Daily Archives: May 3, 2021

In this 2017 photo, Gavin McInnes (center), founder of the far-right extremist group known as the Proud Boys, is surrounded by supporters after speaking at a rally in Berkeley, Calif. McInnes told NPR that the group is made up of "funny dudes, not Nazis." At least 25 members of the far-right group are facing charges related to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP hide caption

In this 2017 photo, Gavin McInnes (center), founder of the far-right extremist group known as the Proud Boys, is surrounded by supporters after speaking at a rally in Berkeley, Calif. McInnes told NPR that the group is made up of "funny dudes, not Nazis." At least 25 members of the far-right group are facing charges related to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

On a recent episode of his livestreamed show, the 22-year-old extremist Nick Fuentes repeated a formula that has won him a following with some of the youngest members of the far right. He went on an extended, violent and misogynistic rant, only to turn to the camera and add with a smirk, "Just joking!"

In this case, from the April 22 edition of Fuentes' show, America First, a viewer wrote in to ask Fuentes for advice on how to "punish" his wife for "getting out of line."

Fuentes responded, "Why don't you smack her across the face?"

The rant continued for minutes.

"Why don't you give her a vicious and forceful backhanded slap with your knuckles right across her face disrespectfully and make it hurt?" Fuentes went on. At one point, he pantomimed punching a woman in the face.

He then added, "No, I'm kidding, of course. Just kidding. Just a joke."

Fuentes was following a playbook popular among domestic extremists: using irony and claims of "just joking" to spread their message, while deflecting criticism.

Researchers who track domestic extremism say the tactic, while not new, has helped several groups mask their danger, avoid consequences and draw younger people into their movements.

Irony as "cover" for extremism

Fuentes is best known for using cartoonish memes to spread white supremacist propaganda. His followers refer to themselves as "Groypers" a reference to a mutated version of the Pepe the Frog cartoon that was co-opted by the far right. Though Fuentes exists on the fringes of the extreme right, Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., spoke at a political conference that Fuentes hosted, drawing widespread criticism.

But Fuentes has said himself that he uses irony and "jokes" to communicate his message without consequences.

"Irony is so important for giving a lot of cover and plausible deniability for our views," Fuentes said in a 2020 video. He specifically cited Holocaust denial or what he termed Holocaust "revision" as a topic that is too fraught to discuss earnestly, even on the far right.

Far-right extremist Nick Fuentes, seen here in a screenshot from his livestreamed show, has said he uses irony because it provides "plausible deniability" and cover for some of his most incendiary statements. Screenshot via AmericaFirst.live hide caption

Far-right extremist Nick Fuentes, seen here in a screenshot from his livestreamed show, has said he uses irony because it provides "plausible deniability" and cover for some of his most incendiary statements.

"When it comes to a lot of these issues, you need a little bit of maneuverability that irony gives you," Fuentes said.

And, in fact, after Fuentes questioned the death toll from the Holocaust in one rant, he later claimed to The Washington Post that it was just a "lampoon."

Researchers who track domestic extremism say Fuentes is not the only figure to adopt these tactics, particularly among far-right content creators, who encourage their audiences to follow suit.

"A lot of these content creators will tell the audience explicitly, 'When people say you're racist for liking this or thinking this, just laugh at them. They can't handle it they're sensitive babies,' " said Jared Holt, a resident fellow with the Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab.

Concern on campus

In early 2020, Oona Flood started getting more and more worried about a classmate at the University of California, Los Angeles.

The classmate, a 22-year-old named Christian Secor, was already well-known for his self-proclaimed "love" of guns. Around that time, he was also posting racist and antisemitic memes and tweets, attacking immigrants online and publicly supporting Fuentes. Often, Secor adopted the kind of "trolling" style that's prevalent on the internet.

When one student called Secor out for a tweet that the student found offensive, Secor responded that he was using "post irony."

"It's called a joke and the fact that you think that these posts are anything more than that is telling," added Secor.

Flood, who is Japanese American, said they wanted to speak up.

"I definitely felt that sense of threat," Flood told NPR recently. "And, like, I really hate to say, [because] it sounds so much like, overblown, 'snowflake,' that we're just overreacting, you know?"

And throughout 2020, students told NPR, UCLA took no action against Secor despite his escalating rhetoric, likely because of free speech concerns. (As a public university, UCLA is legally bound to follow the First Amendment, which protects hate speech.)

In retrospect, Flood's concern does not seem like an overreaction.

Secor is currently facing federal criminal charges for allegedly storming the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. Prosecutors have cited his support for Fuentes in charging documents. Secor has pleaded not guilty.

In addition to Fuentes and his followers, other experts point to the extremist group known as the Proud Boys, which has embraced outlandish rituals. The group's name was inspired by a song from the Broadway version of Disney's Aladdin, and one of the group's initiation rites involves members listing breakfast cereals while they get lightly punched in the stomach. Yet that same group is known for its involvement in violent street fights. At least 25 members of the group are facing federal criminal charges related to the Capitol riot, including, in some cases, conspiracy.

Gavin McInnes, the group's founder, said in an email that the media, including NPR, "willfully ignores" jokes to paint the group in a more negative light. The Proud Boys are "funny dudes, not Nazis," McInnes wrote.

But Cassie Miller of the Southern Poverty Law Center said the group's use of "jokes" is strategic. "It distracts from what their actual political ideology is and from their violence," said Miller. "Because if you point it out, it's, like, 'well, they're so goofy.' "

Similarly, the far-right, pro-Trump conspiracy theorist Alex Jones is often so over the top on his InfoWars broadcasts that his own attorney likened him to a "performance artist" during a court hearing about Jones' divorce.

The appeal to young people

Humor has always been crucial to building social movements, experts say, because it serves to define the people who are "in on the joke" and those who "just don't get it."

And online extremists have adopted irony because it is, in many ways, the native language of the internet.

"I'm speaking the language of other zoomers," said Fuentes in 2020. "If you're a young person online, I mean, this is the language of our generation."

"Every kid naturally wants to push away from their parents," said Joanna Schroeder, a writer based in California.

Schroeder was troubled when she saw a pro-Hitler meme pop up in one of her kids' Instagram feeds. Memes that merely pushed boundaries were mixed in alongside outright racist and antisemitic content.

"The problem is that all of this kind of trolling behavior, some of it is harmless and goofy," said Schroeder, "and others of it is designed to look harmless and goofy but will drive our kids' social media and YouTube algorithms toward alt-right and even more extremist content."

Schroeder has since collaborated with the Western States Center to develop a guide for parents who see their kids share online extremist content.

Historic parallels

Violent domestic extremism in America long predates the internet, however, and so does the tactical use of irony.

Historians have documented how the early iterations of the Ku Klux Klan were portrayed by group members and their allies as outlandish, rather than as a dangerous terrorist group. The KKK put on racist minstrel shows and created its own songs.

This drawing from 1868 depicts early members of the Ku Klux Klan. Historians have documented how the group used absurdity to mock its opponents and to try to mask the seriousness of the KKK's atrocities. U.S. Library Of Congress hide caption

This drawing from 1868 depicts early members of the Ku Klux Klan. Historians have documented how the group used absurdity to mock its opponents and to try to mask the seriousness of the KKK's atrocities.

Descriptions of attacks by men in hoods, who had titles like "dragon," "ghoul," and "wizard," were often seen by white Americans as tall tales and ghost stories. Newspapers that supported the KKK played up those aspects of the group and mocked their opponents for supposedly taking the KKK too seriously, said Elaine Frantz, a historian at Kent State University.

Pro-KKK newspaper editors would often "talk jokingly about what the klan has done," said Frantz, "in order to be deniable."

And at first it seemed to work. Frantz cites the testimony of a Georgia congressman who tried to play down klan murders and other racist atrocities.

"Sometimes, mischievous boys who want to have some fun go on a masquerading frolic to scare the negroes," testified U.S. Rep. John H. Christy of Georgia in the early 1870s. Christy insisted that stories of klan attacks were "exaggerated." In fact, he claimed, the group did not exist at all. Frantz said there were also documented instances in the Reconstruction era of white Northerners dressing up in klan robes as a supposedly boundary-pushing "joke."

But eventually, Frantz said, the testimony of Black Americans who witnessed these atrocities published widely by newspaper reporters and in government investigations so thoroughly demonstrated the KKK's campaign of lynchings and assassinations that it became undeniable. They pulled back the klan hood to see the terrorism and violence it masked.

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How Extremists Like The Proud Boys Weaponize Irony And Memes To Spread Hate - NPR

In February, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced a military-wide stand down after civilian and military leaders alike raised concerns about the disturbing link between domestic extremism and the U.S. military, evident in the disproportionately large numbers of servicemembers involved in the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. But this is not the first time that the military has had to reckon with extremism in its ranks. The groups that were involved in the insurrection, including anti-government militias, like the Oath Keepers and the Three Percenters, and militant white supremacist groups, like the Proud Boys, often reject being labelled as extremists or white nationalists by calling themselves western chauvinists or wrapping their ideologies in patriotism and American nationalism. Yet, experts have warned that this new crop of extremists is just the most recent manifestation of the white nationalist and far-right extremist threat that has been facing the U.S. military for over 40 years. The history of Department of Defense responses to domestic extremism needs to inform future policies, strategies, and bureaucratic structures to counter extremism in the military.

This history reveals three key insights. First, we are not starting from scratch existing policies already empower commanders to act to curb extremism, though these policies rely too heavily on the individual commanders discretion. Second, the Department of Defenses approach to countering Islamist extremism post-9/11 led military leaders to consistently underestimate the threat of domestic and white nationalist variants. Third, policy alone is ineffective without continued commitment. This is not a problem that can be solved with isolated policy updates or individual stand-down days.

The Growth of White Nationalism in the Military

Since the growth of the modern white power movement in the 1970s, servicemembers have been directly involved in every major surge in white nationalist activity across the country. Throughout this discussion it is important to remember the legal distinction between veterans, who are no longer subject to Department of Defense regulations, and active-duty servicemembers, though extremists in both groups are often closely linked through ideology, experience, and personal networks. Since the 1970s, when white power militias began recruiting disillusioned Vietnam War veterans, both active-duty servicemembers and veterans have provided stolen weapons and paramilitary training to white nationalist groups, orchestrated the Oklahoma City bombing, founded neo-Nazi organizations, planned the violent Unite the Right rallies, and urged other extremists to enlist in order to gain skills and training for the coming racial holy war.

The 1970s and 1980s featured repeated instances of white nationalist activity on military bases. In 1976, the Camp Pendleton chapter of the Ku Klux Klan, led by active-duty marines, claimed to have over 100 members and held cross burnings outside the base. A 1986 investigation into stolen weapons implicated numerous marines and Army soldiers stationed at Camp Lejeune and Fort Bragg in participation in the White Patriot Party. In 1992, Sgt. 1st Class Steven Barry launched a magazine called The Resister, which he described as the Political Warfare Journal of the Special Forces Underground, a clandestine group of white nationalist Green Berets.

In the 1990s, white nationalist activity on and around military bases increased, resulting in two violent attacks that shook the military community. In April 1995, army veterans Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols killed 168 people in the Oklahoma City bombing, then the deadliest attack committed on American soil since Pearl Harbor. In December 1995, a black couple were murdered by two Fort Bragg soldiers, James Burmeister and Malcolm Wright, Jr. All were known members of neo-Nazi or white nationalist organizations and made no secret of their white supremacist views. After these two deadly attacks, leaders could no longer ignore the threat of white nationalist violence.

Empowering Commanders: Early Department of Defense Policy Responses

The Department of Defenses early policy responses to white nationalist extremism outlined a range of prohibited activities and ways in which commanders could respond, but a critical flaw allowed white nationalism to remain in the military. These policies placed responsibility on individual unit commanders to identify, investigate, and prosecute soldiers suspected of extremism. This resulted in a lack of coherent or coordinated response to what is still a systemic problem and provided no system for collecting centralized data on the extent of domestic extremism.

Two policies formed the core of the militarys early responses to extremism: within the Department of Defense, the Directive on Dissident and Protest Activities, and within the Army, the Extremist Organizations section of the Army Command Policy regulation. The Department of Defense directive was originally written in 1969 to suppress anti-war advocacy and unionization attempts. The directives aim shifted to extremism with the 1986 addition of a Prohibited Activities section, a response to the White Patriot Party weapons-theft incident. The Department of Defense added two additional points in 1996 in response to the Oklahoma City bombing and the Fort Bragg murders. The first point discussed the specific investigative powers that commanders could use against individuals engaging in prohibited activities, while the second aimed to ensure that all military departments implemented training on these policies. The Army made similar changes to the Extremist Organizations section of its regulation by adding new sections on command authority, options, and responsibility. These changes empowered commanders to address extremism in their units, but also placed the responsibility to fix the militarys extremist problem on individual commanders shoulders.

By placing the burden of identifying and eradicating extremism on commanders, these policies failed to address the systemic nature of the problem. With legal authority at the unit level a central pillar of commanders discretion individual commanders, whether unable or unwilling, often ignored, mishandled, or just missed the warning signs of extremist ideology altogether. In one example, former Army Criminal Investigation Division investigator, Scott Barfield, was initially encouraged by his commander to develop local screening and education programs to combat white nationalism, meeting with success, but later resigned complaining of significant backlash and hostility to his work when command priorities changed. The reliance on commanders discretion diffused responsibility for a systemic problem and hindered any attempt to collect coherent and centralized data about the extent of extremism in the military. No matter how extensive lists of prohibited activities become, such an incoherent approach to eradicating extremism within the military hinders organizational progress.

9/11 and the Turn to a Different Kind of Extremism

Despite the flaws, the 1996 policy changes marked important steps towards curbing white nationalism within the military. But policy should be prioritized and consistently implemented to be effective. Following the 9/11 attacks, the military did prioritize anti-extremist policies, but extremism was redefined as exclusively foreign and Islamist. This new chapter of anti-extremism policy ignored continued evidence of domestic and white nationalist threats and even walked back progress made in previous decades.

After the Global War on Terror began, the Department of Defense paired anti-extremist policy with a widespread commitment to educating commanders and troops, but only on the dangers of foreign extremism, Islamist radicalism, and insider threats from these sectors. The focus on a foreign, Islamist threat was so exclusive that experts raised concerns about generalized anti-Muslim bias in federal counter-terrorism training. To this day, the annual insider threat training required of Department of Defense personnel makes no mention of white nationalist and violent right-wing extremism, even though the Defense Personnel and Security Research Center asserted as early as 2005 that the largest and most active domestic terrorist groups are white supremacists.

At the height of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, low enlistment numbers and increased demand for deployable soldiers even led recruiters to ignore regulations meant to prevent domestic extremists from joining. Recruiters ignored neo-Nazi tattoos during enlistment screenings and granted moral waivers to known white nationalists. Extremists such as Forrest Foggarty and Kenneth Eastridge served during this period despite visible neo-Nazi tattoos. Deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan satisfied their genocidal intentions, as they bragged about looking forward to killing all the bloody sand ns. The 2005 Defense Personnel and Security Research Center report concluded that, effectively, the military has a dont ask, dont tell policy pertaining to [domestic] extremism.

Inaction on domestic extremism also came from the top. Letters to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld from the Southern Poverty Law Center and members of Congress revealed the identities of several active-duty white nationalists and called for an investigative task force and enforcement of a zero-tolerance approach to extremism of all kinds within the military. In 2008 and 2009, reports from the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security, respectively, again designated white nationalist and violent right-wing extremism as the most imminent terror threats facing the country. These reports specifically warned about white nationalist leaders encouraging members to enlist in the military. The FBI report, titled White Supremacist Recruitment of Military Personnel since 9/11, detailed 203 individuals with military service involved in white nationalist organizations between 2001 and 2008. Yet, despite numerous warnings, Rumsfeld refused to take action, claiming that current policies were adequate. In fact, the backlash to the 2009 Department of Homeland Security report was so fierce that it was retracted and the team that wrote it was dissolved.

Under the Radar: White Nationalist Extremism After 9/11

After downplaying the threat of domestic extremism post-9/11, several public incidents forced the Department of Defense into action in 2009. After the election of President Barack Obama in 2008, white nationalist activity surged across the country and within the military community. Researchers discovered online discussions about getting around enlistment screenings on Stormfront and found 46 people with their occupations listed as active duty military on the white nationalist social networking site NewSaxon. In 2009, Lance Cpl. Kody Brittingham was arrested after investigators found that his journal contained white nationalist material and a plot to assassinate Obama. These incidents prompted a series of policy changes between 2009 and 2014, which comprises the longest sustained focus on domestic extremism to date. Yet these policy changes perpetuated the same flaws and left the Department of Defense incapable of stopping the flood of extremists who would join the military in the midst of a second nationwide surge in white nationalism, driven by the rise of the alt-right.

Policy reforms enacted between 2009 and 2014 enhanced prohibitions against white nationalist extremist activities, but still relied on individual commanders to solve a systemic problem. Reforms expanded the list of prohibitions to include posting extremist material online and replaced the ban on participating in extremist organizations with a ban on advocating for supremacist ideology. In 2012, a new section in the Department of Defense directive encouraged commanders to remain alert and intervene early, while in 2014, army regulations required commanders to notify the Criminal Investigation Division and law enforcement agencies of any suspected or known cases of extremism. The latter is the first indication of a centralized and coordinated strategy to combat extremism, yet the persistent claim that leaders do not know the extent of this problem demonstrates that this coordination has been ineffective.

The rise of the alt-right after 2015 sparked a surge of white nationalist activity and two new violent organizations emerged with intimate connections to military networks. In 2016, Iraq War veteran Nathan Damigo founded Identity Evropa and quickly attracted several active-duty servicemembers. Atomwaffen Division, founded by Florida national guardsman Brandon Russell, similarly recruited through military networks. In 2017, Russell was arrested with a massive cache of explosives in his garage and at least five other Atomwaffen Division members have since been discharged from military service.

The defining event of this period was the 2017 Unite the Right rallies, which led to violent attacks on counter-protesters and the murder of Heather Heyer by army basic training washout James Alex Fields, Jr. Many veterans were involved in organizing the rally, but there were also several active-duty marines discharged for crimes committed during the event. One of those marines was Lance Cpl. Vassillos Pistolis, a neo-Nazi and Atomwaffen Division member. After the events, Pistolis bragged online about cracking skulls, even posting pictures of the violence.

Simply figuring out the extent of the problem is a challenge. This brief account does not include many less-publicized or uninvestigated occurrences of extremism throughout the military. Accounting is hampered even further by evidence that even known extremists were quietly discharged on other grounds, so as to not attract public attention. In February 2020, the House Armed Services Committee hearing on white supremacy in the military led to the Armys most recent update of its regulation, which further prohibited online extremist activity and radicalization. While these changes make it easier to charge servicemembers for their online activity, it still does not provide a centralized, coordinated strategy, nor does it provide commanders with resources on how to identify such activity. Much of the traffic on online forums comes from individuals hiding behind accounts designed for anonymity. Extremists like former national guardsman and self-described Nazi content creator, Shandon Simpson, are able to enlist without their online personality being known or traced. When activated in response to Black Lives Matter Protests in June 2020, Simpson celebrated online: were getting real ammunition to shoot and kill. Rahowa [Racial Holy War]. Dangerous military extremists like Simpson are rarely discovered through proactive internal measures, but rather are arrested for harm already committed or are uncovered by independent organizations who can only forward their findings to individual commanders and hope for the best.

What This History Means for the Military Today

With the mandate of a stand down day and Austins April 9 announcement of a counter extremism working group, military leaders have again taken initial steps toward a necessary commitment to rid the military of white nationalism and domestic extremism. But we have walked this ground before. Over the past four decades, military leaders have repeatedly updated policy, but crucial policy failures and disregard for the severity of the threat have allowed extremism to remain. There are important lessons to be learned from this history.

First, existing policies empower commanders to investigate, prosecute, and curb servicemembers extremist activities. Instead of further tweaking these policies, the Department of Defense needs to support individual commanders by making implementation of these existing policies more consistent across commands and services. Ensuring that individual unit commanders know what their authorities are and what they should watch for is the first step, and providing a centralized system for monitoring and prioritizing enforcement is also needed.

Second, the militarys post-9/11 response to Islamist extremism led to years of ignoring and even tolerating domestic and white nationalist extremism among active-duty military members. In order to fulfill its function of protecting the military and the nation, anti-extremist policy should place equal emphasis on all extremist threats, including domestic threats, with specificity and nuance. The militarys at-times too-broad approaches toward Islamist extremism resulted in discrimination against people of Muslim faith or backgrounds. We are not arguing for a broad crackdown on political activities, from right or left, in the name of rooting out extremism, especially as studies have shown that current military legal structures used to enforce good order and discipline unfairly target soldiers of color at significantly higher rates. The military needs to approach future anti-extremism efforts with a nuanced understanding of the ideologies and structures of the particular extremist threats they face, whether white nationalist, anti-government, or other, and how they overlap with each other and with foreign extremist organizations. This understanding needs to be paired with clear statements of priority from military leadership.

Finally, the most important lesson is that policy updates alone are ineffective without continued commitment from military and civilian leadership. It takes more than words. New, centralized bureaucratic structures, robust strategies, and better processes are needed to create a standardized mechanism for reporting and recording incidents of extremism within the military. The absence of this type of data collection has left military leaders without the information they need to even understand this problem. Our academic research team is working to remedy one aspect of this information deficiency by developing a historical database of incidents with confirmed ties to the military and white nationalism in the hopes of mapping past patterns of behavior and response. Our database is limited only to publicly reported incidents and currently has over 130 identified entries and over 300 cases found in de-identified reports, forming the largest single compilation of such incidents. Yet, based on recent reporting that the FBI opened 143 investigations into extremist activity among current and former military members in 2020 alone, our database and the public record capture only a small sliver of the true extent of the problem. Austins Feb. 5 memo called for a concerted and sustainable effort to eliminate the corrosive effects [of] extremist ideology. The military can learn from its own history to make this call a reality.

Simone Askewis a 2018 West Point graduate and Rhodes Scholar. She earned a masters degreein refugee studies and a masters in public policy from Oxford University. While a cadet at West Point she was the first African-American woman to serve as First Captain of the Corps of Cadets. She is currently serving as a first lieutenant in the U.S. Army and is a research fellow with the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies at the U.S. Military Academy as part of the New War Research Consortium.

Jack Loweis a 2019 West Point graduate and Fulbright Scholar completing his masters degree in cultural criminology at Lund University, Sweden. He is a first lieutenant in the U.S. Army anda research fellow with the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies at the U.S. Military Academy as part of the New War Research Consortium.

Nette Monausis a 2018 West Point graduate and Schwarzman Scholar. She completed a masters degree in global affairs at Tsinghua University in Beijing, China and is a co-founder of the annual Mass Atrocity Prevention Symposium at the US Military Academy. She currently serves as a first lieutenant in the U.S. Army andis a research fellow with the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies at the U.S. Military Academy as part of the New War Research Consortium.

Kirsten L. Cooper, Ph.D.,is an assistant professor of History at the U.S. Military Academy, West Point. She is a Boren National Security Fellow, specializes in the study of nationalism and propaganda, and has analyzed international disinformation campaigns as an intern with the U.S. Department of State. She currently leads the West Point Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies research team as part of the New War Research Consortium.

The views expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Department of the Army, Department of Defense, or U.S. government.

Image: U.S. Marine Corps (Photo by Cpl. Zachary T. Beatty)

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We've Been Here Before: Learning From the Military's History with White Nationalism - War on the Rocks

BROWNSVILLE, Texas (KVEO) Some people exude good vibes.

The kind of good vibes that put you on South Padre Island with a 311 CD in one hand and a pair of sunglasses in the other.

Cannon the Dealers have carried these vibes for years now and are finally seeing their hard work crystallize with their first music releases over the past half-year.

The band formed out of a group of friends at Brownsville Pace High School in 2015 and has more or less stayed intact, save for trading their original vocalist for St. Joseph Academy alum Nick Tomayo, who would become the bands unofficial leader.

Together with original band members Tony Olivares (bass), Jesus Galindo (rhythm guitar), Luis Segura (drums), and Juan Cervantes (lead guitar), Tomayo has helped put Cannon the Dealers get themselves some notoriety in the Brownsville scene.

The self-described alternative rock band features a blend of inspirations ranging from various scopes of the rock genre, from heavy metal to pop-punk and everything in between.

Their local fame hit a milestone in February 2020 when they played a primetime slot at the Crossroad Brownsville Festival.

Things were riding high for Cannon the Dealers, and then, the COVID-19 pandemic struck.

We were all pretty scared of [the pandemic], said Tomayo. We didnt want to go out, we didnt want to meet up for practice, it was pretty bad.

Bassist Olivares even noted that Tomayo contracted COVID-19 early on in the pandemic, heightening their worries that one of them could get sick.

But even though the pandemic put concerts and consistent practice at a halt, Cannon the Dealers still made an effort to get in the studio in 2020 to release their debut EP.

In Fall 2020, the band laid down three songs for the release and put in extra effort to get it out before the year ended.

It was released right at the end of the year, said Tomayo. I told the guys Im getting this released in 2020 if it kills me! I wanted the EP out in 2020.

Too Soon to Tell was released on December 30, 2020, and features three songs with catchy guitar riffs and memorable songs reminiscent of 2000s alternative rock bands such as Alien Ant Farm, Foo Fighters, and The Strokes.

Although its a short sample size, its a good sign of things to come as the band displays brilliant musicianship on the release.

Outta Here (La La La La La) is a clear gem just begging to become a hit with its catchy hooks that flick along with the chorus.

Ready to Go shows some great guitar work from Cervantes and Galindo while Tomayo delivers a solid vocal performance.

Cannon the Dealers quickly hit the studio again in 2021 to release a stand-alone single, Hell and Back.

The single is a fiery track highlighted by tight production that the band members describe as a heavier side of their sound.

And they arent stopping there. Cannon the Dealers plan to release another single in early May before putting down another multi-track EP in the summer.

The Brownsville band is hoping to join the trend of bands releasing a multitude of singles in consistent spans, rather than spending a lot of time and effort on a full album.

Were not planning to release an album for a long time, said Olivares.

Tomayo stated that social media has drifted people away from wanting to hear albums.

People want things that they can quickly hear and then move on from, said Tomayo. Thats why apps like TikTok are so popular, its real short videos one after the other.

As the pandemic slowly wanes, Cannon the Dealers are hoping to burst out and deliver their music to anyone looking to have a good time, whether it be at one of their shows, on a road trip, or kicked back at the beach.

We want people to have a good time when they hear our music, said Olivares.

Cannon the Dealers can be found on Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube, and Bandcamp.

You can follow the Brownsville band on Facebook and Instagram.

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RGV Sounds: Brownsville alt-rock band wants everyone to have a good time - KGBT-TV

Three months after a group of rioters attempted to halt the certification of the presidential election results by breaching the U.S. Capitol, 401 people have been arrested.

Of those, Pennsylvanias 38 arrests rank behind only Texas and Florida, with 39 each. Eleven of those charged in Pennsylvania come from the federal western district.

Robert Pape, a political scientist from the Chicago Project on Security and Threats at the University of Chicago, has thus far conducted three studies on the riot, including reviewing the demographic study of those arrested.

He says a fine-grained understanding of who broke into the Capitol on Jan. 6 and the nature of the insurrection movement is necessary to reduce the risk of future violence.

Pape uses this analogy: The United States is a patient, and the riot is a tumor.

The tumor could be benign and never cause any trouble, or it could be malignant and spread and worsen over time.

In medicine, Pape said, doctors would study the mass biopsy it, dissect it, analyze it to understand its potential impact.

The same things need to happen with the Capitol riot, he said.

You care because the patient is sick, Pape said. And the patient is us.

***

The Chicago Project attempted to identify common denominators among those arrested by looking at things like residence, age, employment and election results.

Nationally, their studies found that some 67% were 35 or older; 44% either owned their own business or worked in white-collar jobs, including physicians, IT professionals and bankers; only 9% of those arrested were unemployed.

52% came from counties that Joe Biden won in the election.

But the biggest predictor for who participated in the riot, Pape said, was counties that have a declining white population.

Many of the rioters, he said, were driven by what is known as The Great Replacement the fear of, or belief that, the rights of Hispanics and Blacks are outpacing the rights of whites.

Theyre afraid theyre going to lose their social prestige and way of life, said Christopher Sebastian Parker, a political science professor at the University of Washington.

Pape said a survey of 1,000 people conducted after the riot found that 4% of Americans believe the 2020 presidential election was stolen and that they would be willing to participate in violent protest. That equates to as many as 10 million people who are willing to become violent.

Thats worrisome, he said, and runs counter to a broad segment of society that wants to believe that what happened that day in Washington was an isolated incident.

Matt Valasik, who teaches sociology and criminology at Louisiana State University, said much of what drove the rioters was messages sent by former President Trump.

Perceived threats to the Second Amendment, conspiracy theories and covid-19 denial all came into play, Valasik said.

You have that, and always along with that, concern that white status is diminishing in some way, he said.

To that group of people, Parker continued, it doesnt matter that their fear is unfounded.

If youre not a straight, white, Christian, middle-class man, youre not a real American, he said. If you cant check all those boxes, youre in a subordinate position.

Elizabeth Neumann, who served in the Trump administration and is a director of the Republican Accountability Project, said there is more to the movement that spawned the Capitol rioters than just the fear of the Great Replacement.

Neumann, a counterterrorism expert who held senior positions in the Department of Homeland Security from 2017 through April 2020, said that for years, the alt-right has been moving itself into the mainstream by making quasi-academic policy arguments that appeal to conservatives. The problem, though, she continued, is alt-right white supremacists want to overthrow the government.

When it came to the 2020 election, Neumann said, Theyve had four years of a leader telling them their world is coming to an end and they are in an existential crisis unless you elect me because Im the only one who can save you.

Why Pennsylvanians?

Pennsylvania is known for having a relatively large far-right population, Valasik said. He compared it with Michigan in the number of militias and hate groups that operate here.

Harry Litman, a former U.S. attorney in Pittsburgh, said Pennsylvania has for many years had real, radical, conservative extremism very much along the line of the dominant model thats emerged in the last few years.

They are a group of racist, conservative, white extremists, that lures actors and ragtag groups into dangerous, misguided patriotism and a willingness to break the law and a belief that they are advancing and vindicating the Constitution.

But, according to the Chicago Project studies, 87% of those arrested in the Capitol riots were not affiliated with any group or militia.

The movement has moved heavily into the mainstream, and thats quite worrisome, Pape said.

According to data compiled of all the Capitol riot arrests by USA Today, the states with the most arrests are Florida, Texas, Pennsylvania, Virginia and New York.

Valasik, who grew up in Ohio and has family in Mt. Pleasant, noted that most of those were considered to be battleground states in the election.

You had a lot of rhetoric in those states, he said.

In addition, they were places where a lot of money was spent on advertising, social media and billboards which ratcheted up the rhetoric, Valasik said.

Add in the fact that a drive to Washington, D.C., from Pennsylvania is a pretty easy one, he continued, and it makes sense why the Keystone State had so many arrests.

David A. Harris, a law professor at the University of Pittsburgh, said hes not surprised by the Pennsylvania numbers either.

They swallowed the whole big lie, he said. They thought they were going to serve the country at the presidents behest.

Republican U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania had another explanation.

Given the lack of any tangible evidence and failing in dozens and dozens of lawsuits in state and federal courts with Republican and Democratic judges, why do people contine to believe the election was stolen? Toomey asked. Because of the sudden and dramatic changes in election rules because of the pandemic.

We changed the rules to make it easy for people to vote in this once-in-a-century pandemic.

The problem, the senator continued, is that some of the changes werent well thought out, and others were imposed by the courts. And, he believes, they often didnt include basic safeguards.

That kind of thing undermines confidence in the integrity of an election, Toomey said. Despite that, theres no evidence of widespread fraud.

What happens next

Its not enough to know that the insurrection happened, Pape said. Now, experts need to know the contours and drivers of the movement. That includes exploring the rioters networks, the impact of political leadership and the economic and religious factors.

We need to understand not just primary but contributing factors, he said.

That information will be crucial going into the 2022 midterm elections.

But experts disagree on what can be done to try to move the country past Jan. 6.

Harris said Republicans in national leadership positions need to clearly and explicitly tell their supporters the election was not stolen.

Wouldnt it be great if the leadership on that side of things would say, You know what? We were wrong.

Thats what they owe those people.

But, Harris continued, thats not likely to happen.

They have a strong interest in not doing so, because they have a political interest in sticking to the lie.

And, he said, as long as Trump has a strong hold on his base and can threaten those in office with primary challenges that wont change.

They have to toe the Trump line as long as he can sic the mob on them.

Like Harris, Neumann believes it is unlikely anyone in power in the Republican Party will admit to the false narrative.

But, she said, even if they did, it wouldnt fix everything.

We were extremely polarized well before there were allegations of fraud in the election.

Neumann thinks one answer may be in the church, since 85% of conservatives identify as Christians.

With such a strong influence on that community, churches might be well equipped to tackle the problem, said Neumann, herself a lifelong evangelical Christian.

Otherwise, Neumann suggests there must be a grassroots movement, where community members slow down and listen to the people who are in the 4% identified in the Chicago study.

We dont want to drive them into extremist arms by further ostracizing them, she said. You have to slow down and listen to their stories. You have to first let them feel heard and them go deeper past their talking points.

Ask them what they fear, what has changed in their lives, Neumann continued.

Those changes are real, and some people have not been able to adapt to them, she said. Its not just economic. Its a power shift.

The heat of the moment

J. Gerald Ingram, a defense attorney based in Youngstown, Ohio, represents Matthew Perna, who is accused of being inside the Capitol building during the riot, but not of causing any damage.

Perna, of Mercer County, had never been in trouble before, said Ingram, who has been practicing law for 42 years.

There is a psychological phenomenon when youre part of a crowd that begins to act in an unreasonable and unruly manner, Ingram said. You sort of get caught up in the heat of the moment, which is exactly what happened to Mr. Perna.

He called him a nice kid who just got led astray.

Neumann, too, blamed mob rule for the number of people who attacked the Capitol.

She suggested that pre-pandemic, there might not have been such an attack or as many people participating.

Combining the political climate with the loss of control during the covid-19 shutdowns and loss of life, Neumann suggested, drove some people deeper into politics.

And they saw Trump as a messianic figure.

Its the gaslighting effect, she said. If he says the lie long enough, then it becomes truth.

Toomey agreed, but thinks its important to distinguish between those who attended Trumps rally that day and those who breached the Capitol.

I think a lot of people believed the presidents story that he won the election, and it was stolen from him, Toomey said. He repeated it many times, every day.

At the rally, Trump told his supporters to stop the steal.

For his most extreme supporters, Toomey said, What could that mean other than literally going in to stop them from certifying the vote?

Although Ingram concedes his client willingly traveled to Washington, D.C., that day, he said Perna was induced to travel by the inaccurate assertions by the president of the United States.

Now, the attorney said, his client regrets his actions.

He feels betrayed, I guess, and has certainly grown up as a result, Ingram said. Mr. Pernas not the only one who took the bait here.

Ingram said his client believed everything he was told about the election being stolen from Trump.

For Mr. Perna, if theres one lesson here you cant believe any politician.

Paula Reed Ward is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Paula by email at pward@triblive.com or via Twitter .

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