SPLC's Intelligence Report | Page 40

MAY 3  38 splc intelligence report ‘PATRIOT’ GROUPS 1995–2015 1274 1096 998 874 858 824 523 512 435 217 194 158 143 171 152 132 147 131 149 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 BILL CLINTON 1993-2001 GEORGE W. BUSH 2001-2009 than 83 percent of the population,” The New York Times’ Eduardo Porter wrote of lower-income whites in a trenchant essay this January. “Today, their share has shrunk to 62 percent as demographic change has transformed the JUNE 3  A police officer and an FBI agent shoot dead Usaamah Rahim after he allegedly lunges at them with a military knife in Boston. Officials say Rahim initially planned to behead Pamela Geller, but instead attacked officers. JUNE 17 In an attempt to start a “race war,” Dylann Roof murders nine black churchgoers at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, S.C., after accusing African Americans of raping white women and trying to “take over.” The massacre provokes a major backlash against the Confederate battle flag, which Roof venerated, and that in turn fuels enormous rage and pro-flag rallies on the radical right. BARACK OBAMA 2009- United States into a nation where others have a shot at power. “Their fear is understandable. In general, the concerns of Hispanic and black American voters are often different than those of white voters. But the reaction JULY 16 Four U.S. Marines are killed by Kuwaiti-born Muhammad Youssef Abdulazeez, a naturalized U.S. citizen, in an Islamist attack on a military recruiting office and a naval facility in Chattanooga, Tenn. Abdulazeez is also killed. Members of the III Percenters, an antigovernment group, later insist on guarding a number of other recruiting centers with guns despite officials’ requests that they not do so. JULY 21 Former correctional officer Michael O’Neill blows off his own leg while building bombs in his parents’ garage in Wheatland, N.Y. While authorities do not know what O’Neill’s plans might have been, the garage is hung with white supremacist propaganda — including Nazi symbols, Klan posters and Confederate memorabilia — and O’Neill is ordered held without bail. AP IMAGES/LES STUKENBERG, THE DAILY COURIER (SIMPSON); AP IMAGES/SALT LAKE COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE (SOOFI); AP IMAGES/MARK GARFINKEL, BOSTON HERALD (KNIFE); LASTRHODESIAN.COM (ROOF); AP IMAGES/DAVID GOLDMAN (FUNERAL) In Garland, Texas, anti-Muslim propagandist Pamela Geller holds a Muhammad cartoon contest, an obvious provocation that she bills as a “free speech” event. Two Arizona roommates, Elton Simpson and Nadir Soofi, attempt to attack the gathering in the name of radical Islam, but are almost immediately killed by a police officer with a pistol despite their body armor and semiautomatic weapons. 1360 AP IMAGES/JAN BAUER (CLINTON); AP IMAGES/MIKE GROLL (BUSH); AP IMAGES/CAROLYN KASTER (OBAMA) Trump. They are angry over the coming loss of a white majority (predicted for 2043 by the Census Bureau), the falling fortunes of the white working class, worsening income inequality, the rise of left-wing movements like Black Lives Matter, major advances for LGBT people, growing numbers of refugees and undocumented workers, terrorism, and more. Their anger, above all, is directed at the government. In November, the Pew Research Center reported poll results showing that just 19% of Americans trusted the federal government always or most of the time, a number that is less than a quarter of the 77% level of trust recorded in the late 1950s. Just 20% saw government programs as being well run, and 59% said the government needs “very major reform,” up from 37% under President Bill Clinton in 1997. A January poll, this one by NBC and Esquire, found that the news makes 77% of Republicans and 67% of Democrats angry at least once a day. Whites were angriest, at 73%, compared to Latinos (66%) and blacks (56%). “Such voters are nostalgic for the country they lived in 50 years ago, when non-Hispanic whites made up more