State leaders denounce white supremacist letters sent to lawmakers

Leaders in the House and Senate on Friday strongly denounced mailers sent to the homes of several state lawmakers by white nationalist organizations and reported the incident to Capitol Police.

Their condemnation came hours ahead of a legislative committee’s vote not to support a bill that would require Maine public safety officials to track and address domestic terrorism threats and extremist groups.

The mailing claims to raise awareness of “AntiWhiteism” and advances white supremacist propaganda such as the “Great Replacement,” a conspiracy theory that immigration, multiculturalism and diversity initiatives are being used to displace “ethnic Europeans.” It also pushes back against anti-racism terminology such as white privilege and white fragility.

In a joint statement Friday, Senate President Troy Jackson, D-Allagash, and House Speaker Rachel Talbot Ross, D-Portland, said the “inflammatory mail” had been reported to Capitol Police.

“We cannot state this forcefully enough: We have zero tolerance for white nationalist groups’ behavior or intimidation,” the leaders said. “The groups issuing these messages masquerade as seeking social justice, yet in reality distort information to create false equivalency to misdirect the public and stoke racial tensions.”

It’s unclear who sent the letters, but a copy provided to the Press Herald says it was produced in collaboration with the Way of the World, Anti-White Watch, Solidarity Europa and Klaus Arminius.

Peggy Shukur, the interim regional director for the Anti-Defamation League’s New England office, said Friday that the league isn’t familiar with these groups and it’s possible the names were made up by actual white supremacist organizations.

A report from ADL New England released in March documented 30 incidents of antisemitic, racist, anti-immigrant and anti-LGBTQ+ messaging across Maine in 2022, up 50% from what the group recorded in 2021.

“These are all in the same genre of stunts and tactics that these extremist groups employ,” Shukur said.

‘STAY OUT OF MAINE’

A spokesperson for the Senate president said that at least eight members of the caucus received the letters on Wednesday, but she did not respond to voicemails and emails seeking further information on the recipients Friday, including which members received the letters.

House Minority Leader Billy Bob Faulkingham, R-Winter Harbor, and Senate Minority Leader Trey Stewart, R-Presque Isle, said they’re not aware of any Republican House or Senate members who received the letter.

Faulkingham said that getting “strange, creepy and sometimes threatening mail is not uncommon” for lawmakers.

“Racism in any form should be condemned and is reprehensible,” Stewart said. “These types of hate groups should stay out of Maine.”

Former Portland City Council candidate Richard Ward, who’s known for displaying an “It’s OK to be white” banner, read the same letter aloud during a public comment period at Monday’s City Council meeting.

Dozens of Portland residents attended the meeting to condemn white supremacy after a white nationalist group staged a demonstration in downtown Portland, the state’s largest and most diverse city. About 30 members of the Nationalist Social Club, or NSC-131, marched throughout the city on April 1 and assaulted several counterprotesters in front of City Hall.

Portland police came under fire at the meeting from residents who criticized officers for not identifying any of the masked members or charging anyone for the assault.

Ward said Friday that he did not send the letter to lawmakers and that he found a copy of it on Twitter. Ward said he shared the letter at Monday’s meeting to exercise free speech and “to show that not everyone thinks the exact same way.”

“I don’t see how that could possibly be taken as offensive,” Ward said. “If you don’t agree with me, then just move on, I guess.”

The National Socialist Club is an extremist group formed early in 2020 in Massachusetts that has had a presence in Maine for more than two years. The group embraces racist tropes spread by Adolf Hitler’s Nazi party, targets those who are Jewish and non-white, and seeks to create an underground resistance group.

“The state Legislature is a place where lawmakers, members of the public and professional staff deserve safety, security and the certainty that the democratic process will operate without harassment,” said Jackson and Talbot Ross, who is Black. “As presiding officers, we will be relentless in safeguarding every single person who visits the Legislature and will always call out hateful and racist behavior.”

‘TARGETED APPROACH’

Later Friday morning, the Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee voted “ought not to pass” on a bill that would require the Department of Public Safety to provide annual reports to lawmakers about domestic terrorism threats and groups suspected of posing these threats. The legislation also would have required the Maine Criminal Justice Academy to develop minimum standards for domestic terrorism response and information-sharing.

Committee members were concerned the bill focused too much on targeting groups, rather than tracking individual threats and actions.

“I do think there is significant concern from the committee on the vagueness this would create and the ambiguity on who is qualified as a domestic terrorist organization, what the reports would look like, where it would go,” Rep. Tavis Hasenfus, D-Readfield, said Friday. He added that a “more targeted approach” would be better and that he would possibly support amending other legislation to accomplish this.

Other committee members said they felt like the state is adequately tracking this information already.

Rep. Donald Ardell, R-Monticello, said in Friday’s meeting that the legislation had “the ability to politicize crime.” Rep. Robert Nutting, R-Oakland, questioned state leaders’ ability to classify certain groups as violent extremists, and that leaving this up to law enforcement officials seemed “ineffectual.”

“I think we’re doing a good job as we are,” Ardell said.

Rep. Nina Milliken, D-Blue Hill, was the sole committee member to vote against the ought not to pass recommendation. The bill was supported by the Department of Public Safety.

“Reporting to this committee and developing minimum standards for training and dissemination of Domestic Terrorist Threats while protecting the integrity of any individuals or investigations makes common sense,” Jack Peck, assistant director of the criminal justice academy, said in written testimony.

The U.S. Government Accountability Office warned in March that domestic terrorism is on the rise, pointing to racially motivated shootings that killed 10 people in Buffalo in May 2022 and a shooting that killed 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue in 2018.

Between 2010 and 2021, there were 231 domestic terrorism incidents, with about 35% motivated by race or ethnicity.

“These attacks were also the most lethal,” the GAO said. “Anti-government or anti-authority motivated violent extremism was the second largest category of incidents, and resulted in 15 deaths over the same time period.”