Summer of Hate: White Supremacist Activity from Memorial to Labor Day

From Memorial Day through Labor Day 2024, the ADL Center on Extremism (COE) tracked a sustained, high level of white supremacist activity that included paramilitary-style marches, demonstrations, “fight nights,” propaganda drives, and disruption of public forums across the country.

COE documented 64 white supremacist events across 25 states between May 27 and September 2, 2024. A majority of these events were small, with just five to 12 participants, but there were also larger gatherings including one demonstration of roughly 200 participants.

In 2024 and throughout the summer, white supremacists also continued to distribute propaganda material in the form of banners, fliers, graffiti and stickers. This propaganda was primarily antisemitic, anti-Zionist and anti-immigrant, with a spike in anti-LGBTQ+ activity and messaging during Pride month in June.

These activity patterns demonstrate how white supremacists continue to opportunistically exploit current issues to raise their visibility, whether by inserting themselves into the anti-immigration debate in the lead-up to the 2024 election, targeting the LGBTQ+ community during Pride month, or adopting anti-Zionist messaging in response to the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza following the October 7 attack.

Such efforts allow the white supremacist movement to further its goals; recruit new members, fundraise, harass and intimidate minority communities and normalize racist, antisemitic, anti-immigrant, and anti-LGBTQ+ hate.

The following is a glimpse into some of the activities and rhetoric over the past few months.

Demonstrations, Marches, and Fights

Patriot Front held more public demonstrations over the summer than any other white supremacist group. Summer has been a particularly active time for Patriot Front since it often chooses significant American holidays like Memorial Day, the Fourth of July and Labor Day to hold larger demonstrations for higher visibility. Patriot Front’s Independence Day march, held in downtown Nashville, drew approximately 200 participants and was the largest white supremacist event of the summer.

The group also held several medium-size flash demonstrations over the Memorial Day and Labor Day holiday weekends, including in Texas, Washington, Colorado, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, and Indiana. Many of these demonstrations took place at cemeteries or memorials with a connection to American history, such as the Gettysburg National Military Park.

Over the Labor Day holiday weekend, approximately 30 individuals associated with Patriot Front held a demonstration in downtown Tallahassee, FL.

The neo-Nazi group Blood Tribe also held several events this summer wearing their now-signature black ski masks and red outfits, carrying swastika flags and sometimes even firearms during militant marches through Pierre, South Dakota; Springfield, Ohio; and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

During the June march in Pierre, Chris Pohlhaus, the group’s leader, stated that they were there to protest South Dakota’s HB 1076, a state bill signed into law in March that includes a definition of antisemitism in investigations of unfair or discriminatory practices.

White supremacist groups also continued to host collaborative fight nights and MMA-style events over the summer. These events attracted a range of white supremacist groups from across the United States and allowed them to fraternize, recruit and fundraise.

The largest fighting events occurred in August. Over the weekend of August 9, individuals affiliated with Patriot Front and the Active Club network took part in a Jiu-Jitsu tournament organized by “Devotion Jiu-Jitsu,” a Virginia-based gym closely connected to the white supremacist group Wolves of Vinland (WoV). Later in the month, on August 24, SoCal Active Club, a southern California-based white supremacist group, organized its third annual “Frontier” fight night in Hemet, California. The event attracted approximately 50 white supremacists, including members of Patriot Front and regional Active Clubs from Massachusetts, Idaho, Michigan, Wyoming, Texas and Arizona. Individuals affiliated with the Western Hammerskins, a historically violent neo-Nazi skinhead group, were also in attendance.

Antisemitic Activity

Over the summer, white supremacists distributed antisemitic propaganda and held events that targeted the Jewish community.

From July 13 - 21, approximately two dozen individuals associated with the antisemitic Goyim Defense League (GDL) gathered in Nashville, Tennessee, to participate in the network’s “Name the Nose” tour, its sixth since launching the event in 2019. Participants included individuals from Florida, Georgia, Colorado, California, Oklahoma, Missouri, Wisconsin, Tennessee, Texas and even drew some from Canada. The group engaged in antisemitic trolling tactics including overpass banner drops, propaganda distributions and demonstrations that displayed antisemitic banners and swastika flags.

During the tour, the group also disrupted a city council meeting, protested outside a synagogue and disrupted “Nashville Together,” a Jewish solidarity event.

Individuals associated with GDL give the Nazi salute during the antisemitic “Name the Nose” tour in Nashville, TN, July 2024. (Source: Telegram)

In both July and August, GDL associate Shane Powell organized “FlyerCaust” events in California during which he and several other individuals associated with the GDL and Clockwork Crew livestreamed overpass demonstrations and the distribution of thousands of antisemitic fliers in the surrounding cities of the greater San Francisco area from Petaluma to Berkeley Hills.

Patriot Front, which has been responsible for the vast majority of white supremacist propaganda distributions since 2018, continued its use of the antisemitic message “No Zionists in government, we serve one Nation” in banners and fliers.

Individuals associated with various white supremacist networks also distributed some of the anti-Zionist propaganda and messaging seen since the October 7 attack, as well as antisemitic tropes. Some of their material read: “No more wars for Israel, End Jewish terror,” “Resist Zionism,” “Anti-Zionist action,” “Boycott Jewish businesses,” “Boycott Israeli business” and “Jews & The AIPAC Lobby Control Congress & The Senate, Wake Up."

Anti-Immigration Activity

Since late May 2024, COE tracked an increased focus on anti-immigrant themes in white supremacist propaganda and rhetoric. Opposition to non-white immigration is core to white supremacist ideology and extremists rush to exploit the ongoing immigration crisis.

White supremacists held demonstrations at locations where these groups allege immigrants are being housed or in cities perceived as welcoming to them.

On June 2, individuals associated with the Atlantic Nationalist Club, a small white supremacist group primarily based in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and New York, demonstrated outside a Farmingdale, New York Motor Inn claiming immigrants were being held there. The group held a banner that read, “No migrants in N.Y.” A few weeks later, on June 15, individuals associated with a Washington-based chapter of white supremacist White Lives Matter (WLM) network held an anti-immigrant demonstration outside a refugee encampment in Kent, Washington. Members held a large sign that read: “Ausländer Raus!”, a German phrase meaning “foreigners out.”

In August, Blood Tribe turned its focus on the Haitian immigrant population in Springfield, Ohio, and encouraged other white supremacist groups to do the same. On August 10, twelve Blood Tribe members marched through the city, with several participants waving swastika flags while others carried AR-style rifles and knives. During a stop in front of City Hall, Blood Tribe Ohio leader Drake Berentz gave a speech complaining about “non-white immigrants” in the United States.

Members of Blood Tribe demonstrating in front of City Hall in Springfield, OH, August 10, 2024. (Source: Telegram)

 

Berentz and four other Blood Tribe members returned on August 27 to attend the Springfield City Commission meeting. During the public comment portion of the meeting, Berentz, griped about the city’s immigrant population, speaking for less than two minutes before being escorted out of the building by police officers.

On September 1, approximately two dozen individuals associated with Patriot Front followed Blood Tribe’s lead and held an anti-immigration rally outside Springfield City Hall displaying a banner that read, “American spirit, European blood.”

Blood Tribe’s final march of the summer also focused on immigration. On August 24, approximately two dozen members of Blood Tribe marched through Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, waving swastika flags and shouting the “Sieg Heil!” while engaging in verbal and physical altercations with pedestrians. The march ended on the state capitol’s steps where brief speeches were given that attributed high crime rates to the “non-white” and immigrant population of the city.