Answering Our Critics: ĂŰĚŇ´ŤĂ˝ âSmearâ Dissected
This Thursday, the (CIS) â a Washington, D.C., think tank that describes itself as âpro-immigrantâ but pumps out an endless stream of papers claiming that immigration is hurting America in a myriad of ways â plans to issue a âreportâ attacking the Southern Poverty Law Center (ĂŰĚŇ´ŤĂ˝).
According to CISâ press announcement, the report will claim the ĂŰĚŇ´ŤĂ˝ âjoined with the National Council of La Raza [a Latino civil rights organization] and others to launch a campaign to smearâ three anti-immigration groups: CIS, , and the (FAIR). The press release charged that the key to this âsmearâ was ĂŰĚŇ´ŤĂ˝âs listing of FAIR as a hate group. (The ĂŰĚŇ´ŤĂ˝ annually publishes a list of hate groups and a map with their locations.) The CIS and NumbersUSA were not listed, but CIS says ĂŰĚŇ´ŤĂ˝ intended to âtaintâ them, too.
The suggestion that the ĂŰĚŇ´ŤĂ˝ worked surreptitiously with La Raza and others to designate FAIR a hate group is false; the decision to list the organization was made by the ĂŰĚŇ´ŤĂ˝ alone, based on almost a decade of ĂŰĚŇ´ŤĂ˝ research. We make no apologies for sharing that research with others in the human rights community, including La Raza, which we consider an important ally.
FAIR, an organization that has been dominated for much of its life by its racist founder John Tanton, has probably done more to inject fear and bigotry into the national immigration debate than any other modern organization. Its demonizing propaganda, aimed primarily at Latinos, comes at a time when the number of hate groups continues a decade-long rise, fueled by anti-Latino hatred. At the same time, the FBI reported a 40% rise in anti-Latino hate crimes between 2003 and 2007. Those crimes decreased slightly in 2008, the latest year for which statistics are available.
What follows is a list of factors that resulted in the listing of FAIR as a hate group. More detailed information on FAIR and its founder may be found and .
â˘Â   The racism of FAIRâs founder. John Tanton, who founded FAIR in 1979 and remains a central player on its board today, has a decades-long history of making racist statements and pursuing his interest in eugenics (he once asked Michigan officials if forced sterilization was illegal, citing the case of âa local pair of sisters who have nine illegitimate children between themâ). Tanton has said that unless U.S. borders are sealed, America will be overrun by people âdefecating and creating garbage and looking for jobs.â He has complained of Latinosâ allegedly low âeducability,â and said Latinos âbring with them the tradition of the mordida [bribe]].â He has a long record of friendly correspondence with Holocaust deniers, former Klan lawyers, and leading white nationalist thinkers, including . He wrote a major FAIR funder to suggest she read the work of a â to âgive you a new understanding of the Jewish outlook on lifeâ â and suggested that the entire FAIR board discuss his theories about the Jews. At one point, Tanton wrote that âfor European-American society and culture to persist requires a European-American majority, and a clear one at that.â In a letter to FAIR board member Donald Collins, Tanton enthused over the work of â a key architect of the racially restrictive Immigration Act of 1924 and a man who distributed pro-Nazi propaganda and warned shrilly of âdiabolical Jewish controlâ of America â and said it should serve FAIR as âa guidepost to what we must follow again this time.â
â˘Â   Taking money from racists. FAIR solicited and accepted a total of $1.2 million from the , a notorious organization set up by Nazi sympathizers in 1937 to fund studies of eugenics (selective breeding of humans to produce a âbetterâ race) and race and intelligence. Saying it didnât know about the fundâs background, FAIR stopped publicly seeking Pioneer money in 1994 after a barrage of embarrassing publicity. But that didnât stop three FAIR board members from meeting privately three years later with the Pioneer Fundâs then-chairman, Harry Weyher, to discuss fundraising. Moreover, FAIR has apparently lost its shame about the Pioneer Fund, and now devotes to defending the foundation.
â˘Â   Views of FAIRâs president. Dan Stein, once the groupâs executive director and now its president, has warned that immigrants are engaged in âcompetitive breedingâ aimed at diminishing white power. He led efforts to win funding from the racist Pioneer Fund, saying in 1993 that his âjob [was] to get every dime of Pioneerâs money.â Stein also served as editorial adviser to , at a time when it ran its ugliest edition ever, The issueâs lead article argued that multiculturalism was replacing âsuccessful Euro-American cultureâ with âdysfunctional Third World cultures.â Stein has declined to offer any criticism of FAIRâs founder, instead Tanton last September as a âRenaissance man.â
â˘Â   Leading FAIR officialsâ participation in racist groups. Rick Oltman, who for much of the 1990s was FAIRâs Western Regional Coordinator, spoke as part of a 1997 immigration panel put on by the , a hate group that has described black people as a âretrograde species of humanity.â Council publications at the time listed Oltman as a member. Jim Staudenraus, FAIRâs Eastern Regional Coordinator, participated in an anti-immigration conference in 2002 with Jared Taylor, a âwhite nationalistâ publisher who recently wrote, âWhen blacks are left entirely to their own devices, Western civilization â any kind of civilization â disappears.â In 2007, a senior FAIR official met with leaders of Vlaams Belang, a Belgian political party that officials outlawed in a previous incarnation () as a âcriminal organizationâ because of its racist anti-immigrant views.
â˘Â   Bigotry on the board. FAIR board member Donald Collins writes frequently for the , named after Virginia Dare, said to have been the first English child born in the New World. The site is dedicated to bashing immigrants and has published the work of a broad array of white nationalists and anti-Semites. Collinsâ articles have focused on attacking the Catholic Church over its stance on immigration, one of them âin exchange for more temporal power and glory.â In another, Collins said bishops were âinfiltrating and manipulating the American political processâ to attack the separation of church and state. Another FAIR board member, Richard Lamm, once said that ânew culturesâ in America were âdiluting what we are and who we are.â
â˘Â   FAIR programming. FAIR has produced television programming under the title âBorderlineâ that featured interviews with white nationalists like Jared Taylor, who later launched the racist American Renaissance magazine, . FAIRâs âBorderlineâ program also featured a televised interview with , who went on to become editor of the publication of the Council of Conservative Citizens, a group prone to gutter racism like posting on its website photo comparisons of the late black pop singer Michael Jackson and a chimpanzee.
In its press announcement, CIS alleges that the ĂŰĚŇ´ŤĂ˝ is attempting to âtaintâ both CIS and NumbersUSA by their close associations with Tanton, which are described in the ĂŰĚŇ´ŤĂ˝âs 2009 report, Here are some facts about CIS:
â˘Â   Bigotry of the director. CIS Executive Director Mark Krikorian, who is moderating the panel of speakers CIS has organized for the release of its anti-ĂŰĚŇ´ŤĂ˝ report, has made several ugly statements about minorities. Most recently, , he responded to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Haitians in a major earthquake by saying, âHaitiâs so screwed up because it wasnât colonized long enough.â The solution, he added, âwould be to resume colonialism.â In 2008, shortly after the failure of Washington Mutual Bank, Krikorian found a press release recently issued by the bank that celebrated its inclusion on a list of âBusiness Diversity Elites.â He â a clear suggestion that Washington Mutualâs commitment to opening its ranks to Latinos had caused its financial collapse.
â˘Â   Ties to John Tanton. Krikorian claims to have no âpersonal relationshipâ with Tanton, who has become an embarrassment to CIS. But the reality is that Tanton originated the idea for CIS and installed his close friend, Otis Graham, as its first director. (Graham has written that the civil rights movement falsely depicted America as a ânation of immigrantsâ; he also described the racist Immigration Act of 1924 as merely an honest attempt to preserve âa working American nationality.â) For his part, and despite his statement about not being close to Tanton, Krikorian worked at FAIR before coming to CIS, has participated in Tantonâs writers workshops, and has received letters from Tanton, including copies of correspondence with white nationalists and suggestions for various organizing tactics. Krikorian has generally avoided criticizing Tanton until earlier this month, when, in response to a question, Krikorian conceded that his colleague has âkind of a big tent policy, and his big tent is too big.â
â˘Â   Circulating of white nationalist material. CIS regularly circulates articles to its members that come from the white nationalist VDARE.com website.
In the case of NumbersUSA, executive director Roy Beck has downplayed his relationship with Tanton for the same reasons that CIS has. In a 2004 congressional hearing, Beck was especially cagey in response to questions from a congressman about that relationship. Here are some other facts about NumbersUSA and its leader:
â˘Â   Ties to John Tanton. NumbersUSA began life as a program of Tantonâs foundation, U.S. Inc., only becoming independent in 2002 â a fact that goes unmentioned in the groupâs literature. Beck, in other words, was an employee of Tantonâs for a decade. During that period, he helped edit an anti-immigrant book by Tanton and another U.S. Inc. employee, white supremacist , that was banned as hate literature by Canadian border officials. Tanton often wrote Beck, including a letter in which he asked âwhether the minorities who are going to inherit California ⌠can run an advanced society.â Beck was also one of the editors of Tantonâs immigrant-bashing The Social Contract. Beck and his wife have vacationed with the Tantons, once joining them on a visit to the home of a member of the board of the Pioneer Fund. At one point, Tanton named Beck his âheir apparent,â which Beck says was an honor. Tax forms show that NumbersUSA still receives funding from U.S. Inc.
â˘Â   Associations with bigoted groups. Beck spoke in 1996 to a conference of the white supremacist Council of Conservative Citizens, though he says he did not understand the groupâs racism until he arrived. (He still gave his speech.) In 2008, he spoke at a conference hosted by Tantonâs .