Did you know that in the first year of the Trump regime “anti-Semitic incidents” surged 57 percent, according the Anti-Defamation’s League (ADL) annual report. No Trump hyperbole, this was the single largest increase ever recorded by the ADL. Also on the rise are xenophobia, nativism, white supremacy, and neo-Nazism. In the most recent Associated Press poll, 57 percent of adults believe Trump’s a racist.

No one was incredibly surprised that Trump’s fan club, the neo-Nazi Patriot Front, was busy flyering down Indianola Avenue in Clintonville Monday, February 26 in broad daylight. Whenever local residents removed them, the flyers would soon reappear. The neo-Nazis have now flyered Clintonville four times in the last few months in addition to Hilliard, Worthington, Westerville, and Dublin. Clintonville activists and their allies made their values known with a large anti-racist demonstration Saturday, March 3, that drew about 60 people at the corner of North Broadway and High.

Here is a Patriot Front quote from Brakton Bragg, a Front leader: “This nation is the property of the founding stock and no one else.” I don’t suppose he’s referring to the Wyandot or the Ottawa founding stock of this land. On the flyer, they wrote: “Our goals do not end with a candidate in an office or a bill signed into law. Out horizon is set on absolute victory.” Hmmm. And even more violent language: “Resurrection through insurrection.

The resurrection they speak of is the rebirth of a genocidal white Anglo-Saxon Protestant America. The insurrection is one based on paramilitary so-called patriot groups. Hate groups rose from 892 in 2015 to 917 in the aftermath of Trump’s election. Ohio ranks 8th in the number of hate groups, with 35 groups. In the Southern Poverty Law Center’s analysis: “Trump’s run for office electrified the radical right which saw in him a champion of the idea that America is fundamentally a white man’s country.”

This sentiment is one of the reasons why essentially a crazed white guy gun culture is permeating our nation. Heavily armed 3 percent militia groups emerged in Ohio during the Trump campaign dedicated to protecting his supporters’ free speech. The intimidating paramilitary group has carried assault rifles onto the Ohio Statehouse grounds in violation of state law.

The ability of armed extremists to openly flaunt gun laws and get away with it underscores one of our most racist double standards. John Crawford, a young black man purchasing a toy gun at a Beavercreek, Ohio Walmart, was shot on sight by a white police officer. Thirteen-year-old Tyre King, also black, was shot in the back, just a block from the Free Press office, after police feared he had a real gun. And there’s 12-year-old Tamir Rice, another black child shot to death with a toy gun in Cleveland. All while YouTube is littered with white guys brandishing loaded assault rifles and being coddled by the police. Many were surprised that when law enforcement stopped Nikolas Cruz after he killed 17 people in Parkland, Florida that he was taken alive. This is part of white skin privilege.

The police are always quick to respond and shoot an allegedly armed black person, toy gun or not. But if you’re white, you can announce on YouTube your desire to become a “professional school shooter,” dozens of your classmates can warn local police and the FBI – and nobody challenges your right to own your AR-15.  

People fear neo-Nazi paramilitary activities, but routinely accept men carrying assault rifles protecting Trump supporters. Columbus fears gun-bearing gang members but tolerates similar tactics used by its militarized police force on a daily basis. The brutal and extensive beating of Timothy Davis by a half a dozen cops in plainclothes, who look like neo-Nazi skinheads, was just another day in Columbus law enforcement. And the #BlackPride4 were targeted by Columbus police for arrest using excessive force, while their white fellow LGBTQIA+ parade-goers – with the exception of Lori Gum – spent their time cooperating with the police and the legal system to convict them of crimes they never committed. See page 6 to find out how you can support the #BlackPride4.