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Republicans: It’s time to confront white nationalism and neo-Nazism

Elon Musk and Vice President-elect JD Vance recently defended Germany’s Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) political party, a far-right party whose leaders have made comments suggesting that they align with neo-Nazism. While I concede that the Left tends to overuse the terms “racist,” “Nazi,” and “far-right,” if the AfD—an ethno-nationalist party with leadership that has been embroiled in controversy for espousing support for Nazism—does not embody these terms, I don’t know what does.

Indeed, the AfD is so out of touch that other right-wing parties, including France’s National Rally and Italy’s League, have refused to associate or work with the AfD in the European Union (EU) Parliament. But since the AfD is the most anti-immigration party in Germany, Musk and Vance appear willing to overlook its other policy proposals, including a desire by its leadership to whitewash Hitler and the Nazi SS. Either that or they’re uninformed. Nevertheless (and predictably), millions of X users—mostly right-wing Americans—followed Musk and Vance in tweeting support for the AfD.

On a related note, American mixed martial artist and prominent right-wing influencer Jake Shields recently went viral for posting an image perpetuating blood libel, a false and malicious accusation that Jewish people murder non-Jews to use their blood in religious rituals. Such posts are a common occurrence from Shields, though this one in particular was notable for its depravity.

I’ve included the post above despite its disturbing nature and chose to write this article to address the lack of discussion around right-wing anti-semitism, support for Nazism, and white nationalism—chronically under-discussed topics in right-wing circles, including at Princeton. These issues warrant our attention and critical examination.

A History Primer

For years, white nationalists and neo-Nazis were considered fringe elements and excluded from the GOP. After all, why would they expect to be welcomed in a party led by Ronald Reagan, a man who argued that “anyone, from any corner of the Earth, can come to America and become an American”? This openness began to fade when Pat Buchanan sought the Republican presidential nomination in 1992. Buchanan, a paleoconservative, claimed that “the sovereignty of the United States is being undermined by Israeli control and Mexican incursion” and that “non-white immigrants [will] destroy Western culture”—all preposterous lies. Buchanan won 23% of the Republican primary vote, a significant showing compared to George H.W. Bush’s 73%, which was worse than Donald Trump’s performance as a non-incumbent this past year.

In 2021, Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Paul Gosar (R-AZ) attempted to kick-start an “America First Caucus” dedicated to protecting America’s “Anglo-Saxon political tradition,” which is a dog whistle for white Anglo-Saxon protestant (WASP) dominance. The 2012 presidential election was the first election in history in which neither major party candidate was a WASP, and their dominance has continued to decline since then. Greene and Gosar were condemned by House GOP leadership and former House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH). Nativists and paleoconservatives were considered part of the GOP’s fringe as recently as three years ago. Unfortunately, that is no longer the case.

As of late 2024, 55% of Republican voters believe that increasing racial diversity “threatens American culture.” In 2019, that number was 21%. Republicans are quickly turning into the new Know-Nothings. 32 years after Buchanan’s loss, it would appear that Buchanan’s ideas and paleoconservatism are on the verge of dominating the GOP, while Reaganism and neoconservatism are on their way out.

2024 in Review

Although white nationalists and neo-Nazis have long been relegated to the fringe of American politics, white nationalist and neo-Nazi rhetoric from the Right has exploded over the past year. Last summer, for example, Candace Owens argued that Joseph Stalin was Jewish, that Sigmund Freud was a Kabbalistic pedophile, and that the Germans were ethnically cleansed by Jews after World War II (all three claims are false and easily debunkable).

Meanwhile, Tucker Carlson interviewed and defended Darryl Cooper, a well-known Hitler apologist. On Carlson’s show, Cooper claimed that “[Winston] Churchill was the chief villain of the Second World War.” Cooper subsequently argued that “millions of [Jewish and Slavic] people died [only] because the Germans didn’t have a plan to care for the millions of civilians and POWs.” Churchill, of course, didn’t orchestrate the Holocaust, and the Germans systematically genocided millions of Jewish and Slavic people because they viewed them as genetically inferior.

Carlson has also continued to promote the great replacement conspiracy—the belief that Jews and Democrats are “replacing” white Americans with non-white people from the third world when in fact, white Americans are simply having fewer babies than non-white Americans—likely because the former are more likely to have white collar jobs and be career-oriented (we’ve seen this trend in Japan and South Korea).

The conspiracy also absolves white Americans of their role in the actual replacement and dispossession of Native Americans, Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians—including some of my distant ancestors—by implying that “replacing (read: genociding) Indigenous people is okay, but diluting the dominance of white people is bad.” Ethnic demographics aren’t a zero-sum game, where anything gained by one side is lost by the other, but white nationalists are too retarded to see it that way.

Elijah Schaffer, a Turning Point USA contributor, argued that America is a homeland for white people and that “once America isn’t majority white, it’s no longer America as we see.” This narrative was peddled a century ago by nativists about people from southern and eastern Europe—especially Catholics from Ireland and Italy. The implication was that once such people became a plurality, America’s culture would erode, yet America and its culture survived without fundamental changes. His claim also ignores the contributions of non-white Americans, whether they be African-American slaves or Asian-American laborers, among others, to America’s culture. Schaffer has also insisted that the GOP study and emulate Hitler to better combat the Left.

The Conservative Political Action Committee (not to be confused with Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC) meanwhile has implied that turning America into a poor country is preferable to “ethnic dilution” and has long raged against Trump campaign co-chair Susie Wiles’s strategy of appealing to Hispanics.

The former College Republicans of America (CRA) President also recently argued that Elon Musk is wrong to try to exclude white nationalists from the GOP after Musk—who has been in the Republican Party for over two years and has donated to Republicans for longer than that—stated that “hateful, unrepentant racists” should be removed from the GOP. If purging your political party of hateful racists is somehow controversial, we have a problem. Then again, the former CRA President has also advocated for restoring the Asian Exclusion Act of 1924, so it shouldn’t surprise anyone that he’s taking offense to Musk’s call to purge racists from the GOP. The Republican nominee for Delaware’s U.S. Senate election in 2020 was even more blunt and argued that H-1B visas should only be given out to white people.

Embracing white nationalism and Nazism isn’t the only problem facing the GOP. Some Republicans, when confronted with the existence of these beliefs within the Republican tent, challenge its veracity. Senator Mike Lee (R-UT), for example, argued without evidence that a march in Tennessee organized by Patriot Front, a white nationalist extremist group, was a “false flag operation.” Either Mike Lee genuinely believes white nationalists are a thing of the past, or he’s being deliberately misleading because he depends on their support—it’s hard to tell.

I could go on and keep listing Republicans who’ve openly embraced white nationalism and/or Nazism, or deflected and argued that it’s non-existent, but I think you get the point.

“But it’s just rhetoric and mean tweets.” Words matter. Extremism begets violence. The 2019 mass shooting at an El Paso Walmart and the 2022 mass shooting at a Buffalo Tops store were both incited by white nationalist rhetoric. Similarly, white nationalist rhetoric instigated race riots in the United Kingdom a few months ago—who’s to say that won’t happen here?

(cover photo courtesy of Tucker Carlson / YouTube)

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