WASHINGTON – Anti-Semitism and racism are contemporary as well as historical, and everyone from academics and religious leaders to the public and police should stand against the White supremacy that fuels them, speakers said Wednesday at a Georgetown University conference at the National Press Club.
White supremacy, White separatism and White nationalism are different names for the same ideology that promotes hatred of and incites violence against Blacks, Jews and other ethnic and religious minorities, keynote speaker Kristen Clarke told more than 200 people attending “Contemporary White Supremacy in America: What Are Its Links to the Nazi Past?” presented by university’s Center for Jewish Civilization.
“White nationalism should be of profound concern to all Americans because it affects all communities and tears at the fabric of our nation,” said Clarke, president and executive director of The National Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.
Clarke, who had testified Tuesday at a hearing on White supremacy before the House judiciary committee, said her nonpartisan civil rights and racial justice organization fights nationally against a “scourge of hate” that has roots in the nation’s “dark and sordid history of racial violence.”
Reports of hate crimes in the nation have increased since 2016, and Clarke pointed the finger at President Donald J. Trump. From court appointees and immigration policies to a proposed travel ban and threats to close the Southern border, his words and deeds “feed into a culture of animus that Black and Brown communities face today,” she said.
Citing several high-profile hate crimes against Blacks, Muslims and Jews in recent years – including the mass shooting last fall at a Pittsburgh synagogue and suspicious fires at three historically Black churches in Louisiana in recent weeks – Clarke said the federal government must “step up in moments like this to hold the perpetrators accountable.”
After pressure from Clark’s organization, Facebook changed its policy regarding a ban on White-supremacist content. Now, Clarke said, White nationalist and White separatist content are banned in the same manner that White supremacist content is prohibited.
