WASHINGTON – Emboldened by the mainstreaming of far-right politics ahead of a presidential election cycle, white nationalist and anti-LGBTQ+ groups rose to record levels in the United States last year, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center’s latest annual report. report on hate and extremism, published on Tuesday.
The Southern Poverty Law Center, which has published the annual report since 1990, documented 835 lively anti-government groups, 133 more than in 2022, and 595 hate groups, 72 more than the previous year.
Much of the enhance was due to a 50% enhance in the number of hateful white supremacist groups in 2023—the highest enhance ever recorded by the SPLC—rising to 165 in 2022 from 109. Across the U.S., there were a total of 143 white power and neo-Nazi rallies in 2023, up from 191 in 2022.
The SPLC reported a 33% enhance in the number of anti-LGBTQ+ organizations from last year, bringing the total to 86. The group said the enhance was largely due to the anti-trans movement on the far right.
“What we are seeing now should be a wake-up call for all of us,” Margaret Huang, president and CEO of the SPLC, said in a call with reporters. “Our 2023 report documents more hate and anti-government extremist groups than ever before. Just months before a historic election, these groups are proliferating, mobilizing, and plotting to destroy democracy, which in some cases they are already enacting.”
According to the report, hate groups have increased their in-person events and leaflet distribution. The SPLC recorded nearly 7,000 cases of leaflet distribution last year, many of which contained language based on racist and anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.
According to the report, the groups also launched campaigns to gain influence in mainstream politics through the conservative Heritage Foundation’s “Project 2025” manifesto, which lays out their goals on anti-abortion, press freedom and LGBTQ+ priorities in the event that presumptive Republican presidential nominee and former President Donald Trump wins the election in November.
Nine of the anti-government and hate groups monitored by the SPLC are part of the coalition supporting Project 2025, the organization reports.
Florida is a leader in anti-government and hate groups
The states with the highest number of anti-government and hate groups include California, Florida, Texas, Pennsylvania, New York, Virginia, Georgia, North Carolina, Washington and Ohio.
California tops the list with 51 hate groups and 66 anti-government groups.
The SPLC found the second-highest number of groups in Florida, a state that leads the way in book bans and restrictive measures against teachers. The Sunshine State is home to 43 hate and 71 anti-government organizations, according to the report, and is the birthplace of the recently influential “parents’ rights” group Moms for Liberty.
Moms for Liberty co-founder Tiffany Justice was invited in March 2023 to testify before a subcommittee of the Judiciary Committee of the US House of Representatives, then chaired by Mike Johnson, the representative from Louisiana who is now Speaker of the House of Representatives.
The annual hate group survey recorded 116 cases of hate leafleting in Florida, where the anti-Semitic groups gathered and distributed leaflets on several occasions, including on Labor Day, when groups named the Goyim Defense League, the Order of the Black Sun and the Maine-based Blood Tribe. marched in Orlando They waved flags with swastikas and gave the Nazi salute.
Anti-Semitism, already on the rise, intensified following Israel’s continued offensive in the Gaza Strip following the Hamas-led terrorist attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.
“Anti-Semitic conspiracies have been seeping into mainstream narratives at an alarming rate, and they have been doing so since 2023. Particularly after the October 7 Hamas terrorist attack, the far right blurred the lines between legitimate criticism of the Israeli government’s actions and outright anti-Semitism,” said RG Cravens, SPLC senior research analyst for its Intelligence Project, during a call with reporters on Tuesday.
After the Hamas attack, the so-called Goyim Defense League distributed a flyer online and in person with the inscription “FREE PALESTINE” as a “not entirely blatant attempt to foment further anti-Semitism and to instrumentalize the Palestinian people for its own goals,” the report says.
Christian “Dominionism”
The SPLC report also cited the growing influence of extreme Christian nationalism as a reason for the increasing number of anti-government organizations.
The report expresses concern about the rise of Johnson in the Republican ranks. Johnson is a former senior attorney for the Alliance Defending Freedom, a Christian legal group that was behind the U.S. Supreme Court case that led to the overturning federal abortion law.
Johnson’s far-right policies, including his anti-abortion and anti-LGBTQ+ positions and his advocacy of the mixing of Christianity and the state, are well documented.
Johnson’s spokesperson did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
The Alliance for Defending Freedom calls the SPLC a “discredited” and “scandalous group” and condemns the organization’s “hate map.” The SPLC currently has an interactive US website. Map accurately identify the locations of anti-government and hate groups.
“Ultimately, their definition of hate encompassed much of respectable, conservative mainstream America,” says a post on the Alliance for Defending Freedom website.
The SPLC report specifically warns against the rise of the National Apostolic Reformation, a Christian movement of “dominionist leaders” whose goal is to “take control of” seven areas of society, including government, education and the economy.
Decline of militias
One area where the report documents a decline is the militia movement, which suffered following the hundreds of prosecutions by the Department of Justice following the violent attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021.
The number of militias fell from 61 in 2022 to 52 in 2023.
One of the most prominent militias, the Oath Keepers, has significantly reduced its presence after its leader, Stewart Rhodes, was convicted and sentenced in 2023 for seditious conspiracy leading up to and during the January 6 attack.
The number of lively Oath Keepers militia units fell from 79 in 2022 to 10 in 2023.
