Category Archives: The far right

‘It’s a small group of people’: Trump again denies white nationalism is rising threat

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President downplays hate surge after white supremacist, who mentioned Trump in a manifesto, attacked New Zealand mosques

Donald Trump said he did not view white nationalism as a rising threat around the world, as New Zealand is reeling from a white supremacist attack on two mosques that killed 49 people.

Asked by a reporter on Friday if he saw an increase globally in the threat of white nationalism, the US president responded: “I don’t really. I think it’s a small group of people that have very, very serious problems. I guess, if you look at what happened in New Zealand, perhaps that’s a case. I don’t know enough about it yet.”

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What does Christchurch attack tell us about rightwing extremism?

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The motivations and actions of far-right terrorists are not dissimilar to those of others

The terrorist attack in New Zealand has focused attention once more on the acute threat posed by rightwing extremists.

Waves of terrorism follow a pattern: a long, unnoticed buildup followed by a massive and spectacular strike that often inflicts significant damage and casualties but focuses minds and eventually resources.

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Slovak liberals cross fingers for election of pro-west Zuzana Čaputová

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Voters rally to presidential frontrunner whose pro-LGBT stance has fuelled rightwing conspiracy machine

Disbelief and a hint of fear flashed across Zuzana Čaputová’s face as the news broke.

After explaining to the Guardian how she would bolster the rule of law in Slovakia if elected president, Čaputová, a 45-year-old lawyer and the frontrunner in Saturday’s presidential poll, suddenly stopped short as an aide read out a headline from his phone: Marian Kočner, a multi-millionaire businessman, had been charged with ordering the murder of Ján Kuciak, a journalist who was investigating organised crime.

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Do the Christchurch shootings expose the murderous nature of ‘ironic’ online fascism? | Jason Wilson

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The most terrible livestream in history suggests online fascism is the most dangerous political current in the world today

Before the massacre in Christchurch, New Zealand, in which 49 people were murdered at Friday prayers at two mosques, a man who identified himself as Brenton Tarrant posted notice of his intention to live-stream an “attack” on 8chan, the notorious online messageboard.

It opened with jokey, ironic lingo. “Well lads, it’s time to stop shitposting and time to make a real life effort post … It’s been a long ride and despite all your rampant faggotry, fecklessness and degeneracy, you are all top blokes and the best bunch of cobbers a man could ask for.”

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Trump attacks ‘Wacky Nut Job’ Ann Coulter over border wall criticism

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  • President insults hard-right commentator and former ally
  • Official: budget to include request for more wall money

Donald Trump will be making a significant request for border wall funds and seeking money to stand up his “Space Force” as a new branch of the military in the White House budget being released next week, an administration official said on Saturday.

Related: SXSW: Warren tells tech audience plan to break up giants is 'like baseball'

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Italian far-right members produce sexist leaflet for International Women’s Day

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Female ministers and opposition condemn leaflet from League members in southern Italy on the ‘natural role’ of women

Representatives of the far-right League in southern Italy have provoked fury after producing an explicitly sexist leaflet to mark International Women’s Day.

It was intended to be a dedication to women, but the pamphlet instead takes aim at those who “offend women’s dignity” by impeding their “natural role” of “supporting life and the family”.

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Estonia election: opposition Reform party wins but far-right support doubles

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Coalition-building begins after Kaja Kallas’s centre-right party wins 28.8% of vote

Estonia’s opposition liberal Reform party won Sunday’s general election, outpacing centre-left prime minister Juri Ratas’s party and a surging far-right that was buoyed by a backlash from mostly rural voters.

Led by former MEP Kaja Kallas, Reform garnered 28.8% of the vote, well ahead of Ratas’s Centre party on 23%. The far-right EKRE more than doubled its previous election score, at 17.8%, according to the full results posted on Estonia’s official state elections website.

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Revealed: Ukip membership surge shifts party to far right

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Investigation reveals exodus of party’s moderates and influx of more extreme newcomers

A surge in Ukip membership is shifting the party decisively towards the far right, as long-standing moderates are replaced by entrants attracted by an anti-Islam agenda based on street protest, a Guardian investigation can reveal.

Membership has risen by about 50% over the 12 months from a low point a year ago, rapidly reshaping the party in the image of its leader, Gerard Batten, who describes Islam as “a death cult” and has appointed the anti-Muslim activist Tommy Robinson as an adviser.

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The neo-Nazi plot against America is much bigger than we realize

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Lt Christopher Hasson is the product of traditions in white supremacist circles, and experts say there are ‘thousands like him’

In the early summer of 2017, US coast guard lieutenant Christopher Hasson had an idea. He had been trying to figure out an effective way of killing billions of people – “almost every last person on Earth” – but found himself coming up against the daunting logistics of such a task.

Related: America's dark underbelly: I watched the rise of white nationalism

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How ‘race whisperer’ seized control of a US neo-Nazi group

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In a story to rival the plot of BlacKkKlansman, James Hart Stern takes leadership of America’s National Socialist Movement

They call him the “race whisperer”, a black civil rights activist able to manipulate some of the most noxious far-right figureheads in the US. Now James Hart Stern has triumphed again – and it is possibly his most extraordinary accomplishment to date. Stern, 54, has emerged as the new leader of one of the largest and oldest neo-Nazi groups in the US – the National Socialist Movement.

Stern said he had gradually wooed the group’s longstanding leader before eventually seizing control. “As a black man, I took over a neo-Nazi group and outsmarted them,” he said.

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Italy’s intelligence agency warns of rise in racist attacks

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Agency says increase in attacks on migrants is likely before European elections in May

Italy’s intelligence agency has warned in a briefing to the Italian parliament that attacks on migrants and minorities could rise in the run-up to May’s European elections.

Racially motivated attacks have seen a sharp increase in Italy and tripled between 2017 and 2018, when the far-right League entered government in coalition with the anti-establishment Five Star Movement.

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Outrage after Brazil ministry asks schools to read aloud Bolsonaro slogan

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New education minister admits ‘mistake’ after asking schools to film students singing the national anthem and as slogan is read

Brazil’s new education minister has been forced into a humiliating retreat after he asked schools in the country to film students singing the national anthem in front of a Brazilian flag and being read the campaign slogan of new far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro.

“I recognised the mistake,” Ricardo Vélez Rodríguez said on Tuesday, a day after the education ministry emailed his instructions to schools across the country – and provoked a storm of outrage.

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Alabama newspaper at centre of KKK outcry appoints black female editor

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Elecia R. Dexter takes reins of Democrat-Reporter from Goodloe Sutton, who called for return of Ku Klux Klan

A small-town Alabama newspaper that drew condemnation for an editorial this month calling for the Ku Klux Klan to “ride again” has named an African American woman as its new editor and publisher, the paper has said.

On Friday, Elecia R. Dexter took the reins of the weekly Democrat-Reporter in Linden, Alabama, from Goodloe Sutton, 79, the longtime owner of the paper who wrote the incendiary editorial that brought sharp rebukes from elected officials in the state and the public.

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Italian senate group votes to block criminal case against Salvini

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Rest of senate must choose whether to ratify decision over kidnapping charges

An Italian parliamentary committee has voted to block a criminal case against Matteo Salvini, the deputy prime minister and interior minister, for refusing to allow migrants to disembark from a rescue ship.

Prosecutors in Catania, Sicily, need the backing of parliament to continue investigations against Salvini, who also leads the far-right League party, for alleged abuse of office and kidnapping.

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Spain heads into election unknown as Sánchez runs out of road

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Political landscape fragmented amid Catalan secession crisis and re-emergence of far-right

Spain is heading into what could be months of political uncertainty after its Socialist prime minister called a snap general election for April – the country’s third in less than four years – against the backdrop of a continuing Catalan secession crisis.

It was always improbable that Pedro Sánchez, whose administration will be the shortest in Spain’s modern democratic history, would last long. He came to power in June only because his predecessor, the conservative Mariano Rajoy, lost a no-confidence vote after a string of corruption revelations about his People’s Party (PP).

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Antisemitism rising sharply across Europe, latest figures show

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France reports 74% rise in offences against Jews and Germany records 60% surge in violent attacks

Antisemitism is rising sharply across Europe, experts have said, as France reported a 74% increase in the number of offences against Jews last year and Germany said the number of violent antisemitic attacks had surged by more than 60%.

Related: Hungary tells UK Jewish group to 'mind its own business' over antisemitism

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John Oliver: ‘Maybe Brexit is a great idea. There’s absolutely nothing to suggest that’

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As the British comedian’s show returns, he discusses fighting fake news, why Brexit is worse than Trump’s presidency – and his attempt to convert his kids to Marmite

The Donald Trump presidency, John Oliver observed in 2017, is a marathon. “It’s painful, it’s pointless and the majority of you didn’t even agree to run it; you were just signed up by your dumbest friend,” he told viewers. “And though you’re exhausted and your whole body is screaming for you to give up and your nipples are chafing for some reason, the stakes are too high for any of us to stop.”

Activists, politicians, judges, journalists and concerned citizens are all running the race. Some have embraced the challenge and now, past the halfway point, are finding hope as they see the 2020 election on the horizon. Others have wobbled, legs buckling, consumed by the anxiety that they will never make it. Oliver, a cheerful and charming presence in a conference room at HBO’s headquarters in New York, is surely one of those runners wearing a wacky costume, pointing out the absurdity of the exercise while embodying the stamina and stoicism required to reach the finish line.

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Hungary, populism and my Orbán-voting father

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Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s far-right prime minister, is at the forefront of a nationalist surge in Europe, and his anti-migrant rhetoric has brought condemnation from the EU. The Guardian’s John Domokos went to find out the attraction Orbán holds to Hungarian voters, including his own father. Plus: how one woman is campaigning to prevent her frozen eggs being destroyed

What makes a person vote for Hungary’s nationalist prime minister, Viktor Orbán? It was a question intensely personal to the Guardian’s John Domokos, whose Hungarian father is a believer in economic nationalism, and supports Orbán.

John took a road trip through the country for a Guardian documentary, in the hope of understanding his father’s politics and to try to overcome their differences. He tells Anushka Asthana what he learned, while Kim Lane Scheppele, an expert on Hungary at Princeton University, discusses how far Orbán has strayed from Europe’s democratic norms.

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Polish far-right trial raises spectre of ‘false flag’ tactics

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German journalist with links to Russia allegedly organised arson attack in Ukraine to stoke tensions, court told

The plot allegedly involved three Polish extremists and a German journalist with ties to the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party, as well as to a number of Kremlin-friendly Russian news outlets.

Their alleged task was to carry out a “false flag” operation in western Ukraine: burn down a Hungarian cultural centre, and make it look as though Ukrainian nationalists were responsible. The main beneficiary of the ensuing recriminations would be Russia.

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