Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
This week on Consider This, NPR investigates a Republican lawmaker from New Hampshire. He officially proposed a known Holocaust denier join a state commission overseeing history lessons in public schools. A story about extremism normalized and creeping into mainstream politics. This week on Consider This, listen on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.
This is Fresh Air. I'm Terry Gross.
Chapter 2: What prompted the recent indictment of the Southern Poverty Law Center?
The Southern Poverty Law Center, the SPLC, a group known for monitoring and exposing white supremacist groups and individuals, was indicted by the Justice Department Tuesday on charges of money laundering, fraud and false statements to banks.
One of the SPLC's tactics, which was discontinued, was paying people to join hate groups undercover, monitor the hate groups' activities from the inside, and, when appropriate, reporting those activities to local and national law enforcement.
The indictment accuses the SPLC of using donor money to amplify hate by sending in paid undercover monitors who had to participate in some of the group's racist activities, while the SPLC also paid people who were members and leaders of hate groups to become informers. It also says the organization failed to disclose to donors that this was how their money was being used.
Many critics of the Trump administration say the indictment was politically motivated. The day before the indictment was announced, I interviewed Stephen J. Ross, the author of a new nonfiction book with parallels to the SPLC's story. It's about the American Nazi groups that formed after World War II—
to carry on Hitler's legacy in the U.S., and three groups that exposed the white supremacists by recruiting and paying men and women to go undercover, join the groups, spy on them, and report their findings to the police and FBI. Those three groups were the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Committee, and the non-sectarian Anti-Nazi League.
After the SPLC indictment was announced, we called Ross to talk about the parallels between his book and the new indictment. His previous book, Hitler in L.A., is about pro-Nazi groups on the West Coast in the years before and during World War II. Stephen Ross is the son of Holocaust survivors. Stephen Ross, welcome to Fresh Air. The book was, I have to say, very enlightening.
You see a direct line between the American-born Nazis who became Nazis after World War II and the organizers of January 6th, like the Proud Boys, the Three Percenters, the Oath Keepers. We don't know the names of these American Nazis, post-World War II, who you write about. Do you think that the organizers of January 6th knew their names?
And if they didn't know their names, do you think that they unknowingly used language or slogans or concepts originated by those post-World War II American Nazis?
Yes, the only name they might have known is George Lincoln Rockwell. But while they didn't know the names, they knew the issues and the causes. And we can go back to the moment when this really, I think, hit the public, which was after Charlottesville and the chanting, the Jews will not replace us. And that really goes back to the post-war era where many men came back from war and
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Chapter 3: What undercover tactics did historical groups use against American Nazi groups?
And every Christian in America will be wealthy once the Jews are gone.
Was there an alignment between the Nazi groups in America and the Klan? Because the Klan were also anti-black, they were racist, and they were anti-Semitic.
Yeah. Well, the interesting thing is these undercover operations that were running from the early 40s through the 1970s. In the early 40s, they uncovered a plot that the Klan and the Nazi party – We're going to join together, the German-American Bund, to create an alliance.
And that was ultimately foiled by undercover spies sent in by the Anti-Defamation League and the non-sectarian Anti-Nazi League. But that effort would eventually fade away. The Klan would revive after the war. But there was a big difference when the Colombians, which was the first post-war Nazi group marching in Atlanta …
When the Colombians and when people like Jesse Stoner who founded the – first the Stoner anti-Jewish party, then the Christian anti-Jewish party and later the National States Rights Party. When these early groups tried to ally with the Klan – The Klan said, no, we're not going to ally with you because you are too extreme in your racial views.
And when I read that, I thought, oh, my God, too extreme for the Ku Klux Klan? That tells you something about who these Nazis were.
So there were three leading groups, Jewish groups, who not only opposed the Nazi groups, they infiltrated them with undercover spies. So what were those three groups?
The three groups who were spying on Nazis and fascists from the 1940s on were the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Committee, both of which still exist today, and a third group that no longer exists called the Non-Sectarian Anti-Nazi League that was founded in 1933.
How do they go about recruiting spies?
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Chapter 4: How did the SPLC's tactics compare to those of earlier anti-Nazi organizations?
who were in Atlanta at the time as well. But they proved much more violent and much more extreme than the Klan. They were the first group to call for the mass murder of Jews. And as for blacks, we ultimately want to deport them to Madagascar. But in the meantime, we don't want any black man, woman, or children murdered. moving into the working class white areas. And they sent patrols out there.
And in several cases, people were beaten up. Homes were bombed. When trucks would come, moving vans would come in, they'd be greeted by 100 people or so, and they weren't able to move into their home. And they were saying that within 10 years, we will elect the mayor, we will elect a governor.
And within 10 to 20 years, we will elect a president of the United States behind this incredibly racist, violent organization. Well, the ADL and the Anti-Nazi League were very much alert to what was going on. And the first spy they hired was Stetson Kennedy, a southerner who was also from Florida.
His uncle had been a Klan leader, and he was a New Dealer, hated by his own family, drummed out by his family. And when his friends were all being drafted and he was too small for the draft, he decided he would go ahead and fight his own battle.
So what kind of information does he report back?
He reports back that the Colombians are getting bolder and bolder. And right now, he has gone on a run with them to collect dynamite and guns. And they want to dynamite a Black Baptist convention in Savannah. And he's very nervous that these guys are not just bluffing, that these guys really can carry this through.
And so he alerts his spymaster, particularly James Sheldon from the Anti-Nazi League. And Sheldon immediately recruits one of his top agents, Mario Buzzi, who had helped foil the Nazi Klan proposed alliance in the early 40s. He recruits Buzzi and he recruits a woman, Renee Fruchbaum, and they go down to Atlanta. claiming to be fascists, part of the Italian Fascist League.
And they want to make an alliance with the Colombians in particular because the Klan is too moderate. So they want an alliance with the Colombians. And they love – the Colombians love this idea, particularly Berkses. Oh, now we can expand to the northeast. This will be great. Well, René Fruchbaum also offers to help them.
And when she goes into their ramshackle offices, she sees everything's in disarray. And she says to Burke and to his partner, Loomis, Homer Loomis, you know, I've done secretarial work and I don't need your money, but I love your cause. And so how about I'll stay here for the next several nights and just get all your files together?
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Chapter 5: What parallels exist between post-WWII American Nazis and today's extremist groups?
And so for three nights, she was photographing every piece of information. And at the end of three nights, she had over 200 pages of photographs. The photographs are processed. They're sent back down to the assistant attorney general, who they're all working with in cooperation. And the Colombians get busted.
So that's a success.
That is a major success. They bring them down and they are dead.
Well, we need to take another break here, so let me reintroduce you. If you're just joining us, my guest is Stephen Ross. His new book is called The Secret War Against Hate, American Resistance to Anti-Semitism and White Supremacy. We'll be right back after a short break. I'm Terry Gross, and this is Fresh Air.
After the Columbians are put out of business, Kennedy, the undercover person who exposes them, ends up going back to journalism. He writes a book about his undercover work. And the part I really love about this, he sells some of his stories to the Superman radio series. Were they used? Were they produced?
Yes, they were. And it was great because Superman radio series was one of the most popular series going. And having been admitted into the sort of secret society within the Klan, he knew all their secrets. He knew their passwords. He knew everything. And he would send that off. And in this case, he sent it off to the radio station to the two men producing the Superman.
And they incorporated a bunch of that into the shows. And the Klan members, because I have this in the spy reports, Klan members were furious because their kids were listening to Superman. And their kids were very happy to see Superman defeat the organization their fathers belonged to. And they put – they changed – They changed their bounty on whoever was providing this.
We were going to give $1,000 if anyone could get their carcass dead or alive. Now it was going to be like $1,000 per pound or something ridiculous like this. And they never caught Stetson Kennedy.
So let's get to George Lincoln Rockwell, who is the American Nazi name that a lot of people will recognize. Where does he fit into your story in terms of being an organizer? You write about how media savvy and charismatic he was.
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Chapter 6: What were the motivations behind the recruitment strategies of neo-Nazi groups?
And after the war, after the liberation of the camp, he had been working for the Germans and the army came in and said, well, you're going to run the bakery and they're going to work for you now. And when he came to America, he didn't speak much English yet. And so he used the one skill he had.
baker and became a baker uh partnered up with someone who had been in dachau with him and they ran a local bakery in queens for years and they only had two wholesale clients zabars and balducci's the two best places in the city to get your baked goods and your delicatessen goods etc etc and uh It was – again, I think you're right. It's the great irony, the great revenge.
He gets to feed America while those who were trying to kill him are all dead. Can I tell you one very quick story? Sure. I had lunch with one of my colleagues. who asked me, because I had given an early talk about the book, he said, I don't get it. You just spent all these years living with Nazis and fascists and writing about them, and now you're turning around and writing another book?
How can you do that? And I looked at him and I smiled and I said, this is my revenge. I get to write their story. They don't die unknown. They get exposed by me. And it gives me great pleasure.
My guest is Stephen Ross, author of the new book, The Secret War Against Hate. This is Fresh Air. My guest is Stephen Jay Ross, author of the new book, The Secret War Against Hate, American Resistance to Anti-Semitism and White Supremacy. We recorded the interview that we just heard Monday. On Tuesday, the Justice Department announced its indictment of the Southern Poverty Law Center, the SPLC.
which is famous for exposing white supremacist groups. One of the SPLC's tactics, which they've discontinued, echoes the tactics Ross just described that was used by organizations opposing American Nazi groups after World War II, sending people undercover to join those groups and get inside information so they could alert law enforcement and the public.
Among the indictment's accusations is that the SPLC funded extremism and amplified hate because the paid undercover informants had to participate in some of the group's activities, and because the SPLC also paid some leaders of the hate groups to become informants. The indictment accuses the SPLC of never informing donors that this was how their money was being used.
I asked Stephen Ross for his reaction to the indictment of the SPLC.
I think we're seeing deja vu all over again, that once again, these groups in the 1930s, 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, the Anti-Defamation League, the non-sectarian Anti-Nazi League, and the American Jewish Committee were also sending in undercover agents and spies, but that was only because the government had refused to protect their lives. The FBI, local sheriffs, and local police were doing nothing.
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