The Death of America First

I’m noticing a familiar pattern.

Nick Fuentes and America First have been electrocuted for associating the America First brand with the optics of Hitler, the Holocaust and Neo-Nazism. There was a clear rise which began after Charlottesville when Fuentes rode the optics backlash against the Alt-Right. There has been a clear fall since Fuentes mixed up his image with Yedolf wearing the gimp mask and praising Hitler.

If that rings a bell, it is because the Alt-Right started out by criticizing the goofiness of WN 1.0, which occurred against a dreary backdrop of NSM and Klan rallies in the 2000s. By the end, the Alt-Right had become mixed up with the NSM at street rallies. There was a descent that went through flooding the internet with gas chamber memes, Heilgate, Charlottesville and mass shooters. The Spencerian climax of the Alt-Right was Richard Spencer screaming “I rule the f***ing world” in Charlottesville.

I saw how this plays out with the Council of Conservative Citizens and the League of the South. Both organizations had a good run. The CofCC was torpedoed by Dylann Roof who cited our coverage of black crime in his manifesto. We had never heard of Dylann Roof until he detonated like a bomb in Charleston and unleashed a flurry of destruction of Confederate monuments. Similarly, the League of the South was gradually pulled into the Nationalist Front by Matt Heimbach. There was a change of tone and messaging and tactics around 2015/2016 and ultimately we ended up at Charlottesville with people like Richard Spencer where James Fields, Jr. plowed his Dodge Challenger into the crowd. None of us had ever heard of James Fields, Jr. before that day either but we ended up getting sued by association with him. Getting mixed up with the Nationalist Front destroyed our brand and weakened the League of the South.

Every few years or so the movement gets bored and forgets its history and for whatever reason decides to unfurl the swastikas and do the George Lincoln Rockwell trolling on a street corner act for the media again. It predictably gets electrocuted. Momentum crashes into a wall of cringe. Organizations collapse as the brand becomes toxic, donations dry up and people begin to abandon ship. The final act is always the remaining true believers becoming crypt keepers of the memory of Hitler and Rockwell.