TCB Jan. 23, 2020 — The lost boys of Ukraine by Triad City Beat

Greensboro / Winston-Salem / High Point Jan. 23-29, 2020 triad-city-beat.com

GREENSBORO EDITION

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The Lost Boys of Ukraine

H o w t h e w a r a b r o a d b e c ko n s t o white supremacists in the United States ‘Binging with Babish’ in W-S PAGE 15

A new superhero in W-S PAGE 6

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GSO’s forgotten saloons PAGE 16

Jan. 23-29, 2020

EDITOR’S NOTEBOOK

Our discontentedness with content I’ll never forget in the 1920s. Basically: The better the the day we got content, the more people want to see it. cable television in Consider the streaming wars. The newour house. Never. est player, Disney, doesn’t have nearly the It was the volume of content that Netflix, which has early 1980s, and been acquiring and creating programming overnight we went for 10 years, does. But Disney has the from just a few good proprietary stuff — all the old movby Brian Clarey terrestrial staies and TV shows, the beloved franchises tions to a 36-channel sliding switchboard. it’s absorbed and some dynamite new Just like that, our options expanded content that brings it all home, like “The exponentially. Throw in a programmable Mandalorian,” which has been having a VCR, which so many of us eventually did, hot cultural minute since Thanksgiving. and one could curate a robust viewing Apple has a new offering, too, based schedule. on a slate of expensive original content, Now, we can watch whatever we want, though none of the shows have yet to whenever we want. Pretty much. There break through the noise like Baby Yoda. are enough free streaming services out They’re proliferating like crazy this year: there to fill 20 lifetimes There’s Peacock, from of viewing pleasure with NBC, which will be based old movies, syndicated on a free model with a There are enough sitcoms and dramas, paid upgrade available; free streaming servintage game shows Quibi, with a catalog of vices out there to fill and other content, plus short films; Discovery the massive YouTube BBC; a new premium 20 lifetimes of viewpantheon of entertainHBO and whatever else ing pleasure. ment, which is an entire is in the pipeline for this subculture unto itself. year. But I’m interested in Plus, there’s the the new television-streaming wars, one of behemoth Amazon Prime Video, legacy those new phenomena that came along service Hulu, which started streaming way with the magic of the internet and its back in 2008 and all of those other boxes promise of choice. And what it shows us on your Roku’s home screen. DC Universe is that, although the business model and has had a streaming channel since 2018. delivery method may be somewhat newESPN has one. PlayStation has one. fangled — though, indeed pay-per-view But no one is talking about Crackle, or and TV-on-demand is as old as HBO and Sling, or Starz. The biggest players, and the corner video store — the lessons we likely winners, have already emerged. And glean from it are the same ones we got they got there because of quality original when Arthur C. Nielsen started trying to content. figure out how to gauge a radio audience

1451 S. Elm-Eugene St. Box 24, Greensboro, NC 27406 Office: 336-256-9320 Covers STAFF WRITER Savi Ettinger savi@triad-city-beat.com BUSINESS GREENSBORO: American white PUBLISHER/EXECUTIVE EDITOR supremacists joined the hot war INTERN: Rachel Spinella Brian Clarey calendar@triad-city-beat.com brian@triad-city-beat.com in the Ukraine, and then came ART PUBLISHER EMERITUS Allen Broach back. [Photo illustration by Robert allen@triad-city-beat.com Paquette] ART DIRECTOR Robert Paquette robert@triad-city-beat.com WINSTON-SALEM: Andrew EDITORIAL SALES SENIOR EDITOR Jordan Green Rea talks about his new book, and jordan@triad-city-beat.com KEY ACCOUNTS Gayla Price the best food from films and TV gayla@triad-city-beat.com ASSOCIATE EDITOR Sayaka Matsuoka shows. [Courtesy image] sayaka@triad-city-beat.com SPECIAL SECTION EDITOR Nikki Miller-Ka niksnacksblog@gmail.com

CONTRIBUTORS

Carolyn de Berry, Matt Jones, Jen Sorensen

Jan. 23-29, 2020

CITY LIFE Jan. 23-26, 2019 by Rachel Spinella

THURSDAY Jan. 23 Up Front

Opening for Winter Exhibits @ Theatre Art Galleries (HP) 5:30 p.m.

FRIDAY Jan. 24

US Figure Skating Championships @ Greensboro Coliseum Complex (GSO) noon

SATURDAY Jan. 25

Artisan & Craft Fair @ Twin Deer Antique Mall & Design (HP) 10 a.m. Looking for some home décor to dress up your house-this Saturday local artisans and crafters will showcase and sell their unique handmade creations. Find the event on Facebook.

Puzzles

Shot in the Triad

Culture

Opinion

News

Frozen Family Fun Night @ Kaleideum North (W-S) 6:15 p.m.

Patrons of the arts can stop by High Point’s art gallery, featuring professional artist and designer Agnes Preston-Brame and her art piece titled “Transfigurations.” The opening reception is free and open to the public. Find the event on Facebook. Pie Day @ West End Coffeehouse (W-S) 8 a.m. Love pie? Come celebrate this special day dedicated to all things pie — from pie slices to mini pies and even hand pies. Indulge in your favorite pie flavor or try something new. Delight your appetite for pie by stopping by and enjoy a slice or maybe two…. Find the event on Facebook.

From Jan. 20-26, figure skaters Nathan Chen, Starr Andrews, Jessica Calalang, Brian Johnson and more take to the ice to compete for this year’s American championship. This will be the third time that Greensboro has been chosen to host the US Figure Skating Championship in the last 10 years. Be there to witness the winners for 2020’s ice skating tournament. Find the event on Facebook. Kids Cooking: Tacos @ Greensboro Children’s Museum (GSO) 5 p.m. A cooking class for children ages 8-11 will teach your kids how to make tasty tacos from scratch with fresh ingredients straight from the non-profit organization here in Greensboro — the Edible Schoolyard’s garden. Find the event on Facebook. Un-Wined with Renae Paige @ the Loaded Grape (GSO) 7:30 p.m.

Bisexual Support & Peer Group @ North Star LGBTQ Center (W-S) 5 p.m. This center is holding a support group for bisexual individuals to provide a safe space to share their experiences with others. Find the event on Facebook. Masqu-arcade Dance Party @ Boxcar Bar + Arcade (GSO) 9 p.m. Join this local barcade it celebrates its third anniversary with a masquerade themed twist. This event will also feature drink specials and more. Be sure to bring your own costume-ball theme masks. Find the event on Facebook.

The Finns @ Joymongers (GSO) 8:30 p.m.

As stated on their website the Finns “epitomize a fun-loving, live rock’n’roll party experience with a comforting dash of Southern charm.” Find the event on Facebook.

Then check out this family-friendly event where you and your kids will create winterthemed crafts, win prizes and enjoy sweet treats. Kids will also have a chance to meet two princesses and a snowman from Arendelle. Find the event on Facebook.

Singer, songwriter and guitarist Renae Paige will be performing an acoustic solo show. And learn more about Paige’s drive to write music. Find the event on Facebook.

Lunar New Year Party @ Limelight (GSO) 10 p.m. Also known as the Chinese New Year or Spring Festival, this holiday is not just celebrated by China but also other Asian countries such as North Korea, South Korea and Vietnam. The celebration will feature Lucky Red Envelopes that will be given to special lucky guests all throughout

Jan. 23-29, 2020

the night. Be sure to dress in outfits that incorporate the colors red and gold. Find the event on Facebook.

SUNDAY Jan. 26

Ramen pop-up @ Kau Restaurant (GSO) 5 p.m.

This house butcher restaurant is hosting a tasty and fun fundraiser dinner for the Greensboro Farmers Curb Market. Kauâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s kitchen will be cooking up ramen noodles with a choice of meat or vegetarian broth. And for $35 you can receive a choice of two beers or house wine tickets. Find the event on Facebook.

News

Spaghetti Supper: Piedmont Park Playground Fundraiser @ Fries Memorial Moravian Church (W-S) 5 p.m. In order to raise money to give the children of Piedmont Park Apartments a good playground and basketball court, Fries is sponsoring a spaghetti dinner that will serve not only the spaghetti meal but salad, bread and homemade dessert. Find the event on Facebook.

Up Front

Candle & Perfuming Workshops @ Scent Workshop (GSO) 3 p.m. This customized apothecary is holding a seminar for people interested in learning how to create perfumes and candles with natural ingredients. Find the event on Facebook.

Opinion Culture Shot in the Triad Puzzles

Jan. 23-29, 2020 Up Front News Opinion Culture Shot in the Triad Puzzles

Winston-Salem gets its own masked vigilante by Sayaka Matsuoka He calls himself Night Watch, and he’s here to save us all. Well, not really — but he’s certainly got people talking. Over the weekend, people kind of lost their shit on social media when they discovered that a masked crusader has taken up the crime-fighting mantle in Winston-Salem and has been patrolling the streets of downtown for about two weeks now. Dressed in all black with a kind of ski mask and large reflective goggles that make him look a bit like a giant fly, Night Watch was first spotted by folks through his Instagram, @night_watch_rlsh — with the last part of his handle acting as an acronym COURTESY IMAGE Night Watch has been patrolling for “real life superhero.” So downtown W-S for the past two far, he’s got 13 posts and weeks. more than 240 followers. Not bad for a 2-week-old account. About the getup, he explained that the Posts range from selfies on downtown kind of absurdity of it helps raise awarestreets to information on missing persons, ness for what he’s doing. One post from endorsements of local businesses, and Jan. 17 encourages other people to join most recently, a photo with a guy who him. recognized him from the aforementioned “Truth is, I could do and have done Facebook group where he’s garnered a most of these things without a mask,” he reputation. says, “but I’ve found When asked that putting on a about his newfound To learn more or follow along costume is a good penchant for patrolway for me to help on Night Watch’s journey, ling the night, Night bring visibility and Watch responded find him on Instagram at @ awareness to these through Instagram issues.” night_watch_rlsh messages that while And yet, it’s hard he has only recently to ignore the strikstarted wearing a ing privilege that a mask, he’s actually random white guy has to have to be able been doing this kind of work for a while. to go around a city’s downtown at night He says he’s most involved with helping with his face covered and not get shot and those who are homeless, and explains that killed by police, when countless black and the issue speaks to him personally because brown men and women in hoodies often he has family members who are homemeet much more fatal fates. less. A number of posts describe how he Plus, there’s that whole question of helped someone figure out a bus route or whether this guy’s actions are even strictly chased away kids who were making noise legal. on top of a parking deck. But if he’s helping the homeless and he’s While he wouldn’t say what he does for not causing that much disruption it’s fine, a living, Night Watch did reveal that he right? lives and works in the city, and patrols at night when he has time.

How Ukraine’s far-right militias catalyze neo-Nazi violence in the United States

As President Trump goes through an impeachment trial in the US Senate for pressuring Ukraine to produce dirt on his political rival, the war in that country is exporting extremism back to the United States. by Jordan Green

Up Front News Opinion

Patriot Front in Austin, Texas, late 2017

analysts believe it’s impossible to enforce, considering that Azov is part of the Ukrainian government. Meanwhile, President Trump faces impeachment over the question of whether he abused his authority as president by temporarily suspending military aid and withholding a meeting with President Zelensky in an effort to pressure the Ukrainian government to pursue an investigation into his political rival.

Reconquista

Azov, along with its political wing National Corps, and Right Sector both promote a concept known as “Reconquista,” a historic reference to Christians reclaiming control over present-day Spain from the Moors in the 1400s. While the Azov Battalion has been incorporated into the Ukrainian Ministry of Interior, Right Sector describes itself as a “national liberation movement” and operates outside the formal control of the Ukrainian armed forces and police. In a July 2015 interview on the Azov podcast, Olena Semenyaka, a spokesperson for the National Corps, made a direct connection between Reconquista and the concept of loss — not just of Ukrainian sovereignty but also of Eu-

Puzzles

2018, has been previously reported. The social-media posts and leaked internet chats by roughly a dozen former volunteers show a glorification of war coupled with memes inciting violence against refugees, nostalgia for the 1970s military campaign to preserve white rule in present-day Zimbabwe, slogans like, “America is a white nation,” and quotations by Julius Evola, a philosopher widely admired by fascists. “Yes, these are indicators that these individuals may be going down a dangerous radicalization pathway,” said Jason Blazakis, a former State Department official under Presidents Obama and Trump in an email to TCB. “It is impossible to say whether they’d directly turn to violent acts, however. They very well could end up trying to spur others to commit acts of violence by working online to red-pill potential like-minded individuals to turn to violence.” Blazakis now directs the Center on Terrorism, Extremism and Counterterrorism at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in California. The United States has backed the Ukraine in the war. And while a provision of the 2018 spending bill blocks US arms from going to Azov, many

Shot in the Triad

Two former volunteers, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Triad City Beat that many of the foreign volunteers suffer from mental-health disorders. “They’re young kids, and they have no idea,” one of the former volunteers said. “They have PTSD. And they have mental issues. These guys are idiots basically… lost boys…. A lot of people have lost their way. They’re wanting to be accepted, and they’ll say, ‘Yeah, fuck the Jews. Fuck the n****ers.’” Through a review of leaked internet chats, public social-media pages and federal court documents, along with interviews with former volunteer fighters, TCB has uncovered new details of how the ultranationalist battalions in Ukraine have opened recruitment channels through US neo-Nazis and how American volunteers have participated in neoNazi flash rallies upon their return from Ukraine. TCB’s investigation particularly shows linkages between the Ukrainian volunteer battalions and two American organizations — Atomwaffen Division and Patriot Front. Azov’s relationship with the California-based neo-Nazi group Rise Above Movement, whose members visited Kyiv to participate in mixed martial arts competition in April

UNICORN RIOT

Culture

In early 2014, violent street protests in Kyiv forced the resignation of the pro-Russian Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych. Within four months, Russia had annexed Crimea and was backing separatists in the eastern Donbas region of Ukraine. Ultranationalist protest groups — instrumental in the toppling of Yanukovych government — transformed overnight into volunteer battalions like Right Sector and Azov, then rushed to the eastern front, where they were lauded as patriots for undertaking the heavy fighting while the under-resourced Ukrainian state military scrambled to mobilize. Azov in particular has leveraged its social capital by integrating into the Ukrainian National Guard, where it wields outsized influence in Ukraine’s democratically elected government. More than five years later, with the war locked in a stalemate, the seasoned fighters and street activists in the ultranationalist movement present a challenge to newly elected President Volodymyr Zelensky if he is seen to be conceding too much in negotiations with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The emergence of Azov Battalion and Right Sector in Ukraine in 2014 electrified the neo-Nazi movement in the United States, Western Europe and Australia, presenting a tangible model for how the far right could topple a government and wage a nationalist war to forge a new society in a predominantly white country. Over the past five years, the Ukrainian nationalist cause has attracted an assortment of American volunteer fighters — veterans, inexperienced adventurers and hardened ideologues. Some have gone in search of new wars, as the Ukrainian conflict has cooled in late 2016, while others have returned to the United States or stayed on in Ukraine and attempted to put down roots there . At the same time, extremists in the United States, like their counterparts in Western Europe, Canada and Australia, have looked to the volunteer battalions in Ukraine for inspiration and tactical advice in their desire to wage an insurrectionary war for white power at home.

Jan. 23-29, 2020

The lost boys of Ukraine

NEWS

Jan. 23-29, 2020 Up Front News Opinion Culture Shot in the Triad Puzzles

rope as a whole. “We understand the development of the modern world, and we want to change it,” Semenyaka said. “We try to reconstruct the problem of this European decline, so to speak. And we want to start a revolt against it. Reconquista, revolt, revolution — of course all of them are homological concepts which are quite understandable to European rightwingers and other educated persons. In a Russian-language version of the podcast, Semenyaka more sharply articulated the racial dimensions of the movement. “We are not resigning ourselves to the boundaries of thinking in terms of a single region,” Semenyaka said, according to a translation published by the UK-based investigative outfit Bellingcat. “We defend not only the Ukrainian nation, national identity, but also the Slavic element, the European element, and in the end — the white race.” Semenyaka did not respond to a Facebook message from TCB. The recent release of the contents of the defunct Iron March website — a global forum for neo-Nazis that operated from 2011 to 2017 — provides further insight into how Azov and Right Sector energized neo-Nazis around the world, including within the United States. “We need something that appeals to American history, to a sense of shared racial identity, but also to our mission and future goals,” an anonymous user wrote on Iron March in 2015, using language strikingly close to that of American Vanguard, a neo-Nazi group established in California in 2016. “I think we can take inspiration from Right Sector in this regard. I like there [sic] motto of ‘European Reconquista.’ It appeals to the shared past of Europe, a shared identity, and outlines their mission to carry on the work of European Christendom to drive out the foreign invaders. “Wouldn’t the American equivalent be something like ‘Manifest Destiny’?” the post continues. “What do people think of that name? I feel it pulls from our past as a nation, a shared racial identity, a line of continuity from our ancestors who settled this country to us today, and shows we wish to carry on their mission. The mission to create a nation for the white man here on this continent as ordained by God and fought for by our ancestors.” American Vanguard changed its name to Vanguard America in early 2017. During the Aug. 12, 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Va. a man

named James Fields carried a Vanguard America shield and then rammed his car into a group of antiracist marchers, murdering Heather Heyer. In the weeks following the public-relations black eye, a Dallas native named Thomas Rousseau seized control of the organization and rebranded it as Patriot Front. In a January 2018 discussion in the “Front and Center” channel, a forum for Patriot Front members, Thomas Rousseau, the leader of Patriot Front, outlined a vision of American society breaking down through a corrosion of trust in democratic institutions. The chats were part of a massive leak published by Unicorn Riot, a decentralized media collective. “The territory map of the Balkanization, or whatever you would call it, is going to look a lot like the electoral one,” Rousseau wrote. “The United States as a government won’t survive, not as we know it, but the local systems of selfgoverning and the communities in that red [area] there will. From there it isn’t conventional warfare any more than it is cultural.” Democracy is destined to fail, Rousseau argued, providing an opening for white supremacists to seize power. “South Africa usually isn’t an example to follow, I am aware, but a very, very small minority of Boers and Afrikaners effectively ruled and sustained a society because they had power, and voting was not in the picture,” Rousseau said. “The failure came once power was a matter of counting heads.”

‘We practice always at war’

The first inkling of the Ukraine conflict’s role in fueling transnational white supremacy came to many observers through reports that showed Brenton Tarrant, who live-streamed his massacre of 51 worshipers at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand in March 2019, wearing the “black sun” symbol, which is incorporated into Azov’s insignia, on his jacket. Tarrant indicated in his manifesto that he had visited Ukraine, although there’s no additional evidence to back his claim. (Azov has publicly condemned Tarrant, and declared that he has never had any contact with the organization.) The Iron March leaks reveal that from July through September 2015, several members of the forum communicated with an individual who represented themselves as an emissary of Azov. And in February 2015, a user named “Palmer” referred a prospective recruit from Europe to Semenyaka, writing, “She is

the person I was coordinating with.” One of the Iron March users who reached out to Azov through the forum was Brandon Russell, a Florida Army National Guard member who founded the neo-Nazi group Atomwaffen Division in 2015. Atomwaffen is linked to five murders, and requires prospective members to read Siege, a book by neoNazi James Mason that promotes an idea called accelerationism. The group’s propaganda utilizes shocking rhetoric and gory visuals to call for societal breakdown through escalating violence. In addition to the Third Reich, members glorify Charles Manson and claim to practice Satanism. Using the name “Odin,” Russell greeted the anonymous representative on Iron March in July 2015, describing himself as “an avid supporter of the Azov Battalion.” He added, “I’d like some advice from you about my militia that I lead in the US.” The anonymous user happily obliged, recommending running to keep in shape, night walking, coordinating artillery fire through radio communication and blowing up bridges, while also advising “to learn combat medicine.” They closed, “Also we practice always at war.” Russell is now in federal prison at FCI Terre Haute in Indiana serving a fiveyear sentence for possession of an unregistered destructive device and improper storage of explosive materials. Another Atomwaffen member, Devon Arthurs, posting under the name “The Weissewolfe,” inquired about volunteering with Azov in August 2015. He exulted in January 2016 that Misanthropic Division — a group linked to both Azov and Right Sector — had vandalized a Holocaust memorial, writing, “Kiev will be cleansed.” Arthurs, who caused controversy within the neo-Nazi movement by converting to Islam, is facing charges for the 2017 murder of two fellow Atomwaffen members, Jeremy Himmelman and Andrew Oneschuk. In August 2016, Kent McLellan a Florida man whose Iron March profile described him as “a skinhead ongoing 16 years, politician and militarist fascist,” messaged the forum’s founder, a Russian man named Alexander “Slavros” Mukhitdinov. Attempting to smooth over a controversy among members concerning the Ukraine conflict, McLellan claimed that he was former leader of Misanthropic Division in the United States, adding, “I still work closely with the DUK on foreign recruitment and such. Needless to say, not too many people get

through.” DUK likely refers to Ukrainian Volunteer Corps — Right Sector, the military wing of Right Sector, known by its Ukrainian initials as DUK PS. McLellan, 29, is currently serving a four-year prison sentence in Florida for multiple charges related to meth trafficking. Right Sector could not be reached for this story.

‘Too Nazi’ for Azov

Nate Morris, who now lives in the US Northeast, was one of the first American volunteers in Ukraine, fighting with Right Sector from 2014 to 2016. “I served reconnaissance with a threeman squad working up to 5 kilometers behind enemy lines up to five days at a time,” Morris told TCB in an email. “I also served medical assistance to soldiers and civilians.” He shared Misanthropic Division posts multiple times on account on VK — a Russian social-media platform similar to Facebook — during his time in Ukraine. In response to questions from TCB about his affinity with Misanthropic Division, Morris used the analogy of rowdy fans who give their team a bad name. He heaped scorn on McLellan, adding that he had to google him to figure out who he was. “If it’s that dude with the face tattoos, he looks like a real asshole,” Morris said. “And a meth-head on top of it? Pff, please. What a bonehead. Definitely not Right Sector material.” In an Instagram comment to Craig Lang, another American volunteer, Morris described himself as “too Nazi” for Azov. Acknowledging the comment to TCB, Morris said his intention “was just to stop him from glorifying idiots.” Morris said he had watched YouTube videos of Nick Griffin, a notorious British neo-Nazi who has made statements denying the Holocaust and called on the European Union to sink boats carrying migrants. “I don’t identify as a Nazi or a National Socialist,” Morris told TCB. “My affiliation is pan-Germanism. I think National Socialism is a valid form of government, though, just needs to be updated.” He also said, “I believe Germanic culture is the best culture. America was founded by mostly German people.” He said he believes the Germans were the victims, not the aggressors in World War II, while expressing a kind of watered-down Holocaust denial. “I don’t deny Jews died in the Holo-

News Opinion Culture Shot in the Triad Puzzles

Craig Lang, who grew up near Greenville in eastern North Carolina, was discharged from the US Army in 2014. A year earlier, he had been jailed after threatening to kill his wife, going AWOL from Fort Bliss and driving 1,800 miles to his wife’s home in Harnett County, where he was charged with assault for pulling a gun on her neighbor. According to his wife’s testimony, Lang had threatened suicide multiple times, and had to be hospitalized on base during one episode. The two are no longer married. After his discharge, Lang struggled to find work and keep up with childsupport payments. The war in Ukraine beckoned. Lang traveled to Ukraine in 2015, fighting with Right Sector as early as June, based on a photo posted by a fellow volunteer on social media. That summer, according to news accounts, members of Right Sector attempted to disrupt the first LGBT Pride parade in Kyiv and later exchanged gunfire with police in southwestern Ukraine while maintaining a roadblock and demanding the resignation of the interior minister. Valeriy Akimenko, an analyst for the Conflict Research Centre in the United Kingdom, told TCB that DUK PS, as Right Sector’s military wing is popularly known, “continues to function in a legal vacuum. It has no official status, but neither is it expressly outlawed. Some time ago, Ukraine’s military prosecutor likened it to an illegal combatant force, but rowed back immediately as he proceeded to talk about its heroes.” Lang, the US Army veteran, was described in a Vice article — and by former volunteers who spoke to TCB on condition of anonymity — as a first point of contact in Ukraine for Americans hoping to join the fight against the Russian separatists in the east.

Fort Bragg in 2016. After unsuccessfully attempting to join the French Foreign Legion, he made his way to Ukraine. In contrast to his mentor, Craig Lang’s outward presentation as a laconic warrior, Zwiefelhofer’s social media posts display a younger generation’s predisposition towards irony and shock value. Zwiefelhofer’s posts on Facebook and Instagram include a photo of a young American GI in Vietnam wearing a helmet inscribed with the words “Make war, not love,” a T-shirt with the words, “Help more bees… shoot refugees,” a photo of himself wearing a narrow Hitler moustache, and a racist meme depicting white mercenaries gunning down black people in thatched huts that references the armed struggle to preserve white rule in present-day Zimbabwe. The cause of preserving white, minority rule in what was then called Rhodesia is an early example of transnational white-supremacist organizing, according to a recent report from the Soufan Center, which indicates that as many as 2,300 Americans, including members of the John Birch Society and neo-Nazis, traveled there to join the fight between 1965 and 1980. Harold Covington, a white supremacist who helped build the coalition of neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan members that carried out the 1979 Greensboro Massacre, had previously served as a volunteer in Rhodesia. And the Rhodesian cause has continuing resonance in the white supremacist movement: Dylann Roof, who murdered nine black parishioners at Mother Emanuel church in Charleston, SC in 2015, looked to Covington for inspiration and created a website called “The Last Rhodesian.” Zwiefelhofer and Lang appear to have grown bored as the war in Ukraine settled into a stalemate in late 2016, and in early 2017 they went looking for the next fight. They were detained by Kenyan authorities in 2017 while attempting to enter South Sudan to fight the Islamist group al-Shabaab, and were deported back to the United States. Zwiefelhofer was questioned by Customs and Border Protection officials when he flew into Charlotte Douglas International Airport. The authorities allegedly found child porn when they searched Zwiefelhofer’s phone, leading to state criminal charges. After skipping his plea hearing in March 2018, Zwiefelhofer reportedly told WSOC-TV in Charlotte via Facebook that he was not guilty of the child porn charges, adding, “It’s best to keep a little tight-lipped when your home country calls you a terrorist for aiding a

Up Front

The mentor

At the end of 2015, Right Sector’s leader, Dmytro Yarosh, announced he was leaving, creating a split. The schism appears to have prompted some of the foreign fighters to look for a new arrangement. In early March 2016, Quinn Rickert, another American volunteer, indicated in a private Facebook message obtained by TCB that Lang had arranged for them to join Georgian National Legion, a battalion of foreign fighters under the control of the Ukrainian armed forces. But by the summer of 2016, Lang had rejoined Right Sector. Speaking to a reporter from Vice, Lang described himself as a “strict constitutionalist” and someone who despised communism. Other volunteers who spoke to TCB on condition of anonymity said that Lang is not particularly VK Jarrett Smith joined the army and learned politicized or right-wing in PHOTO how to make IEDs. his views. Unlike some other volunteers, he wasn’t known chat on Facebook that included Lang, in to throw Hitler salutes or bash Jews, they which Smith discussed his ability to build said. If anything, Lang didn’t seem to IEDs. exercise much discretion in his personal “Oh yeah, I got knowledge of IEDs associations. for days,” he reportedly said. “We can In June 2016, while he was serving make cell phone IEDs in the style of the with Right Sector, Lang connected on Afghans. I can teach you that….” Facebook with a South Carolina native Smith now faces federal charges of named Jarrett William Smith. The FBI distributing explosives information and would later say the messages exchanged threatening interstate communication. between the two “highlight Lang’s A federal magistrate ordered him mentorship to Smith as he prepared to be held without bond pending his for Smith to join him in fighting in trial, citing a report from Smith’s postUkraine.” According to the FBI, Smith Miranda interview with the FBI finding expressed a desire to join the Azov Batthat “he gives information out freely to talion. people who may use it for harm, for the “Alright, I’ll forward you over to the glory of Quayinism, and his religion of guy that screens people; he’ll most likely anti-kosmik Satanism. He wants to cause add you soon,” Lang told Smith, accordchaos, as it brings back [t]he realm of his ing to the FBI. “Also, as a pre-warning, religious beliefs, through the destruction if you come to this unit and the governof the universe…. ment comes to shut down the unit you “Smith said the idea of chaos in the will be asked to fight. You may also be world is a disruption, and he can be an asked to kill certain people who become agent of chaos by enabling people with on the bad graces of certain groups.” his knowledge,” the FBI report continThe two men stayed in contact, and ues. “Smith said that if the death of at one point, the FBI alleges, they met in people isn’t affecting him, he doesn’t see person in El Paso, Texas, home to Fort an issue. Smith said that if chaos results Bliss. in the death of people, and he provided Smith did not travel to Ukraine, but information to them, it doesn’t affect instead joined the US Army — his him.” backup plan, he said, if he was unable “to find a slot in Ukraine” by October ‘Make war, not love’ 2016. Alex Zwiefelhofer, a Wisconsin native In December 2018, while enlisted in whose father is the chief of police for the Army, Smith allegedly led a group the town of Bloomer, went AWOL from

Jan. 23-29, 2020

caust, that is just ignorance,” he said. “I do think there is a lot of misinformation behind a lot of events as justification to punish Germans, and create the Israeli state.” Morris said his Facebook account was disabled because he posted a meme that said, “Save bees, not refugees.” Although a variation popular on the far right says, “Help more bees… shoot refugees,” Morris contends that his post is not “extremist.” “Give money to science, not people who can’t defend their own freedom and need to hide in our countries,” he told TCB.

Jan. 23-29, 2020 Up Front Puzzles

Shot in the Triad

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Opinion

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Craig Lang, who grew up in eastern NC, traveled to Ukraine in 2015 and fought with Right Sector. Lang is currently wanted by US authorities for various charges.

friendly nation.” The following month Zwiefelhofer met Lang in Florida, and federal authorities alleged they planned a trip to Venezuela to join armed rebels in an attempt to overthrow socialist President Nicolás Maduro. The US government alleges that the two lured a Florida couple, Danny and Deana Lorenzo, to a church parking lot south of Fort Myers on the basis of a fake gun sale, and that one of or both of them gunned down the couple in the commission of a robbery. The two men are charged with multiple federal offenses, including conspiracy to interfere with commerce by robbery; interference with commerce by robbery; conspiracy to use a firearm during and in relation to a crime of violence; use of a firearm during and in relation to a crime of violence; conspiracy to kill, kidnap, or maim persons in a foreign country; and violation of the Neutrality Act. Zwiefelhofer has pleaded not guilty and remains in federal custody awaiting trial. Federal prosecutors in Florida issued a request for Lang’s extradition from Ukraine in late August 2019. Lang was arrested on Ukraine’s border with Moldova on a US international warrant, according to a report by Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty. Dmitry Morgun, Lang’s lawyer in Kyiv, told TCB he is advising his client to not comment on the case. Morgun said Ukraine cannot extradite Lang under its laws because the United States has not made any guarantee that he won’t be subject to the death penalty. The lawyer also said the United States must agree that Lang will not be prosecuted for any crimes for which he has not been charged. Mikael Skillt, a former neo-Nazi from Sweden who fought with Azov and now runs a global security consulting firm,

COURTESY PHOTO

told TCB that if the United States tries to extradite Lang, there will be repercussions in Ukraine. “He has a lot of friends; he’s active in social media,” Skillt said. “He’s been involved in the war as long as anyone. If they would extradite him, there would be consequences in terms of a demonstration.” That holds even though Lang is accused of a crime against civilians in the United States. “The civil society, in my opinion, feels that those who helped when no one else did — in the beginning the US didn’t help — they feel they owe them something,” Skillt said.

Banner drop in Raleigh: ‘America is a white man’s land’

Dalton Kennedy was a member of Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps, or JROTC, at Western Johnston High School in Benson and graduated in 2015. He began active duty in the US Army in August 2015, but left the service at the end of September, according to a status report from the Defense Manpower Data Center. The fact that Kennedy lasted less than two months in the Army means he didn’t complete Basic Training. TCB has obtained video of Kennedy with other foreign volunteers in Ukraine, and four sources speaking on condition of anonymity have confirmed that he was in the country in 2016. Posting in the “Front and Center” Discord channel under the name “Alfred NC” in January 2018, Kennedy, then 21 years old, said he had served in “two militaries,” although he didn’t mention his visit to Ukraine. It’s unclear whether Kennedy actually joined a volunteer battalion or made it to the front in Ukraine. His familiarity with Alex Zwiefelhofer and Craig Lang is

evidenced by Zwiefelhofer tagging Lang and Kennedy — under the username “Dalton Torni” on his now-disabled account — in a Facebook post mocking Vice magazine for its coverage of the Ukraine conflict. In an exchange with other Patriot Front members in January 2018, Kennedy said “I did recon for a while, and that work puts regular infantry life to shame.” And he advised: “Shoot, move, communicate, kill. If you fail any of three, the fourth changes to die. Moving and communicating properly, and then shooting under said stress is hard.” He also shared: “I unironically worked as an EMT for a year via YouTube videos. Their power is astounding.” Kennedy appears to revel in his neoNazi beliefs in his posts in the “Front and Center” channel. He posted a photograph of himself giving a sieg heil straight-arm salute in front of a building at Campbell University in North Carolina while he and a friend were furtively posting fliers on the campus. And in one of his posts he identified himself as “natsoc,” short for National Socialism. A string of posts in December 2017 particularly demonstrate the depths of Kennedy’s ideological commitment. He wrote, “HITLERJUGEND DID NOTHING WRONG,” and, “Only whites have souls because we’re higher creatures due to our Hyperborean blood.” Patriot Front members discussed Balkanization — a concept embraced by many white supremacists — as a mechanism for achieving the whites-only society that they seek. In addition to posting fliers at Campbell University, Kennedy’s posts on “Front and Center” chronicle him hanging a banner from an overpass in Raleigh on Martin Luther King Jr. Day 2018 declaring “America is a white man’s land.” And earlier that month, he told his comrades that he posted fliers at a Democratic Socialists of America office in Durham. Later that year, in August, when antiracists toppled the Silent Sam Confederate monument at UNC-Chapel Hill, Kennedy joined a crowd of angry monument supporters watching from the sidelines, according to an anonymous source with direct knowledge of the incident. Several months later, on Memorial Day weekend in 2019, about 20 members of Patriot Front held a flash rally at the Unsung Founders memorial, which honors the black enslaved persons who built UNC-Chapel Hill. More recently,

Patriot Front activists posted stickers in downtown Greensboro on Winter Solstice 2019 and Winston-Salem, Raleigh and Wilmington on Christmas Eve, part of an ongoing nationwide propaganda campaign. On July 1, 2019, FBI Special Agent James Roncinske interviewed “DK” — who is likely Dalton Kennedy — in Buckhannon, W.Va., according to an affidavit filed last month. “DK” told Roncinske that he had communicated with Lang and Zwiefelhofer via Facebook Messenger in 2018, and that “DK” had declined two invitations from Lang to join him in a military expedition in Venezuela. Kennedy also reportedly told Roncinske that he met Lang and Zwiefelohofer in Raleigh in May or June 2018. Kennedy could not be reached for this story. James Kennedy, his father, told TCB he had no knowledge of his son’s travels to Ukraine or his white supremacist activity. “I mean, he wasn’t raised that way,” James Kennedy said. “He’s got black and Spanish and all kinds of things in his family. It’s weird to me.”

‘I don’t fear death at all’

The footage shows two foreign volunteers dressed in military fatigues with caps bearing the Right Sector insignia outside a training camp north of Kyiv. The younger man, identified as “Ty,” shifts uncomfortably as the other man, a Norwegian former neo-Nazi and bank robber named Joachim Furholm, explains his motivation for joining the fight. When it was his turn to speak, Ty, who had no previous military experience, told documentary filmmaker Emile Ghessen: “I would have full-on dreams night after night after night of being here, and serving here. And it just got to the point where I couldn’t get it off my mind. “I don’t fear death at all,” he continued. “It doesn’t matter if I die here or anywhere else in the world. You’re gonna die anyway. I know for a fact that if I didn’t come here, on my deathbed I’d regret not coming here.” TCB has confirmed through Facebook posts and two anonymous sources who were in Ukraine that “Ty” is Ty Wingate Jones, a 22-year-old who grew up in Harnett County. Jones’ Facebook page reflects a fascination with right-wing violence, including sharing YouTube videos made by a Nazi World War II re-enactor and a series of photos of the Rhodesian Army in combat, a news article about vigilantes kidnapping refugees on the Bulgaria-

Culture

Characters:

Shot in the Triad Puzzles

1. Devon Arthurs — Atomwaffen Division member facing murder charges in the deaths of two fellow Atomwaffen members 2. Matthew Ryan Burchfield — American volunteer who has visited Ukraine 3. Joffre Cross — Patriot Front member, U.S. Army veteran 4. Joachim Furholm — Norwegian national who volunteered in Ukraine, active in the neoNazi scene in Norway before coming to Ukraine 5. Aaron Harford — Right Sector medical volunteer from Arkansas 6. Jason Jackson — chief of police in Arkadelphia, Ark.

Opinion

Organizations:

1. Al-Shabaab — short for Harakat al-Shabaab al-Mujahideen, a jihadist fundamentalist group based in East Africa that’s aligned with al-Qaeda 2. Atomwaffen Division — neo-Nazi group founded in Florida in 2015 that promotes societal collapse through chaos and violence, inspired by Charles Manson 3. Azov Battalion — ultranationalist militia that is integrated into the Ukrainian National Guard

4. Georgian National Legion — battalion of foreign fighters integrated into the Ukrainian armed forces 5. Iron March — secret global neo-Nazi internet forum that was active from 2011 to 2017 6. Misanthropic Division — worldwide neo-Nazi network with links to Azov and Right Sector 7. National Corps — political wing of Azov 8. Patriot Front — US neoNazi group formerly known as Vanguard America, and before that, American Vanguard 9. Right Sector — ultranationalist militia that operates outside of the formal command structure of the Ukrainian military and police

News

A tip in late March 2019 led the FBI to Jarrett William Smith’s Facebook page, and the agency received a report that Smith had disseminated guidance on how to build IEDs and had spoken about his desire to travel to Ukraine to fight with Azov. In addition to staying in touch with Craig Lang by Instagram in 2019, Smith befriended Joffre Cross, a Patriot Front member in Houston on VK. In 2007, Cross pleaded guilty to federal charges after admitting to stealing morphine and body armor from Fort Bragg, and offering them for sale to a cooperating source working for the FBI who was posing as a white supremacist. He currently faces state charges in Texas for illegally possessing firearms and body armor as a convicted felon. Cross participated in the “Front and Center” channel on Discord under the moniker “502ssOtto” during the same period that Dalton Kennedy was active on the channel. An anonymous manifesto shared by Cross on his VK page and liked by Smith on Aug. 5, 2019 gives some insight into Cross’s ties to the wider neo-Nazi movement and the analysis shared by the two men. Entitled, “Fourth Generation Civil War,” the manifesto predicts that American citizens who want to see a reduction in immigration will become radicalized by government inaction, and gradually come to support the goal of a white ethno-state. “As the cycle of disenfranchisement and radicalization continues,” the manifesto declares, “it is likely that the amount and frequency of violence will increase until some kind of boiling point is reached.”

On Aug. 19, 2019, Smith spoke to a law enforcement “confidential source” in an online chat group about looking for more “radicals” like himself, killing members of “antifa” and destroying cell towers or a news station, according to the FBI. On Sept. 20, using the handle “AntiKosmik 2182,” Smith exhorted fellow white supremacists on the app Telegram to burn down the house of antifascist podcaster Daniel Harper. As the Daily Beast reported, one Telegram user published a video showing himself driving by Harper’s house in Michigan. That inspired this advice from Smith: “Ditch the car somewhere a few blocks away, take back alleys, trails in the woods, etc., and then come up on the house wearing a mask. I’m not saying do anything illegal, but I am saying it would be a real shame if all he has went up in literal flames.” When news broke of Smith’s arrest on Sept. 23, Cross hailed him as a “POW” on his VK page, while lamenting, “We gotta be smarter than talking to people we don’t know thoroughly in real life about anything questionable.”

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Up Front

‘… Until some kind of boiling point is reached’

Volunteer Aaron Harford (bottom right) poses for a photo with Right Sector.

7. Ty Wingate Jones — American volunteer who has visited Ukraine 8. Dalton Kennedy — American volunteer who has visited Ukraine, active with Patriot Front and other white supremacist groups 9. Craig Lang — U.S. Army veteran who fought with Right Sector and Georgian National legion in Ukraine, now wanted for double murder in Florida 10. Kent McLellan — neoNazi skinhead in Florida who claimed to recruit for Right Sector 11. Nate Morris — American who volunteered in Ukraine with Right Sector 12. Alexander “Slavros” Mukhitdinov — founder of Iron March, a global neo-Nazi forum 13. Puffing — Discord username for Patriot Front member who claimed to have combat experience in Ukraine 14. Thomas Rousseau — leader of Patriot Front 15. Brandon Russell — founder of Atomwaffen Division 16. Olena Semenyaka — spokesperson for National Corps 17. Mikael Skillt — former neoNazi from Sweden who fought with Azov Battalion in Ukraine and now runs a global security firm 18. Jarrett William Smith — U.S. Army soldier who faces federal charges for attempting to disseminate information about explosives 19. Brenton Tarrant — Australian terrorist who murdered 51 Muslim worshipers in Christchurch, New Zealand in March 2019 20. Viktor Yanukovych — former pro-Russian president of Ukraine who was ousted during the 2014 Maidan uprising 21. Dmytro Yarosh — Right Sector leader who left the organization in 2015 22. Volodymyr Zelensky — president of Ukraine, elected in April 2019 23. Alex Zwiefelhofer — U.S. Army soldier who went AWOL and joined Right Sector in Ukraine, now in federal custody awaiting trial for charges related to a double murder in Florida

Jan. 23-29, 2020

Turkey border, and a meme expressing admiration for Otoya Yamaguchi, a 17-year-old Japanese ultranationalist who murdered the head of the Japan Socialist Party during a political debate in 1960. And in a thread on a family member’s Facebook page, Jones promoted racist stereotypes, characterizing “listening to rap,” “cussing,” “using drugs” and “being degenerate” as characteristics of “your mainstream black,” in contrast to a “normal” black person who “is no different from white.” Jones could not be reached for this story, but a Facebook post by his mother indicates that he was working on a fishing operation in Alaska this past summer, and then joined his family for an elk hunt in Colorado in October.

Jan. 23-29, 2020 Up Front News Opinion Culture Shot in the Triad Puzzles

Two Democrats vie for recently vacated seat in NC House District 72 by Sayaka Matsuoka The seat for District 72 left vacant by Rep. Derwin Montgomery brings forth two Democratic primary candidates, both of whom have long-standing ties to Winston-Salem Rep. Derwin Montgomery’s decision to run for Congress leaves the seat open for two Democratic contenders in District 72. LaShun Huntley and Amber Baker are both first-time political candidates and each have longstanding ties to Winston-Salem. According to the Forsyth County Board of Elections, the district has close to 54,000 registered voters, with about 58.4 percent registered as Democrats and only 15.5 percent as Republican. The district also has 51.2 percent black voters and 39 percent white. Starting in the northern parts of downtown Winston-Salem just above Interstate 40, District 72 radiates out to the northwest to include Wake Forest University all the way towards Oak Hollow Road and Buffalo Creek. To the east, the district stretches towards Walkertown, west of Reidsville Road. For the past decade, the seat has been held by a Democrat, and it is assumed that will remain the case come this November. Considering the district’s partisan lean, the winner of the Democratic primary will in all likelihood be the next representative, but they’ll face Republican Dan Lawlor in the November general election.

On affordable housing and healthcare

Baker, who has been the principal of Kimberley Park Elementary for the past 12 years, told Triad City Beat that she was inspired to run for the district to build on her experience as an educator. In addition to her position at the elementary school, Baker was also elected as vicechair of the Forsyth County Democratic Party’s African-American Caucus four months ago. “I’ve been involved in the community by extension through my job at Kimberley Park,” Baker said. “I’ve worked to help parents get affordable housing, I’ve advocated at City Hall, I’ve tried to help families obtain reasonable jobs. “I wanted to move from the organizing side to the possibility of making policy,” she continued. Both affordable housing and funding for public education are two challenges facing the district according to Baker. “We have $49 million at the state level

for over 100 counties to create additional low-income and affordable housing,” Baker said. “I would like to see that number doubled. That would make it a more viable dollar amount.” When asked how she plans to increase funding for housing projects, Baker said that she would need to be elected first and see what other funding streams exist to help fund her goals. And to do that, she said she would work with her fellow representatives, both across the aisle as well as within her own party. “We are really steeped in partisanship,” she said. “We are a microcosm of what is happening in the nation at large. One of the things that I pride myself on is working to get to a yes, being able to work with people who might look at our issue from different perspectives and find some commonality in that perspective.” Huntley, who decided to run after getting calls from community members to do so, said that he has a proven record of working with Republicans through his capacity as CEO of United Health Services, a network of health clinics in Winston-Salem. He mentioned how US Sen. Richard Burr and Rep. Virginia Foxx have visited his health clinics and how he visits Washington DC annually as the board chair of the NC Community Health Centers Association to talk to representatives about health care. Now, he said he wants to grow his work of helping those in the community on a greater scale. “I want to be able to represent people on the state level,” he said. “I want to think about, How can we impact everybody’s life?” Through his work at United Health Services, Huntley said he sees a lot of issues with the healthcare system and would work to get Medicaid expanded if he were elected. “There are a lot of people who are without healthcare, and they need it,” Huntley said. “I’ve seen it firsthand with United Health Services. The majority of people we serve are uninsured.”

On education

When it comes to education, Baker voiced her support for a mandatory African-American studies course, but said that individual school districts should be allowed to design the course curriculums for students to graduate.

Amber Baker and LaShun Huntley are both first time political candidates. Both have longstanding ties to Winston-Salem.

“What is hindering this issue is that the state requires the history courses that must be taken,” she said. “That locks in the number of courses that students can take and, if you try to require yet another course for students to take, it makes it more difficult for students to meet the requirements to apply for college.” Both Baker and Huntley also expressed the need to recruit and maintain high-quality teachers in the district. Baker noted an increase in base salaries for teachers as part of the state’s budget as well as more flexibility in who can be hired are steps that can be taken to improve education. She also said she wants to see the quality of public education mirror that of the state’s universities and colleges. “When we have top secondary institutions, I want our primary and our pre-K programs to mirror that,” she said. Huntley, who worked as a biology and earth science teacher at Parkland High School in 1993 and 1994, echoed Baker’s calls for increased teacher pay. “When I was a young teacher with a young family, you couldn’t live on a teacher’s salary,” Huntley said. “That pushed me out of teaching.” He said that his experience of working with kids as a teacher, as well as having his own kids, fostered his passion for helping other people. “I would love to hear what other people think the district would need,” Huntley said. “I want to hear what the constituents want to happen.”

Winston-Salem roots

Both Huntley and Baker have spent decades living and working in Winston-

FILE PHOTO

Salem. Baker said she has called WinstonSalem home on and off since 1981. She graduated from North Forsyth High School before going to Howard University for her undergraduate degree and then to Ohio State University for a PhD. In the years since she’s lived here, Baker said that Winston-Salem has grown, creating a new identity around arts and innovation, but that the growth hasn’t necessarily benefited everyone in the city. “There’s limited access for people who have limited skills,” she said. “We see communities be reinvigorated and gentrified. We need our communities to be revitalized but not without a plan for reentry for those residents.” Baker said she brings a broader perspective, compared to Huntley — who has always lived in the district — because she’s lived in other cities. “I have a more global lens when looking at Winston-Salem,” she said. Huntley on the other hand, pointed to his residency as a commitment to his community. He grew up in WinstonSalem, going to Carver High School, then Winston-Salem State University for undergrad before obtaining a master’s degree from Walden University, an online college. “I’m from Winston-Salem,” Huntley said. “I grew up in the community. I have made so many relationships, and I have good relationships with all of the local officials in town. I’m dedicated. My mom says, ‘There’s always going to be challenges but there’s always going to be solutions,’ so I’m dedicated to finding those solutions.”

Thwarted violence and black invisibility in Richmond

Up Front News Opinion Culture Shot in the Triad Puzzles

Outside the Virginia Capitol grounds on Monday, thousands of Second Amendment supporters, predominantly white, roved the streets of downtown Richmond, many of them wearing camo, helmets and body armor while wielding high-capacity, military-style rifles. The Second Amendment supporters by Jordan Green and the Democratic governor they were protesting celebrated that the day passed without any incidents of violence. But the potential for a bloodbath was most certainly there. “We’ll have a fucking rifle, you’ll have your fucking kit set up,” Patrik Jordan Mathews told Brian Mark Lemley, according to a government motion to detain the men. “We’ll have radios, nods [night vision goggles]. Holy fuck.” Mathews and Lemley were among three members of the white supremacist terrorist group the Base, who were arrested by the FBI five days before the Richmond rally. According to the government, members of the Base have discussed creating a white ethno-state and committing acts of violence against blacks and Jews. Mathews’ description of their gear could have described hundreds of clusters of young, white men roving the streets of JORDAN GREEN Grayson County (Va.) Sheriff Richard downtown Richmond on Monday. And while Lemley allegedly Vaughan poses with a fan at the rally. admonished his co-conspirators against wearing Base patches citizens.” in Richmond so they could remain “clandestine,” the skull masks The sheriff remained sanguine when I asked him if his stance favored by the group were in abundant supply in the crowds surcould put him in conflict with Virginia State Police. rounding the Capitol. “I think our Virginia State Police use common sense as well when According to a motion for detention filed by the government on it comes to this gun legislation,” he said, “and there will be a lot of Tuesday against Mathews, Lemley and a third defendant, William discretion used by the officers when it comes to enforcing these Garfield Bilbrough IV, “Lemley discussed using a thermal imagbills.” ing scope affixed to his rifle to conduct ambush attacks, including Speaking of discretion, the police arrested a 21-year-old woman against unsuspecting civilians and police officers.” And during the an hour and a half after the end of the rally and charged her with same discussion with Mathews on Dec. 23, he reportedly said, “I a felony violation of the state’s anti-masking law for covering her literally need, I need to claim my first victim.” face, although hundreds of people, some of them The three men repeatedly discussed their hope carrying long rifles, wore masks throughout the that they could help start a second civil war during the rally that took place in Richmond on Monday, ac- ‘We will not enforce day without interference from law enforcement. Chelsea Higgs Wise, the executive director of cording to the court documents. On New Year’s Eve, Marijuana Justice Virginia, said she stayed home Mathews and Lemley allegedly discussed the idea of unconstitutional throwing or slingshotting fireworks into the crowd in laws, and we’ll stand on Monday and lobbied lawmakers by phone. She helps organize Brown Virginia, a coalition of 21 Richmond to “cause shooting to go off.” black-led organizations that traditionally take adLemley reportedly ordered about 1,500 rounds of toe to toe with anyof the day off work for Martin Luther King ammunition before the three men were arrested by one else that tries to vantage Jr. Day to lobby the legislature. They canceled the FBI five days prior to the rally. take guns from our plans to come to the Capitol to lobby lawmakers Considering the threat of violence, with law to protect members from violence. enforcement consigned as collateral damage, the citizens.’ “Nothing yesterday felt peaceful,” Higgs said. absence of tension between the police and protesters – Sheriff Richard A. Vaughan “Staying and hiding in our homes doesn’t feel was notable. And in some sense, the two were one like peace. The letter from the governor said that and the same. progress is hard. If this is what progress is, the Sheriff Richard A. Vaughan and two uniformed dream has turned into a nightmare for many. deputies from Grayson County, in southwest Virginia, held a ban“For us to ignore how citizen militias are a part of silencing black ner reading, “We support the Second Amendment.” people after an entire year of talking about reconciliation, it’s In between shaking hands and accepting thanks from well-wishshowing a blind spot as well as our resistance to implementing that ers, Vaughan said in an interview that he would defy the gun-conchange in current policy,” Higgs continued. “We talk about the cititrol measures proposed by the Democratic majority in Richmond, zen militia: They were used to keep enslaved people in their place. if need be. That’s very much how it felt like yesterday with the governor saying “We are the last line of defense for the citizens of our county,” through an emergency order that the best way for you to stay safe he said. “So, we will not enforce unconstitutional laws, and we’ll is to stay home.” stand toe to toe with anyone else that tries to take guns from our

Jan. 23-29, 2020

CITIZEN GREEN

OPINION

by Clay Jones

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Up Front

Jan. 23-29, 2020

Claytoonz

EDITORIAL

When is an impeachment not an impeachment?

It’s a farce. A joke. A meaningless ceremony with a predetermined outcome. This is what passes for impeachment these days. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell laid out the rules on Tuesday, slanted heavily in favor of the embattled president, as widely predicted — even, truly, by McConnell himself, who says without shame that he worked on the plan with the White House. Without shame. There will be no subpoenas for documents the White House refused to provide the House — or, if you will, obstructed Congress in its Constitutionally mandated endeavor to investigate the president. Here’s something else that will steer this into the ground: There are no stipulations on witnesses in the rules, a major point of contention even for some Republicans such as Sens. Mitt Romney and Susan Collins. But after the initial arguments, the Senate will cast a simple majority vote to determine if more evidence will be needed to render judgment. If it passes, then each piece of proposed evidence, witnesses included, must pass a majority vote to

be admitted. And the Senate gets to hear what each witness is going to say before the vote. Some people call that prior restraint. Some people. Each side gets 24 hours to make a case, spread over three days. Unlike the Clinton impeachment, which took over the TV airwaves all day from Jan. 7 to Feb. 8, in 1998, with highlights played each evening on the nightly news, this one will go late into the night, minimizing exposure to the news cycle. It’s no surprise: Everyone knew that Trump’s toadies in the Senate would tilt the field to his advantage. We just didn’t know how. And so, we get yet another empty gesture, absolutely devoid of sincerity, from yet another government agency that has abandoned its purpose. Because even those who think Trump did nothing wrong should be on the side of transparency here, because there should be some evidence that exculpates him. Instead we get this load of crap. So, everyone knows which way this impeachment will swing. But with a huge election on the horizon, no one really knows what will happen after.

Opinion

Everyone knew that Trump’s toadies in the Senate would tilt the field to his advantage.

Culture

We just didn’t know how.

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t was just a couple of years here are some of ago that Andrew Rea spent the highlights: day after laborious day, On naming his toiling away at his day job, show punching the clock, waiting for “My Reddit the hours to go by. At the end of handle was Oliver the day, he would return home Babish [portrayed and pursue his true passion of by Nikki Miller-Ka by actor by Oliver combining film and food into a Platt], one of the popular web series. Now, more than three years later, most obscure charthe Youtube phenomenon, otherwise known as Oliver acters on ‘The West Babish of the channel, “Binging with Babish,” combines Wing.’ He only aphis love of film and television with his passion for inpeared in eight epistruction and experimenting in the kitchen to recreate sodes. Initially I did iconic dishes from pop-culture television and movies. it as a joke and now The videos almost instantly go viral. Thousands of peoit’s my whole brand. ple come out to line up to meet him, and his dominant There are so many hand cramps from the sheer number of books he signs. people who come And soon, he’ll be at SECCA in Winston-Salem. up to me and really Rea’s Youtube channel has more than 240 videos and think my real name 5 million subscribers and, now, he’s released a second is Oliver Babish. It’s cookbook. Rea’s written 100 of his show’s recipes down hilarious.” in Binging With Babish: 100 Recipes Created From Your Favorite Movies and TV Shows, a follow-up to Eat What COURTESY IMAGE On his notoYou Watch: A Cookbook for Movie Lovers, which conRea recreates iconic meals from popular TV shows and movies like the Krabby Patty from “Spongebob Squarepants.” riety tained 40 recipes featured in film and was released in “There are so 2017. many people out there who work their asses off and for Rea’s visit to the Triad will be the fourth stop on the the longest time I felt like an imposter. Last year was second leg of his 16-city book tour. the first time I felt like I knew what I was doing and that On his show, he’s created versions of the Krabby I was good at it. I’m grateful and thankful for it all.” Patty from “SpongeBob SquarePants,” the Traeger Turwith Dr. Blair Wisco at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro key Burger from “Parks And Rec” and even the maple On producing high quality videos for his syrup-laced dessert spaghetti from Elf. Rea’s favorite WHAT YOU’LL DO: WE’RE EXAMINING: show recipe he’s done is the Every Meat Burrito stuffed with •Interviews and questionnaires emotional and physical reactions (3 hour visit) to memories of stressful or “It takes about 20 to 60 27 different exotic meats traumatic experiences. hours to produce one epiranging from rattlesnake to •Monitor your bodily reactions Rea will be in conversation with sode. There’s no way I could caribou, kangaroo and bacon, while you think of past YOU MUST BE: do more than one video in from the animated kids show Winston-Salem Journal Food Editor experiences (2 hour visit) •Age 18 or older a day. It’s the reason why I “The Regular Show”. Since Michael Hastings at SECCA on Jan. 27. barely post once a week.” •Able to read and write in English 2016, Rea has upgraded his •Wear a cardiac monitor and On inspiration for own viewership to include answer questions on a tablet THE BASICS: cooking videos a web series, “Basics With Tickets are sold out, but you can get computer on 3 days •5 visits to our lab within 2 weeks “I have to admit, I’ll make Babish.” (30 min set-up per day) •$150 total compensation on the waiting list for the event. Copthings I never would have Viewers are treated to ies of Rea’s book are also available for heard of if it weren’t for the themed music, a clip of the fans. Chasing that steady show or movie as it pertains purchase online. stream of viewership, fans to the recipe of the day and would throw out the craziest a prolonged look at Rea’s things and I would go ahead apron-clad torso, lightly tatand make them.” tooed arms and sometimeYou will be asked to complete screening manicured hands. His resonant, melodic voice bounces questions online and over the phone. On new projects for the future along as he narrates the recipe, punctuated with jokes Email or call us to get more information “Between ‘Basics’ and ‘Being Babish,’ I’m working on and timely commentary about his techniques and ocand be directed to the online survey. a third book, a new show, a cookware line, opening up a casional mishaps on-screen. The production quality and brewery in Brooklyn. It will allow people to step inside lighting of each video is one of high caliber, as Rea has a Or, scan the QR code to take you straight there. a living, breathing episode of my show, bringing the BA in Film Studies from Hofstra University. As a former internet to life.” video-effects specialist for a large corporation before he quit his job to run BWB full-time, Rea has managed to Dr. Blair Wisco - UNCG take obscure references and built them into his brand. copelab@uncg.edu I spoke with Babish himself for a phone interview and

Jan. 23-29, 2020

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Jan. 23-29, 2020 Up Front News Opinion Culture Shot in the Triad Puzzles

CULTURE UNCG pop-up exhibit tells story of Greensboro’s forgotten saloons by Sayaka Matsuoka

he patrons at Oden Brewing in Greensboro mingled and talked while enjoying glass after refreshing glass of ales and lagers and stouts on the eve of the 100th anniversary of the passing of prohibition in the United States. Nestled under the exposed wood ceiling and surrounded by dozens of drinkers lined up at Oden’s reclaimed bar, it’s hard to imagine what it must have been like all those years ago, a time that Winston Churchill once called “an affront to the whole history of mankind.” And yet, by the time the 18th Amendment — which made the production, transportation and the sale of alcohol illegal, but not the actual consumption of it — had gone into effect, North Carolinians had been living a dry lifestyle for at least 10 years. “North Carolina was the first state in the South to implement prohibition,” explains Erin Lawrimore, an archivist and associate professor at UNCG. “My joke is that we were the first in flight and first to ban flights.” Lawrimore works quickly to set up a public display table at Oden Brewing in Greensboro on Jan. 16 that chronicles the history of saloons and prohibition in the Triad. The pop-up exhibit is part of the university’s Hop Into History initiative that aims to bring the story of craft beer to the public. “Archives have such a reputation of being stuffy,” says Lawrimore. “We wanted to take the archives out to where people are. We wanted to show what’s going on in the beer industry but also what has gone on.” Much of the material comes from the university’s Well Crafted NC project, which documents the history of beer and brewing in the state. In addition to

the pop-up exhibits that her department puts on at local breweries, interested scholars can find most of the information online at UNCG’s library website. A gallery of historic images displays the plethora of breweries and saloons that once existed in the Triad. As a gathering crowd takes in the information, the plinky notes from Scott Joplin’s “The Entertainer” punctuate the atmosphere, adding to the ambience. Excitedly, Lawrimore explains how recent archival documents revealed that the Triad may have been the home to the state’s first brewery, a Moravian outfit built in Bethabara just outside of Winston-Salem in 1756. More than a century later, downtown Greensboro, particularly up and down Elm Street, would be dotted by an array of saloons, each claiming to sell the best beer around. One location in particular at the junction of South Elm UNCG ARCHIVES The Cascade Saloon located at 410 S. Elm St. was one of the first saloons in Street, Smothers Place and Greensboro. MLK Jr. Drive might look familiar to residents. taking a hatchet to whiskey casks during her rounds, sold The Cascade Saloon, located at 410 S. Elm St., was one of trinkets and even little hatchets at her talks like she was some the first saloons in Greensboro, according to the display. An kind of ultra-conservative, angry, hatchet-wielding superstar. interactive image on the UNCG library’s website lets users A devout Christian, Nation opposed almost anything that scroll across an archival photo of the building and watch it brought people joy, Lawrimore says, including smoking. as it changes to the building that stands on the corner today. An hour into the pop-up, attendees gather around the Another black-and-white photo nearby shows a saloon owned display, pointing out important dates or scrolling through the and operated by CC Shoffner in the early 1900s. More than a online archives on an iPad. century later, that same location would house Little Brother “I think it’s really interesting,” says Josh Sherrick, who visBrewing. ited the brewery to see the exhibit. “You get an understanding Despite the city’s booming beer inof the Bible Belt and how much they dustry, a stronger force was gradually hated booze.” working to eliminate alcohol entirely. And yet, 100 years later, North To learn more about Well Crafted Further down the table, newspaCarolina’s craft beer industry grows per clippings and old ads show the NC and future Hop Into History stronger each year. appearance of famous prohibitionist According to the North Carolina events, visit library.uncg.edu/dp/ Carrie A. Nation on one of her naCraft Brewers Guild, the state boasts wellcraftednc.com tional tour stops in Greensboro. the largest number of craft brewer“Carrie Nation, the Kansas Saloon ies in the south, with more than 300 Smasher, will appear at Lindley Park breweries and brewpubs. Casino,” the ad announces. AdLawrimore says that delving into the state’s rich beer history mission was 10 cents, and according to the exhibit, Nation not only helps put the industry into context, but also serves referred to Salisbury as the “whiskeyest-soaked city in the as a way to teach about larger movements in history like Civil United States” outside of Chicago, and called Salisbury a “hell Rights and the women’s movement. hole” with “plenty of saloons, and every one of them is a ticket “Everybody gets really jazzed to learn about beer,” she says. office to hell.” “Beer is an important part of our history here whether it’s Lawrimore explains that Nation, who was well known for drinking it or banning it.”

Jan. 23-29, 2020

CULTURE S-P-E-L-L-I-N-G under the influence at Gibbs Hundred by Savi Ettinger

Up Front News Opinion

Tazmen Hansen shows off her trophy after winning the drunken spelling bee at Gibb’s Hundred Brewing.

SAVI ETTINGER

Shot in the Triad Puzzles

line.” Sovich and Hansen answer purposefully, cycling through Shouts of “What?” and “Huh?” burst from the crowd, which what seems like an endless length of letters as they go headquickly falls eerily silent as the first person tries, and fails to to-head. spell the word. The same hush continues as the second person It all comes down to a vowel. The word? “Lycium.” steps up. When the third person makes a misstep, the round The word ruins Sovich’s near-perfect record, and it hinges finishes and Scott reveals the actual spelling, earning even on whether or not Hansen can get it right. The room goes still, more confusion. only the sound of cups being placed No pause from difficult words is given, down breaking the silence, half the as “triptych” strikes two more contescrowd shifting to one side of the room Learn more about Gibb’s tants. As the third person cautiously to watch. restarts, and orders the vowels correctly, The moment Hansen reaches “M”, the Hundred Brewing Company actual applause breaks out. Stomping, room yells and claps for her victory. Not at gibbshundred.com. clapping and hollering echoes in the cozy a person stays quiet, and even Sovich space of the bar. applauds her win. The round leaves only three standing: “I wanted to try a spelling bee,” he Jeff Sovich, Amanda Turner and Tazmen says, “because I’ve never done one Hansen. The rules now shift. If one of the finalists misspell a before.” word, they may remain should the other two contestants not Hansen laughs as Scott hands her a small trophy and know the answer. crowns her the winner. She holds it in both hands, feeling The trio pass through 17 different rounds, as words like more nostalgic than Sovich, and remembering elementary “abecedarian” and “sinistrocular” keep them at a standstill. school victories. Turner second-guesses her spelling of “promiscuous,” and “It’s third grade all over again,” she grins. then it becomes only two.

Culture

he first word is…,” Rachel Scott announces to a crowd, “haughty.” Across from her, the first of almost 40 contestants takes the mic, unsure. Even though there is not an empty chair in the building, a hush falls over the crowd. “H-O-T-T-I-E?” the contestant spells out. “I’m sorry, that is incorrect,” Scott declares. The night begins and continues in traditional spelling-bee fashion. Scott presents, defines and gives the origins of dozens of words during a crowded Saturday night at Gibb’s Hundred Brewing Company in Greensboro. Their Inebriated Spelling Bee sees guests flocking to the corner of the bar that, tonight, acts as a makeshift stage, where contestants make lucky guesses and unfortunate mistakes. Scott keeps up with the official rules of the competition, bringing up 10 people at a time. All must repeat their given words, spell them correctly and repeat them again to move on to the next round. If they mess up, Scott eliminates them from the running; their word becomes the next contestant’s challenge. And, of course, they’re encouraged to drink as much as they wish, if they want. Reliving grade-school glory draws many people out. Scott has a spelling bee memory of her own, from the fifth grade. “I was the winner for my school in 1995,” she recalls. She laughs, remembering the thick Southern accent from the judge making her not recognize the word “squirrel.” She even remembers exactly how she misspelled it. “S-Q-U-A-R-R-L,” she says. After her first word takes her down, Chanell Bryant grabs a brew from the bar. She commiserates with other eliminated contestants because of a tricky word: trichinosis. Bryant finds the loss ironic. “I’m a legitimate childhood spellingbee winner,” Bryant says. “My mom still has all my trophies.” Even as the night winds on, and the stakes get higher, a few players persevere. Toting wine glasses and beer mugs, the contestants line up to attempt to spell words like “absorptive,” and “misdemeanor.” Scott grins as she finds the next person’s linguistic trial. “The word is,” she pauses, “thermoha-

Jan. 23-29, 2020

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Parlor, in La Paz Boat with three hulls 2020 Best Supporting Actor Oscar nominee Talking bear film of 2012 Occupied, as a lavatory “From Peru to ___ hear the power of Babylon” (Philippine island name-dropped in Enya’s “Orinoco Flow”) They receive paper assignments Crew member What a celebrity might use at a hotel “Who ___?” (“Les Miz” song) Fixed illegally

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It’s produced in a Van de Graaff generator Glass with a radio cadence Base times height “Garfield” cat “As much as you want” Type of music video with a world record set in 2012 by 9,300 participants in Lindsay, Ontario Book-based movie series that ended in 2012 with “Breaking Dawn - Part 2” Q&A feature, on Reddit Like Dali’s art Spear-shaped fish Need an ice bag 8-Down’s need Home of the Nevada Museum of Art Opera highlight Actress Claire of “The Crown” Becomes dim 2012 song that was YouTube’s most-viewed video until “See You Again” surpassed it in 2017 Yoko born in Tokyo “___ Nub” (common name of the 1983 song called “Ewok Celebration”) House vote ___ Lipa (“New Rules” singer) What China became the third country to achieve with the Chang’e 3 mission in 2013 ___ dab in the middle Suffix with puppet or racket Key West, e.g. Minnow’s home Sign of sorrow Fascinated with Go bad Role for Smith, Cartwright, Kavner, or Castellaneta Athlete’s knee injury site, often Swedish duo with a breakup song that hit #1 on the UK Singles Chart in 2013 Game that “The Price Is Right” devoted all six pricing game segments to in a 2013 episode Gillian Flynn thriller published in 2012 Bygone Toyota model Drink from a flask Red Sox rival, on scoreboards Jousters’ horses

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