White supremacists have taken to the streets in a deliberate attempt to attract publicity and to exploit and co-opt the national discussion on immigration for their own hateful purposes.  Viewing immigration as a "wedge" issue through which they believe they can foist their racist and anti-Semitic views on the American public, and attract recruits and attention for themselves, white supremacists have organized a number of rallies and protests with anti-immigration and anti-Hispanic themes.

Many of the extremist events have taken place in southern states.  There, white supremacists hope to exploit anti-immigration sentiment that has risen as a result of a significant influx of Hispanic immigrants, primarily agricultural workers, into areas of the South that had never before had a substantial Hispanic population.

Demonstrations, rallies and other events taking place in spring 2006 included:

• In Seattle, Washington, and Las Vegas, Nevada, members of the neo-Nazi National Vanguard held anti-immigration protests on May 20.   On its Web site, the National Vanguard declared that day to be a "day of protest against George W. Bush's plan to destroy America," calling the president's immigration proposals a "sellout of the nation."  In Seattle, neo-Nazis appeared along Interstate I-5, displaying signs for motorists stuck in traffic to read.  In Las Vegas, white supremacists held a small rally in front of the federal courthouse.
• In Keene, New Hampshire, New England members of the Arkansas-based neo-Nazi group White Revolution held a self-described "anti-invasion" demonstration on May 7 to protest "the invasion of America by illegal non white hordes."  Members of other white supremacist groups, ranging from the National Socialist Movement to the American Front, also showed up.
• In Russellville, Alabama, members of the Alabama chapter of the Indiana-based National Knights of the Ku Klux Klan held an anti-immigration rally on May 6, yelling "Let's get rid of the Mexicans!"  National Knights leader Ray Larsen was on hand, telling the crowd that gathered that immigrants "want you out of here because they want this as their land."  After the rally, the Klansmen burned a cross in a field outside of town.
• In Montgomery, Alabama, the neo-Confederate group League of the South and the Coalition against Illegal Immigration together organized an anti-immigration "Cinco de Mayo" demonstration on May 5.  Promoting the event in his racist and anti-Semitic newspaper First Freedom, Olaf Childress wrote that he planned to be there, "maybe even with a baseball bat.  Already got a placard in mind:  MEX GET THE HELL OUT OF MY COUNTRY."   Childress did show up with such a placard and a baseball bat, telling a local reporter that "Jewish supremacists" had a plan to abolish the borders of the U.S.  Other signs at the demonstration displayed slogans such as "multi-culturalism is liberal insanity." 
• In Greenville, South Carolina, the racist Council of Conservative Citizens held an anti-immigration demonstration on April 29 in front of the offices of Republican Congressman Lindsey Graham, where they burned Mexican flags and displayed signs such as "More INS, Less IRS," "Vote for Pedro to Go Home," and "I Didn't Fight in Iraq for Illegal Aliens."   

White supremacists also showed up to counter events organized by immigration and human rights activists, in particular the May 1 "Day without Immigrants" events organized around the country by immigrant rights activists.  In San Angelo, Texas, members of the Empire Knights of the Ku Klux Klan showed up to counter local events.  In Dayton, Ohio, half a dozen members of the neo-Nazi National Socialist Movement appeared in Nazi uniforms at a pro-immigration march to protest, in their words, "the illegal wetback scum and Shabbat goy mud lovers."  In Madison, Wisconsin, in April, members of the neo-Nazi New Order passed out literature at an immigrant rights event at the capitol.

Even where white supremacists have not shown up in person, they have plastered communities around the country with crude anti-Hispanic and anti-immigration fliers.  In Bakersfield, California, for example, one community was littered with National Vanguard fliers that read "Civilization: One Job Mexicans Won't Do."  Residents of Pasadena, Texas, discovered racist fliers that urged people to burn down the homes of people thought to be illegal immigrants.  


Border Vigilante Group Events

Anti-immigration border vigilante groups have also organized anti-immigrant events around the country this spring.  The largest border vigilante group, the Minuteman Project, held a reprise in April of their 2005 vigilante border patrols along the Arizona-Mexico border, and followed up with a caravan that staged anti-immigration events across the country.  One Minuteman event in Birmingham, Alabama, was organized by Mike Vanderboegh, a former militia leader.  At the rally, an attendee distributed copies of Olaf Childress's racist and anti-Semitic newspaper, First Freedom.  Other anti-immigration groups held rallies from Arizona to Minnesota.  

Anti-immigration groups have also turned to publicity stunts.  The Minutemen, for example, declared on May 9 that they would start building their own "border security fence" on private property along the border with Mexico, unless the federal government itself deployed the military or erected such fencing.  The Minutemen claimed that they had received nearly $200,000 in donations to build such a fence.  Other border vigilante groups have already begun or announced similar projects.