Bond with Other Bigots
National Alliance & Skinheads
In an effort to attract young people to their cause, some units of the National
Alliance, including the Midland, Michigan, and Cleveland, Ohio, units, have reached out to
neo-Nazi Skinhead groups. Frank Hesse, an NA leader in Michigan, has successfully
recruited local Skinheads to the group, according to The Saginaw News, a
Michigan daily. The Cleveland NA unit has courted Skinheads and youths in general by
hosting two White Power concerts in 1995. The concerts featured "white power"
rock bands such as Rahowa, Das Reich, Max Resist, and Aggravated Assault, which are known
for their violent, rabidly anti-Semitic, anti-minority lyrics. Both events were
co-sponsored by Life Rune Records, a Cleveland-area NA affiliate.
In 1996, the Skinhead-oriented magazine Resistance, then published by
George Burdi, former head of the neo-Nazi record company, Resistance Records, had kind
words for the NA. It informed readers that "The National Alliance is clearly
the most forward-looking and progressive Racialist organization in the world today, and it
is no wonder that Robert Mathews endorsed them so whole-heartedly." In a March 1997
letter to the readers of Resistance, Burdi, who at the time was in prison for
attacking and beating an anti-racist protester, wrote, "The American Dissident
Voices radio show done by the National Alliance is an example of the progressive
direction we needed to take in the propaganda field." He urged his readers to devote
more energy to the "white power movement" that he said was being spearheaded by
his record company and groups like the National Alliance. But the NA did not rely only on
Burdi's endorsement. The group regularly promoted itself in slick full-page
advertisements in Resistance.
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