White Nationalist Group Seeks To Form Separate Community in Paoli

White nationalist group seeks to form separate community in Paoli | Local news | heraldtimesonline.
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12/4/16, 10:56 AM
http://www.heraldtimesonline.com/news/local/white-nationalist-group-seeks-to-form-separate-community-in-paoli/article_3eeb5b4e-b8d1-11e6-954e-535619a8e007.html
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White nationalist group seeks to form separate community in Paoli

By Lauren Bavis 812-331-4376 | lbavis@heraldt.com 9 hrs ago
PAOLI Matthew Heimbach and Matt Parrott say all they want is the opportunity to opt out.
"
To opt out of living in a society in constant conflict caused by years of forced multiculturalism. To opt out of working to benefit the
globalist agenda of international corporations. To opt out of a political system they believe has abandoned the white working class,
and instead to work as advocates for their people, who they say are at risk of losing their European traditions and culture.
Paoli residents Heimbach and Parrott call themselves white nationalists and want to build a separate society for other like-minded
members of their newly formed political group, the Traditionalist Worker Party. Organizations that track the work of hate groups,
though, call them white supremacists.
We see this multicultural experiment, this idea were all going to integrate, fundamentally fails because people, at end of day, want
to return to their traditions, to their ethnic identity, and thats a good thing, 25-year-old Heimbach said.
His words, repeated and put into context by Marilyn Mayo, a research fellow at the Anti-Defamation Leagues Center on Extremism,
have a very dierent meaning. The Anti-Defamation League began as a Jewish civil rights organization and fights hate, antiSemitism and all forms of bigotry.
One of the arguments of white nationalists is we dont think were superior to anybody; we believe everyone should have selfdetermination, Mayo said. Why are they opposed to nonwhites living with whites? I dont believe its just about love for their own
people. Theres a lot of hatred there; theres a lot of rejection of people who are not white.
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White nationalist group seeks to form separate community in Paoli | Local news | heraldtimesonline.com
12/4/16, 10:56 AM
The Herald-Times
The Traditionalist Worker Party: White nationalism in southern Indiana
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Links to violence
White nationalism and alternative right ideologies started garnering national attention and bringing it to southern Indiana
during the presidential election season. In March, Heimbach was videotaped shoving a black woman protesting during a rally in
Kentucky for then-Republican presidential candidate, now president-elect, Donald Trump.
Heimbach and two other men at the rally were charged with misdemeanor harassment, said Louisville Metro Police Department
spokesman Dwight Mitchell. But because the men live outside of Kentucky, the department has no jurisdiction to summon
Heimbach to court.
Violence broke out again at a protest in Sacramento organized by the California chapter of the Traditionalist Worker Party and the
self-described white nationalist social club the Golden State Skinheads, which the Southern Poverty Law Center also calls a racist
hate group.
The potential (of violence) is there with the rhetoric, said Keegan Hankes, an analyst for the Southern Poverty Law Center, a
nonprofit that monitors hate groups and extremists in the U.S. Im not saying theyre the ones necessarily to do it, but words have
consequences; ideas have consequences.
At least 10 people were hurt, some stabbed, when hundreds of anti-racist and anti-fascist counterprotesters clashed with 30 or so
white nationalists who were protesting legally with a permit.
Heimbach has tried to form alliances throughout his involvement in the white supremacist movement. Hes someone who has ties
to the most extreme elements of the white supremacist movement, Mayo said. Sometimes you have violence on the other end. A
violent reaction is not the answer.
Police called the scene chaotic, but Heimbach and Parrott, who did not attend the rally, argued that their members were only
defending themselves and their beliefs.
White Americans now have a voice, and were going to be part of the discussion, said Parrott, 34. And there are people who are
so violently opposed to that that theyre prepared to engage in terrorism to stop us from having a civil conversation. But were
going to try to have it anyway.
Far beyond politics
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12/4/16, 10:56 AM
Parrott brought a PBS reporter onto the Paoli property he shares with Heimbach for a PBS NewsHour segment on the growth of
white nationalism in the United States. He said the broadcast segment incorrectly portrayed his home as the center of a new and
growing white homeland.
We just happen to live in Paoli. Theres no Craig Cobb-style plan to take over the town, Parrott said, referring to the white
separatist who attempted to build an all-white commune in North Dakota.
Southern Indianas a natural home for our politics, he said. You have struggling working-class issues; you have the frustration and
alienation from Washington insider politics. We need to be where people are being left behind, and I think there are few places that
can compete with Kentucky (and) Indiana.
Threats to their safety and the safety of their families following the televised report have led the co-founders of the Traditionalist
Worker Party to limit their political and advocacy work outside of Orange County.
But its still work they see as critically important to the Midwest, Rust Belt and Appalachia regions, where Heimbach said workingclass whites and their families have been left behind by their political representatives and left without a voice for going on a
generation.
Its the idea of building an infrastructure to be advocates and community organizers that will use politics, but I think it goes far
beyond politics, Heimbach said.
When it comes to nationalism, we are the future. Globalism has failed. It hurts our people; it takes our ability to govern ourselves
and gives it to oligarchs that dont have our best interests at heart. This is a worldwide movement, and were winning.
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Forming the TWP

For us, to be truly anti-capitalist is to be a nationalist, Heimbach said over lunch at the Dennys restaurant in French Lick, roughly a
10-minute drive from the property he shares with Parrott. Nationalism is a bulwark against capitalist exploitation and globalism.
Its a hefty political and economic theory for a group that models itself as the voice for white, working-class families. In coal country,
Heimbach elaborated, men working in mines, factories and mills used to be able to provide a stable middle-class life for their
families. Heimbach himself works in a warehouse.
Now, following what Heimbach and Parrott see as the intrusion of globalist corporations, poverty rates in Indiana and other Rust
Belt and Midwestern states hover between 14 and 18 percent, according to government census data. These communities
compound economic failure with public health crises. Heimbach cited, for example, rampant drug abuse in Kentucky and Indiana
and high rates of suicide in West Virginia.
These are people that have been fundamentally left behind and are suering, Heimbach said. The political establishment for
decades has told them to sit down, shut up and die.
Party platform
The Traditionalist Worker Party first registered as a national political committee with the Federal Election Commission in the summer
of 2015, according to FEC records. The TWP is designated as a non-qualified, unauthorized party, which means it hasnt been
active long enough or received enough donations to be recognized, and it isnt aliated with a qualified candidate or connected to
an authorized political party.
Heimbach claims the Traditionalist Worker Party has three dozen active chapters and an estimated 500 members across the
country. Hankes and Mayo said they dont think the numbers could be that high.
The partys leading philosophy is to fight for faith, family and folk. This includes defining marriage as only between a man and a
woman and supporting families with male breadwinners and stay-at-home mothers. The party advocates for freedom from the
government to conduct business and education in accordance with religious values; and severely limiting immigration in order to
maintain the European traditions of white Americans.
White Americans have hundreds of years of unique history, Parrott said. When we travel, its a joke; everybody can point us out
and spot us rather quickly by our dress and our behavior and customs and our mannerisms.
The party platform also calls for the federal government to end programs that force communities to accept resettled refugees and
those that require neighborhoods to adhere to fair housing standards that prohibit homeowners associations from restricting the
ethnic, religious and cultural qualities of an area.
They believe that whites are dierent from other groupings of people, and they believe that whites have a more advanced culture,
that theyre dierent socially, theyre dierent on all sorts of levels, said Mayo of the Anti-Defamation League.
The ultimate goal of white nationalists is to have a separate white ethnostate, which would be devoid of minorities, and thats a
form of white supremacy to want that.
The Traditionalist Worker Partys values include prohibiting abortion; creating youth mentorship programs that encourage a path
toward marriage, starting families and seeking environmentally sustainable employment that stimulates the local economy; and
ending birthright citizenship, dual citizenship and working visa programs, as well as limiting immigration into the country to no more
than the number of U.S. citizens leaving the country.
The ultimate goal: peaceful secessionist projects that give communities and regions full autonomy to govern themselves
according to their values.
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12/4/16, 10:56 AM
Separation doesnt have to be a hostile thing. It can be a voluntary, constructive thing, like the Native American reservations,
Parrott said.
Even if we were in favor of multiculturalism, youd have to be psychotic to enforce it when you ... know its creating tension, conflict
and mutual distrust. Stop the hate, separate.
Advocating for white Americans

The Traditionalist Worker Party advocates for white people, Heimbach and Parrott repeated, and they wont back down from the
need for white advocates. Their work does not equate to supremacy, they said.
Hankes, of the Southern Poverty Law Center, doesnt see that distinction.
They can sling whatever yarn they want about love, but at end of the day, they believe, for whatever reason, theyre the superior
race here, Hankes said. I think its all pretty much doublespeak. I think hate is at the heart of it.
There are Trump campaign signs in Parrott and Heimbachs yard, but that is as political as the Traditionalist Worker Party plans to be
in Paoli.
Since the broadcast of the PBS segment on the property Parrott purchased this fall from a bank, the party members say theyve had
cause to fear for their lives beyond the daily threats on social media they are used to, including threats to rape Heimbachs wife and
kill his son.
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12/4/16, 10:56 AM
Were not trying to force any of our views on anyone else. We dont want to make anyone not love Paoli, Heimbach said. They
can have dierent political perspectives than us, be of dierent backgrounds, but were just there and trying to build a community in
a community.
The Orange County Sheris Oce has not received any reports related to the group neither threats toward its members nor
people feeling threatened by its members and its presence. Nor has the town council received complaints, said Amy Morris, clerk
treasurer for the town of Paoli. Weve not had anybody call and ask, inquire, complain, nothing, Morris said. I dont think most of
the community knows.
Parrott would agree that Paoli residents may have only seen or heard negative things about his party.
The responsibility is on us to prove were a constructive element, Parrott said. Ordinary families, were not coming for them.
Should the radical leftists in Bloomington be concerned? Absolutely. Not for their personal safety, but ..."
For the political changes that are happening, Heimbach finished.
The future of the party
Despite animosity toward the liberal-leaning city, the Traditionalist Worker Party was formed in Bloomington, where Parrott said they
still have dozens of active members, including Indiana University students. College activism with the Traditionalist Youth Network
was a good first step, but Heimbach and Parrott wanted to create something with a wider reach.
For every other community, you can go into an oce if youre black or Latino, and they can help you with the paperwork,
Heimbach said. No one is advocating for us, and people are suering and people are dying. The system made it racial by explicitly
leaving us behind and at the same time saying we have privilege.
Its what party member Jason Augustus said he experienced while living and working in New York City. Though he had a well-paying
job, Augustus estimates with the high costs of rent, utilities, food and other necessities, he had the same standard of living as his
neighbors, some of whom were people of color and immigrants living in government-subsidized housing and utilizing food pantries.
I dont have an advocacy group to help me with all those costs, said Augustus, 32. These are just basic things, and the only thing
standing in our way of that is this illusive privilege. There are a lot of poor white people. Not all white people get nice corporate jobs
like I had. But theyre still told they have a leg up.
Augustus started looking for others who shared his values and found a group with white nationalist leanings, which led him to meet
Heimbach. He since has moved to Paoli, where he feels more at home.
He was the dude going in the direction I was thinking, Augustus said of Heimbach.
The common narrative is we are evil Nazi racists, that we hate anybody whos not like us. But this simply isnt the case. We just
want to be around people like ourselves without the government coming in and telling us who we should live next to, who we should
do business with.
Heimbach soon hopes to run for political oce, locally, as a candidate who would fight for the white nationalist ideologies he shares
with Augustus.
Hankes said he doesnt see Heimbach as the next David Duke, even though a headline in the Washington Post recently likened
the chairman of the Traditionalist Worker Party to the former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan.
We think the more people learn about what were actually doing and what were actually saying, the less frightened people will be,
Parrott said.
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12/4/16, 10:56 AM
But the Southern Poverty Law Center will continue to monitor the partys activities, Hankes said, while party members focus on
maintaining their community within the community.
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White nationalist group seeks to form separate community in Paoli | Local news | heraldtimesonline.

White nationalist group seeks to form separate community in Paoli

The Traditionalist Worker Party: White nationalism in southern Indiana

Forming the TWP

Advocating for white Americans

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