positions of power in classrooms and influence within communities, even a relatively small number of extremist teachers poses an outsized threat to students and society more broadly.
Extremists Targeting Schools
Extremists are targeting schools and school boards nationwide, hoping to expand their reach and influence. Throughout 2021, Proud Boys members attended school board meetings across the country and joined calls to ban certain books from school libraries. In May 2021, Aryan Nations distributed racist and antisemitic fliers in an Arizona neighborhood which was selected, according to the chapter’s leader, David Miner, due to debates over Critical Race Theory in the local elementary school. The following month the Ku Klux Klan distributed leaflets with racist, antisemitic and homophobic language directed at various school board members in a neighborhood in Virginia. These groups are using opposition to mainstream curriculum and school policies as a weapon in their larger fight against demographic and social changes.
Teachers on Stormfront
It’s impossible to know the total number of teachers who hold extremist beliefs, but the overall number is likely small, especially when compared to the vast number of people working in schools. However, given teachers’ positions of influence, even a small number of extremist teachers can cause outsized harm and presents a serious problem. To estimate the prevalence of extremist teachers in schools we examined posts on the white supremacist forum, Stormfront.
Stormfront is the oldest and longest running white supremacist website, created in 1995 by former Ku Klux Klan leader, Don Black. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, in 2015 Stormfront was visited more than twice as frequently as the NAACP website.
The forum currently has just under 370,000 registered users, not including the many visitors who browse without creating an account. The number of active users is considerably smaller but still significant. Stormfront’s analytics estimate there are approximately 450 active users online at any given time, and just under 7,000 guests visited the forum in the last 24-hours as of May 6, 2022.
ADL researchers reviewed posts on Stormfront to identify users who claimed to be teachers, using an intelligence database’s archive which included posts made in 2001 through the present day. Posts were searched for the phrases “I am a teacher,” “I teach” and “my students.” We manually reviewed the posts to confirm the user was identifying themselves as a teacher and to remove duplicate users. During this stage, users who called themselves teachers but actually described themselves teaching self-defense, firearms courses or pick-up artist techniques were removed. This resulted in 165 users who self-identified as teachers. Of those 165 users, 28 claimed to teach at colleges and universities, 13 at high schools and six in elementary schools. The 165 number is almost certainly low, given that it does not include those who do not actively post or those who do not reveal personal information.
The conversations these teachers are having on Stormfront highlight the dangerous influence they can have in the classroom. They appear to be acutely aware of the power they have in shaping the minds of the next generation. One user wrote, “I do my best to shape and mold young minds that have not already fallen to the lies of zog [Zionist Occupied Government], and the communist left that has such a stronghold on academia.” In a post made in 2019, another user expresses that his position is good because it allows them to “impart knowledge to younger people,” but also notes this is “treacherous for my job security.”
Extremist teachers’ impact is amplified because of their positions of authority and influence. Young people are especially vulnerable to radical ideas and movements. During adolescence, young people are still searching for their identity and developing their worldview. Additionally, due to cognitive changes, they are drawn to thrill-seeking behaviors, crave a sense of belonging and are highly susceptible to peer pressure. Extremists capitalize on these vulnerabilities.
In a 2018 Stormfront thread where users introduce themselves to one another, one user who claimed to be a college professor described their experience with diversity and inclusion training requirements at universities as their primary motivation to join Stormfront. The user explained, “I have now begun to educate my students about the entire indoctrination that is plaguing our education system from grade school through college. I committed to being an undercover advocate in this cesspool to quietly get our message out.” He then ends his post with a quote from Adolf Hitler, “Er allein, der die Jugend besitzt, gewinnt die Zukunft” which translates to “he alone who owns the youth gains the future.”
Abusing Relationships and Trust
Extremists can use their position to radicalize the students who trust them. Brant Williams, a former teacher who now runs a white supremacist educational platform, joined another white supremacist, Don Jackson who used to be an art and ESL teacher, for an interview that has over 1,000 views on YouTube. Williams (whose identity as a former Arizona public school teacher was first exposed by an ADL researcher) explained how teachers can take advantage of their relationship with students. He described how when he disagreed with material in the textbook, he would shut the classroom door and tell his students, “Hey kids, actually this is a lie” before telling them what he believed to be the truth. He emphasized “when you develop trust with your students, they’ll believe everything you say.”
On a Stormfront thread in the “Education and Homeschooling” room, one user wrote “Would any WN [white nationalist] teachers recommend teaching as a career? I’m really gravitating towards it, as I see it as the one place that we can influence the next generation to what is right.” Several teachers responded to describe their experiences. One user explained that while teaching they “never openly discussed white advocacy, though it was certainly implied in certain subtexts and discussions... I took chances because I felt responsibility for my students.”
This threat of radicalization is also evident in the case of Dayanna Volitich, a former Florida public school teacher who ran the white nationalist podcast, Unapologetic, under an alias, while she was actively teaching middle school students. In 2018 she bragged, on the podcast, about radicalizing her students. She reportedly told her students that the Ku Klux Klan was a “good thing” and on her podcast explained, “that age when they first become teenagers is very critical. They’ve been indoctrinated for 12 years before coming to me. Some of them, I believe, were red-pilled as 13-year-olds. And I think that was kind of a cool thing to watch. I was watching them just open their eyes and seeing what is happening in this country.”
Teaching the Holocaust
Educating students on the Holocaust presents extremist teachers with a heightened opportunity to share their corrosive, hateful views. Studying the Holocaust is a powerful opportunity for students to understand the consequences of racism and recognize their role as responsible citizens in a democracy. However, many white supremacists believe the Holocaust was either a hoax or an explicitly positive event.
In a 2018 post, one Stormfront user (self-identified as a teacher) described how they avoided mentioning the Holocaust when teaching about World War II and instead tried to “focus 90% of the study on the economic policies which Hitler implemented that staved off economic collapse, the progressive social policies he implemented to help families and young people, and have all my students study the reasons behind his popularity.”
The user adds: “When one of my students waited around after class and said to me in a hushed tone, 'Wow, so Hitler actually did a lot of great things, didn't he?', I couldn't help but smile. Take that, zog.”
In another post, a user who claimed to teach Biology at a university in New Hampshire wrote, “I believe as a professional Educator it is my duty to teach my students the truth not what is ‘politically correct’ Although I have lost one job already for asking my students to have an open mind and reconsider some of the so called facts of WWII and the holocaust.”
This can have a tremendous impact on students. In 2014, an assignment in the Rialto Unified School District in California required students to read sources that denied the existence of the Holocaust and write an essay about whether they believed the event actually took place. The assignment referred to these sources as “credible” and in their assignments at least 50 eighth graders questioned or outright denied the Holocaust. In one paper a student wrote, “I believe the event was fake, according to source 2 the event was exhaggerated [sic]… I felt that was strong enogh [sic] evidence to persuade me the event was a hoax.” In response to this paper, the unidentified teacher wrote, “You did well using the evidence to support your claim” and scored the paper 23 out of 30 points. Administrators defended the assignment as an opportunity for students to learn critical thinking and refused to release the names of the staff responsible.
Election Conspiracies and January 6th
Another subject that teachers have discussed inappropriately with their students are election conspiracies and the events of January 6th. At least nine educators have been criminally charged for involvement in the attack on the Capitol. Additionally, at least seven other teachers participated in the events that day but avoided criminal charges along with several school board members.
U.S. District Judge Trevor N. McFadden considered Robert Morss, who as of January 6, 2021, was a Pennsylvania substitute teacher and army veteran, one of the most extreme individuals among the 30 related cases he reviewed. Morss arrived at the Capitol dressed in his military uniform, armed with scissors and what appeared to be a knife. During the siege he allegedly assaulted police officers, removed barricades and directed his fellow rioters to grab police officers’ shields and use them against the officers. After he was arrested, police found his plans to establish a militia and six firearms in his home.
United States of America v. Robert Morss: Photograph of Robert Morss standing in front of the Capitol building around 2:49 pm on January 6th, 2021, that was used as evidence in the affidavit in support of an arrest warrant.
Some of the teachers involved in the insurrection discussed their activities with their students. After Benjamin Plummer returned to teach middle school social studies, a student recorded him saying “I was there” while telling his students about his involvement in the insurrection. Despite the attack leaving five dead, in the recording Plummer can be heard explaining that Trump supporters were peaceful and the media’s attempt to blame them for the violence that day was a “setup.” Plummer has since resigned.
In Massachusetts, Matthew Lynch resigned from his teaching position after he was identified in photos of the attack. After he was elected to the city’s school board a few months later, Braintree Public Schools released 27 complaints filed against him by other teachers as well as students and parents. While many of the complaints were related to his participation in the insurrection, several pre-dated the incident.
In another alarming example, a history teacher in Burlington, Wisconsin assigned his students homework that promoted disinformation and conspiracies about the November 2020 election while he participated in the insurrection. Jeff Taff sent his students the following message to explain his absence: “Some of you will understand why! Some will not. I am sorry, but standing up for election integrity and our right to vote in FAIR elections is too important for me to NOT be there.” He then instructed his students to watch a video that promoted unsubstantiated claims about voter fraud and election conspiracy theories as part of their assignment. The video was from the Epoch Times, a far-right news site known for promoting disinformation.
Following an investigation into his teaching practices, many students and parents came forward with complaints. According to one parent, her son heard Taff promote conspiracies about the Covid-19 pandemic, calling it a hoax, and blame the Jewish people for the Holocaust. She felt his beliefs were rooted in white supremacy and he was trying to brainwash students. She warned “He is indoctrinating them.” Another student accused Taff of not stopping students in class from using racial slurs that target Latinos. Despite these accusations, after a five-month investigation Taff was reinstated and continues to teach history in the Burlington Area School District.
Up North Times: An image of the assignment and message Jeff Taff posted in his Google Classroom for his students while he went to Washington, D.C.
Abuse of Minority Students
Extremist teachers with white supremacist beliefs put minority students at risk. Even if an extremist teacher does not directly incorporate their white supremacist ideology into their teachings, they still have tremendous power over minority students in terms of responding to bullying, discipline, grading and offering additional help with schoolwork.
On Stormfront, one user who claimed to teach in the humanities department at a university reflected on how radicalizing shifted their attitudes towards their students: “The school year started recently, and my classes are composed mostly of black students. It’s too soon for me to have assessed any of their work, and I’m only just getting to know them, but I find that my attitude towards teaching has changed dramatically. I find that I’m a lot angrier, more resentful and generally less excited about the prospect of going back each day. This is not to say that all of my students are horrid monsters, but what I’ve learned/read here has altered my perceptions of the black-white dynamic.”
Similarly, Benjamin Welton taught at a private elementary school beginning in August 2020 and at the University of Vermont and Boston University during his postgraduate studies. At the same time, Welton wrote fascist and white supremacist articles online under various pennames where he advocated for violence against non-whites. In March of 2021 he wrote, “No mercy for our enemies. Do not weep, for they are not human. Treat those who want to abolish ‘whiteness’ with the same venom if not more. They deserve medieval punishments.” He then continued to teach for several months before his secret identity was revealed when he was subsequently fired.
While Dayanna Volitich was working at a middle school with 18 percent minority enrollment, she used her alias’s Twitter account to call for Muslims to be “eradicate[d]...from the face of the earth.” She also spoke about her belief in racial superiority on her podcast where she explained that some races “have higher IQs than others” and then spoke about her experience with this as a teacher.
Research indicates a teacher’s racial biases strongly correlate with racial disparities in discipline and test scores. Some extremist teachers insist they can separate their personal beliefs from their career and do not bring their racism into the classroom. On Stormfront, one user discussed his belief that some races have a superior IQ, writing “As an educator, I already know what the grade distribution between races will be on average.” The user then insisted “I treat all of my students fairly. My racial consciousness does not intrude on my professionalism in the classroom.” This teacher immediately undercuts their own insistence: “It is one of the great faults of the white race that we are fair. As a result, we have allowed non-whites to step all over us. We need to be less fair and more separatist.”
Extremists do not operate in a vacuum. If a teacher holds white supremacist beliefs, their students will inevitably be impacted by those views.
Targeting Young People
Extremist teachers are strategically using their positions to influence the next generation. This strategy has already been used by contemporary far-right extremist groups with varying degrees of success in Germany and Italy.
In Dayana Volitich’s last podcast episode before she lost her teaching position, she hosted Lana Lokteff, a fellow white supremacist who runs the internet media company Red Ice TV with her husband Henrik Palmgren. During the episode, Lokteff expressed the need for white supremacists to covertly infiltrate public schools to reach children to which Volitich agrees, noting “I am absolutely one of them.”
In the YouTube livestream with former teacher Brant Williams, Don Jackson echoes this strategy. After discussing Williams’ new white supremacist educational platform, Jackson notes “I am a former art teacher, and I am going to get this link out to all of my old teacher friends.” He also encourages his listeners to send this to teachers in hopes that the material will trigger a racial awakening and they will incorporate these white supremacist lessons into their teaching.
In light of this threat, school administrators and parents need to take students’ concerns about their teachers seriously. Before it was revealed that Volitich was a white supremacist, a parent complained that she was injecting her political bias into her lessons, but administrators failed to take meaningful action after Volitich denied the accusations.
In a 2012 review of Benjamin Welton, a student complained that he was “a teacher with too many personal opinions and presents them as facts.” The student goes on to describe Welton as “misogynistic” and “Proto-Fascist.”
If these complaints were taken seriously, perhaps these problematic teachers could have been removed from their schools or faced other appropriate consequences before even more students were exposed to their toxic teaching methods. School administrators should take every effort to highlight the process for reporting inappropriate comments and lessons to remind students of their right to an education free from bigotry.