The Nazi groups waved swastikas, DeSantis flags, and chanted “Jews will not replace us,” a slogan popularized at the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, North Carolina. A notable attendee was Kent “Boneface” McLellan, a neo-Nazi who has reportedly traveled to Ukraine to serve with the Azov Battalion, showing how U.S. aid to Ukraine is being used to train and fuel the far-right movement of our own country. “The chickens coming home to roost,” as Malcolm X said.

While both mobilizations combined numbered less than 100 participants, and many traveled from out of state, neo-Nazis across the country are becoming more emboldened to hold public demonstrations and this must be analyzed. This increase in activity should be understood as the Republican Party openly embracing far-right political stances to mobilize their base, combined with the mainstreaming of racist and chauvinist politics by the media.

Organizations of all stripes are coming together against the rise of white supremacist terrorism, as seen following the murder of three Black people in Jacksonville. The people taking away reproductive rights and banning Black education are the same ones cozying up to white supremacists and neo-Nazi organizations.

We join with other organizations demanding that Governor DeSantis condemn these white supremacist mobilizations stoked by his policies and rhetoric. Governor DeSantis attacks teaching Black history in the legislature while white supremacists commit targeted attacks on Black people. This is national oppression in action.

The increasing activity of the far right extends beyond the DeSantis administration. The mainstreaming of far-right organizations and policies should be seen as a symptom of the decline of U.S. imperialism and power. The U.S. empire is in decline and our internal contradictions are sharpening. The time to join the fight is now! frso.org/join

#OrlandoFL #FRSO #FRSOOrlando #AntiFascism #Nazis #DeSantis

This week an FSU undergraduate student has been exposed through copious emails and message logs as being a member of the Neo-Nazi group Patriot Front. The student is Calvin Stow-Ortiz from Tampa, where his father unsurprisingly works for the Tampa Police Department. In leaked messages Stow-Ortiz references spreading the groups propaganda posters and stickers in the Tampa area and made plans with another Patriot Front member to vandalize FAMU’s campus with white supremacist stickers. On the messaging app Telegram, Stow-Ortiz uses a picture of an SS Nazi soldier as his profile picture. In another leaked message Stow-Ortiz shared a video of a torchlit Nazi march and said Patriot Front should emulate it. There can be no doubt that Stow-Ortiz is a white supremacist, anti-semite, and fascist.

Despite overwhelming calls from the community to remove this white supremacist from our campus, Associate Vice President for Student Affairs and Dean of Students Angela Chong made it clear in an email obtained by Our Tallahassee that FSU would once again allow fascists to remain on campus. The email to a concerned citizen says FSU is unaware of any “actionable activity or offenses” and that “FSU prides itself on protecting freedom of expression and speech.” The email falsely claims that the safety of students, faculty, and staff is FSU’s foremost priority. The FSU and Tallahassee community have made it very clear: Calvin Stow-Ortiz presents a threat to the safety of all marginalized groups in Tallahassee.

In October 2021 Patriot Front held a retreat in Tallahassee at Williams Landing Park. In attendance were members from out of state and all around Florida. At this retreat they practiced marching like Nazis and pathetically attempted to train in hand to hand combat. SDS condemns FSU’s inaction in the face of racism and hate in our community and on our campus. SDS demands the immediate expulsion of Calvin-Stow Ortiz from FSU. SDS calls on all progressive student organizations to join us in opposition to Nazis on campus. FSU claims to care about diversity and inclusion, yet have shown time and time again that this is a lie. FSU honored the legacy of slave owner Frances Eppes for decades, so it comes as no surprise that racists like Stow-Ortiz feel that they can spread hate in our community. No white supremacists on our campus!

#TallahasseeFL #StudentMovement #StudentsForADemocraticSociety #Nazis #Antifascism

On May 8, 1945, at 11:01 pm Central European Time – already May 9 in the USSR – the German surrender took effect, ending World War II in Europe. The war with Germany and her fellow members of what we now call fascist allies in Europe – Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania, Italy, Slovakia and Finland – had already claimed the lives of perhaps 50 million people. In the ensuing years, oceans of ink have been spilled by right-wing historians and polemicists in an attempt to distort or even minimize the significance of this date. The purpose of this rewriting of history is in some cases to defend fascism, but in many more it is simply to diminish the prestige of the Soviet Union, the first socialist state. We think it is appropriate to call to mind a few facts.

First, the Nazi empire was guilty of the most astounding crimes, some without any real parallel in history. Over the summer of 1944, some 400,000 Hungarian Jews – almost the whole Jewish population of Hungary – were transported by rail to Auschwitz, a death camp the Nazis had built in occupied Poland, and murdered, down to the last child. Most were gassed, but history records that many of the children were thrown alive into crematory fires – sometimes more than a thousand children were killed this way in a single day. In all, 6 million Jewish people were murdered in the most efficient genocide campaign the world has had the misfortune to witness. Many millions more were murdered among the Romani, Slavic and other peoples the Nazis considered racial inferiors and among Soviet prisoners of war. Still hundreds of thousands more were murdered among people with disabilities, sexual minorities and other targeted groups.

Second, the capitalist world was for a long time complacent about the rise of Nazism. The governments of France, England and Poland stood idly by while Hitler annexed first Austria and then Czechia. The cost of this was enormous. Almost half the tanks used by the Nazis in the conquest of France were built at the Skoda works in occupied Czechia. And this was not an isolated case. Even with Hitler's racism on full display, the democratic governments of Europe were far more concerned with his value as a bulwark against socialism.

Third, it was the Soviet Union which, from the beginning, was the main enemy of Nazi Germany. What we now know as the Axis originally called itself the Anti-Comintern Pact. Long before what is widely considered the start date of World War II, Soviet soldiers had already fought bloody battles against German and Italian fascists in Spain, and against Japanese militarism in Manchuria. Throughout the period of appeasement by the capitalist powers, the Soviet government urged the strongest possible resistance to Nazi aggression, even going as far as to offer one million Soviet soldiers for the defense of Czechoslovakia – an offer which Czechoslovakia would probably have accepted, but the Polish government refused to allow transit or supply of this army through their country. The period of the non-aggression pact between Germany and the USSR was an emergency measure, agreed by the Soviets only when it was clear they would otherwise be standing alone against Germany and might have to fight a second front against Japan. Throughout the period of this pact, the Soviet government and people frantically built weapons, constructed defenses, and organized and prepared for the decisive confrontation they knew very well was only a matter of time.

Fourth, the decisive sacrifices and the decisive victories in the war against Nazi Germany occurred on the Eastern Front. Casualty figures compiled by the German military showed that between the start of the war and January 31, 1945, 3.5 million of the 4.4 million German casualties had occurred on the Eastern Front. The single Battle of Stalingrad cost the Germans as many casualties as the entire fighting in France, including both 1940 and 1944. When the German invasion of the USSR began in the summer of 1940, the Soviets faced 3.8 million soldiers and 7000 armored vehicles. When the Western Allies made their greatly delayed landing in Normandy, they faced only 600,000 men and 2000 armored vehicles. Worse for the Germans, the crack Nazi units which had conquered France in six weeks in 1940 had been destroyed in the battles on the Eastern Front and rebuilt with raw recruits. In sacrifice, the USSR lost 27 million of her citizens in the war – by far the most of any country in the European conflict. Many of them were killed in combat, but millions more were murdered in prisoner of war camps and concentration camps or were among the civilians massacred or starved by the invaders.

Fifth, the Soviet victory in World War II was possible only due to socialist construction. In World War I, the Russian empire fielded by far the weakest army of any of the major powers. Though it had an almost unlimited supply of soldiers, its level of training, organization, and equipment was disastrously bad. During World War II, in every single year, the newly industrialized USSR outproduced Germany – at the time, Europe's premier industrial power – in every major category of war material – planes, tanks, cannons, rifles, machine guns. This tremendous advantage in war material was key to the Soviet ability to resist and ultimately defeat an invasion force which had completely conquered Belgium and France – at the time, a major military power in her own right – in just six weeks.

The reality is that the Soviet Union was the most consistent and dangerous enemy of fascism, the worst evil that Europe has ever suffered, and Soviet efforts and the strength of the USSR were key to fascism's defeat. This fact was not lost on many people in 1945, and certainly not on the handful of survivors of Auschwitz concentration camp liberated by the Soviet 322nd Rifle Division on January 31 of 1945.

No objective evaluation of socialism is possible without an objective evaluation of the real world history of socialism. In the long list of accomplishments of real world socialism to date, we must prominently include playing the key role in the defeat of Nazism.

#UnitedStates #International #Asia #Europe #Nazis #WorldWarII #Socialism #Antifascism #Russia #SovietUnion

Milwaukee, WI – Activists rallied outside the Milwaukee County courthouse on the afternoon of July 11 to stand in solidarity with a student who was arrested and charged for taking a vulgar, racist sign away from a Nazi.

Grae Hosmanek is a freshman student at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. In May, she and others witnessed a racist student protesting a Jewish event on campus and gathered around to deter him from spreading hate speech and threats. The lone fascist, who called himself “Chris,” was holding a sign that read “(((GAS)))” a reference to the Nazi holocaust, and another sign bearing a Nazi swastika. The sign also advocated for “civil war.” Chris told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel he wanted to “spark the conversation” about “Marxism ideology.”

Hosmanek stepped in to take a sign away from the Nazi student, to the supportive cheers of the crowd that had gathered. She ripped the sign in half and ran off with it. The campus police caught her and arrested her a few minutes later. While police allowed the Nazi student to continue his threats toward Jewish and other students, Hosmanek was charged with theft, vandalism, disorderly conduct and obstructing an officer.

After supporters gathered at her first court hearing, three of the charges were dropped. Hosmanek is still facing a charge of “vandalism,” and chose to fight her case at trial and plead not guilty to the bogus charge. “I want people to see me, what I did, and why I did it,” Hosmanek told Fight Back!, “You need to not only stand up for what is right, but be willing to put yourself on the line for it, every day.”

Inspired by her bold action, anti-racist activists, including students, immigrant rights groups, unionists, and university faculty are rallying to support Hosmanek and demand the bogus vandalism charge against her be dropped. Supporters have attended her first two court dates and are organizing support rallies for future hearings.

The support committee is asking people to attend the next trial on September 23. The support committee will meet at 2 p.m. at the Milwaukee County Courthouse fountain for a short rally to demand the judge “Drop the charges!” and walk into the courtroom together after the rally.

#MilwaukeeWI #UniversityOfWisconsinMilwaukee #Nazis #PoliticalRepression #Antifascism #DropTheCharges

In the wake of the secession of Crimea and its induction into the Russian Federation following a popular referendum in March, the crisis in Ukraine is intensifying. The fascist-dominated junta in Kiev, backed by the U.S. and NATO, is cracking down on ‘separatist elements’ in the east and now the south of the deteriorating country.

Within less than a month of Crimea’s secession, mass protests erupted in Eastern cities – Donetsk, Lugansk, Slavyansk and Kharkov and dozens of smaller towns. Occupying government, public and media buildings, the protesters declared their cities independent and issued a minimum demand: a referendum on the federalization of Ukraine in order to provide its heterogeneous population and ethnically varied regions choice in their official language and allegiance between Ukraine and Russia.

The uprisings in the east come on the heels of the U.S.-backed Maidan coup in February that ousted the Yanukovich government. The Yanukovich government turned down an EU deal on the grounds that EU integration would bankrupt and destabilize Ukraine.

The new coup government is comprised of several menacing parties that usurped power. The neo-Nazi Svoboda (Freedom) Party, which has promoted a campaign to “liquidate” the “Muscovites and Jewry” of Ukraine, holds key ministerial as well as judicial and military positions. The Right Sector party, whose leader has claimed that even Svoboda is “too liberal,” has claimed an equally significant number of military posts. The stubbornly right-wing Fatherland Party, led by the one of the most infamous, wealthiest and criminal oligarchs in Ukraine, Yulia Tymoshenko, is the other newly ascended party in the regime. In tandem with the rise of these parties to power, the portrait of Stepan Bandera, the notorious Ukrainian Nazi-collaborator of World War II, is hanging in government buildings.

Virulently anti-Russian, the new government is hitting hard with its first political offensives that target a vast portion of the Ukrainian population. Such ‘reforms’ included the proposed ban on any official use of the Russian language, which was formerly respected as the second official language of 13 out of 27 regions.

The predominantly Russian east, frightened by the new coup government’s fascist ambitions, is being devastated by the austerity imposed by Kiev as a prerequisite measure to join the EU. Cut off from funding and suddenly faced with the menace of fascism, one city and region after another is rising in defiance of the right-wing government.

Protesters in the east surged out in mass numbers to demonstrate against the new government. After demonstrations changed little and an offensive on the part of Kiev was impending, occupiers soon declared autonomy, formed self-defense teams, and looked to Russia for aid. The most famous instances include the declaration of People’s Republics in Donetsk and Lugansk and requests by newly appointed governors for Putin to intervene on Russians’ behalf. The Ukrainian left, including the Borotba Union and the Communist Party of Ukraine, are organizing and leading protests.

In mid-April, the Kiev junta announced an ‘anti-terrorist’ and ‘anti-separatist’ military operation to clear protests in Eastern Ukraine by force. The Ukrainian military launched offensives against numerous eastern cities, deploying tanks, helicopters and heavily armed soldiers against protesters.

While peaceful protesters initially greeted tanks, intense fighting has since broken out as Kiev makes it clear that it is determined to suppress any resistance to its new order. Although defections, mutinies and executions of soldiers who refuse to fire on protesters plague the Ukrainian army, the Kiev coup government offensive continues and the number of civilian deaths is rapidly increasing.

With Ukraine facing civil war and the U.S. mobilizing and deploying troops throughout Eastern Europe, all progressive people should adamantly oppose U.S. intervention and declare: “Hands off Ukraine!”

#Ukraine #Russia #antiwar #USImperialism #Nazis #antifascism #Svoboda #RightSector #HouseOfTradeUnions #Europe

West Allis, WI – On Sept. 3, protesters converged on a planned rally put together by the Nazi ‘National Socialist Movement.’ The rally was planned in response to violence at the Wisconsin State Fair the previous month.

While the Nazi-led rally's attendance measured in the dozens, many traveling from outside of Wisconsin, several thousand people came out in opposition. In spite of a chilling rain, chants against Nazi hate drowned out the amplified sound of their planned rally.

Speaking with regard to the day's events, Jhoselinn Perez, of the Coalition for Racial Justice and Unity, said, “It was good to see a large community response, especially from such a diverse spectrum of our city. It hurt to see the police more interested in pushing peaceful nonviolent protesters away, while the message of hatred was being presented. It was good to see a vibrant community respond against the evils of racism.”

Well over a hundred police were called out to maintain order throughout the day. Mounted police, as well as officers on foot in full riot gear, were repeatedly used to distance the masses of counter-protesters from the pockets of Nazi supporters. Several people were arrested.

The counter-protest was put together by a coalition of over 30 different community organizations, including Milwaukee Intercity Congregations Allied for Hope, Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), Peace Action-Wisconsin, the L.U.V. Brigade, Bail out the People Movement, and Freedom Road Socialist Organization.

Chance Zombor, representing Freedom Road Socialist Organization, delivered the following speech:

“First, let me say that Nazism is not, and should not be thought of as an equally legitimate but different opinion from ours; it’s a death threat. Nazis are not socialists. Neo-Nazis are terrorists, Nazis are fascists, and fascism is synonymous with death camps and genocide. That’s why it should be boldly confronted and combated head on, in any and all of its manifestations, wherever it rears its ugly head, from extreme right-wing politicians like Scott Walker to racist gangs like the ones assembled in West Allis today. So I’m glad to be here with all of you, on behalf of the Freedom Road Socialist Organization, to stop Nazi hate. And I want to thank Students for a Democratic Society for making these signs.

“Today, the Nazis are attempting to exploit an incident – an incident that has been interpreted and misinterpreted, distorted and spun a thousand different ways, by a thousand different organizations and media outlets in the past few weeks. They would like to spin that incident in such a way as to allow themselves to play the victims. But anyone with a casual familiarity with the history of this country knows that the Ku Klux Klan, Nazis and other racists, are not, and have never been the victims here. They are oppressors. And, by spreading their divisive poison, they’re serving the interests of the banks, corporations and politicians whose drive for ever greater profits and power and total disregard for humanity, has affected so many of us in recent times.

“These Nazis may not be from Milwaukee, but Milwaukee is the most segregated city in America, with statistics comparable to many Third World countries. In infant mortality, unemployment, and in the gap between rich and poor, Milwaukee is comparable to a Third World country! And Milwaukee incarcerates a higher percentage of its young Black men than it graduates from its high schools. Milwaukee is a city in a state of apartheid. And these problems did not arise spontaneously, so they will not disappear without struggle.

“That’s why, while I think it’s important that we’ve come out here today to let these Nazis know that their bigotry is unwelcome in our community, what is more important is what we do after today – whether or not we will build on what we’ve accomplished today to make the changes necessary for the betterment of all of our lives. Tomorrow, these skin-heads will go home, but Wisconsin will still be in the middle of an epic battle for the future of our state – against Scott Walker and his extreme right-wing agenda. Let’s continue to struggle after this demonstration is over with the same spirit of solidarity. Let’s run the right right out of town.”

#WestAllisWI #Nazis #NationalSocialistMovement

Over 30 organizations from all over the Milwaukee area have formed the Coalition for Racial Justice and Unity. Many of the organizations involved have been at the forefront of fighting back against Governor Scott Walker's union busting, anti-immigrant policies and cuts to social services.

“We intend to keep the working-class town of West Allis unified against the real enemy, which is Gov. Scott Walker, the banks and big corporations,” commented organizer Daniel Ginsberg.

The counter-Nazi demonstration will take place starting at 1:00 p.m. in front of West Allis City Hall, on 75th and Greenfield. It will have a stage set-up and a line of speakers representing various oppressed communities, along with Mayor Dan Devine of West Allis.

An earlier counter-demonstration will take place in Red Arrow Park beginning at 9:00 a.m. in Milwaukee at Kilbourn and Water St., and will feature music, speeches and other performances. People will be commuting from this event to the protest in West Allis at 1:00 p.m., where some will be speaking as well.

#MilwaukeeWI #CoalitionForRacialJusticeAndUnity #Nazis