Speaker 1: Col Zone Media. In March of twenty twenty five, a
Speaker 1: few dozen white nationalists from across the country gathered at
Speaker 1: a castle in the mountains. The meeting itself wasn't really
Speaker 1: a secret, it had been announced months ahead of time,
Speaker 1: but it was a private event, and the location was
Speaker 1: a closely guarded secret, shared only with those on the
Speaker 1: invite list at elector and adorned with a golden eagle
Speaker 1: and flanked by flags bearing fascies and lightning bolts. Speeches
Speaker 1: were made by movement leaders spanning generations, men in their
Speaker 1: seventies nearing the end of their decades long careers as
Speaker 1: white nationalist organizers, and men in their twenties looking ahead
Speaker 1: to the movement's future. During an afternoon break between speeches,
Speaker 1: the keynote speaker took off a suit jacket in bolow
Speaker 1: tie to oversee a shirtless, bare knuckle boxing match on
Speaker 1: the lawn. The American Freedom Party has changed its logo,
Speaker 1: its leadership, and even its name over the fifteen years
Speaker 1: since it was first founded as the American Third Position Party,
Speaker 1: but they are still who they've always been, a handful
Speaker 1: of racists and suits whose inability to properly fill out
Speaker 1: paperwork keeps getting in the way of their dreams of
Speaker 1: a white ethno state. I'm Molly Conker. This this weird
Speaker 1: little guy. When we left off last week, we were
Speaker 1: talking about the strange winding road that led a white
Speaker 1: nationalist group called the American Third Position Party to run
Speaker 1: a failed filmmaker for president in twenty twelve. By his
Speaker 1: own account, Merilyn Miller had never been all that interested
Speaker 1: in politics, that is, until he had his political awakening
Speaker 1: after nine to eleven. He'd been trying unsuccessfully to sell
Speaker 1: the distribution rights to his second film, a western called Jericho,
Speaker 1: when he met a man who had served aboard the
Speaker 1: U s S. Liberty in nineteen sixty seven when the
Speaker 1: ship was bombed by the Israeli Air Force. Batman introduced
Speaker 1: Merlin Miller to the wide world of conspiracy theory surrounding
Speaker 1: the incident and connected him with Richard Thompson, a Navy
Speaker 1: veteran who had recently helped finance a documentary about it.
Speaker 1: For several years, Thompson and Miller discussed making a movie
Speaker 1: about the US Liberty, not another documentary that had been done,
Speaker 1: but an action thriller set in the modern day, connecting
Speaker 1: the conspiracy theories that have grown up around that incident
Speaker 1: with those About nine to eleven, the screenplay was written
Speaker 1: and ready to go. The movie was going to be
Speaker 1: called False Flag. Miller would direct and produce it, and
Speaker 1: Thompson was going to be the moneyman. When Richard Thompson
Speaker 1: died unexpectedly in the summer of tearwo thousand and seven,
Speaker 1: the project stalled out. Without funding, he couldn't make the movie,
Speaker 1: and it looks like he redirected some of that energy
Speaker 1: into the Ron Paul campaign. Federal Election Commission records show
Speaker 1: that Merlin Miller made his first ever federal campaign contribution
Speaker 1: in November of two thousand and seven when he gave
Speaker 1: Ron Paul one hundred dollars. He even threw his hat
Speaker 1: into the ring to be a Ron Paul delegate in Tennessee,
Speaker 1: but doesn't look like he was chosen. But he made
Speaker 1: a lot of new friends through the Paul campaign. Admittedly,
Speaker 1: there's a bit of a blank space in my research here.
Speaker 1: I couldn't tell you exactly what path he took down
Speaker 1: the road to political extremism between two thousand and two
Speaker 1: and two thousand and seven. That part of the timeline
Speaker 1: is pretty sparse. It's entirely possible that his descent into
Speaker 1: USS liberty conspiracy theories brought him into contact with the
Speaker 1: political fringe long before he got involved with the Paul
Speaker 1: campaign in two thousand and seven, but that's the point
Speaker 1: in time where he reappears in any record I can find.
Speaker 1: By two thousand and eight, Merlin Miller was rubbing elbows
Speaker 1: with some of the big names in American racism. That summer,
Speaker 1: he was a speaker at the Council of Conservative Citizens
Speaker 1: National Conference. The archived version of that racist group's website
Speaker 1: shows that at some point all of that year's speeches
Speaker 1: were uploaded, but the files haven't survived, and the attendee
Speaker 1: who uploaded some of them to YouTube must not have
Speaker 1: thought Merlin Miller's speech was very interesting, because it isn't there.
Speaker 1: Other speakers at that event included Drew Lackey, the police
Speaker 1: officer who was famously photographed fingerprinting Rosa Parks after her
Speaker 1: arrest in Montgomery in nineteen fifty five, and he was
Speaker 1: also the officer who booked Martin Luther King after his
Speaker 1: arrest in nineteen fifty six. Lackey's speech, too, seems lost
Speaker 1: to the sands of time, but according to a write
Speaker 1: up on AlterNet, he talked about his book Bok called
Speaker 1: Another View of the Civil Rights Movement, in which he
Speaker 1: calls Rosa Parks a communist agitator and dismisses the entire
Speaker 1: civil rights movement as a farce designed to intimidate and
Speaker 1: demoralize the police. In America, Alabama State Senator Charles Bishop's
Speaker 1: keynote speech was a rambling racist rant about Mohammed Obama
Speaker 1: and Several of the other speakers listed on the website
Speaker 1: are men who would go on to serve together on
Speaker 1: the board of the American Third Position Party, Paul Frome,
Speaker 1: Tom Sunich, and James Edwards. And a few months after that,
Speaker 1: Merlin Miller packed a suitcase for another trip.
Speaker 2: September second, two thousand and eight. You remember what you
Speaker 2: were doing that day, September second, two thousand and eight.
Speaker 3: Yes, up in Minneapolis.
Speaker 2: Merlin Miller and another man who will come to these microphones,
Speaker 2: William Daniel Johnson, the chairman of the American Free Party,
Speaker 2: and yours truly, all three of us were in the
Speaker 2: Target Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Speaker 1: This one came as a bit of a surprise to me.
Speaker 1: None of the write ups I could find about the
Speaker 1: early days of the party led me to believe that
Speaker 1: Merlin Miller had been involved with the group's actual founding,
Speaker 1: let alone hanging out with its founders more than a
Speaker 1: year before the group even existed. But there it is
Speaker 1: in his own words. In May of twenty thirteen, he
Speaker 1: appeared on an episode of the American Freedom Party's new podcast.
Speaker 1: It was a project they'd launched that spring as part
Speaker 1: of their rebranding after they changed the name from American
Speaker 1: Third Position to American Freedom Party. And the man he's
Speaker 1: talking to is Jamie Kelso, one of the party's founders.
Speaker 1: Kelso is I know. I say this all the time.
Speaker 1: He's the guy that's going to get his own episodes.
Speaker 1: He is an incredibly odd man. Before he was on
Speaker 1: the board of the American Third Position Party, he was
Speaker 1: a member of National Alliance for years. In the early
Speaker 1: two thousands, he was David Duke's live in personal assistant.
Speaker 1: He was a moderator on Stormfront for a decade, and
Speaker 1: when he was a much younger man, he was a
Speaker 1: member of Scientology's Sea Org. And in two thousand and eight,
Speaker 1: Jamie Kelso was traveling all over the country attending Ron
Speaker 1: Paul campaign events because he recognized their value as a
Speaker 1: recruitment pool for white nationalism. And I guess he wasn't
Speaker 1: attending those events alone. Like I said, I can't find
Speaker 1: much evidence that still exists online about the nature of
Speaker 1: Merlin Miller's relationship with the movement during those early years,
Speaker 1: but he was close enough to Jamie Kelso and William
Speaker 1: Daniel Johnson by the fall of two thousand and eight
Speaker 1: to be traveling with them.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 1: Ron Paul did not become the president in two thousand obviously,
Speaker 1: but Miller's involvement in the campaign had introduced him to
Speaker 1: new friends and new possibilities. He'd failed to gain the
Speaker 1: support of Tennessee Republicans to become a primary delegate, just
Speaker 1: like he'd failed to make films in Hollywood. This system
Speaker 1: seemed designed to prevent white men with traditional values from
Speaker 1: succeeding in anything, and in that spirit, Merlin Miller founded
Speaker 1: a new film production company in two thousand and nine.
Speaker 1: He'd produced his first film, A Place to Grow, in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety five through his company Ozark Pictures. His second film, Jericho,
Speaker 1: premiered in two thousand and one through his company Black
Speaker 1: Knight Productions, But his new vision was going to require
Speaker 1: a new production company, Americana Pictures, a film company dedicated
Speaker 1: to making movies that promote quote, traditional American ideals. He
Speaker 1: announced the new venture in an essay on The Occidental Observer,
Speaker 1: a far right publication edited by Kevin mac donald, another
Speaker 1: future founding member of the American Third Position Party. In
Speaker 1: the essay, Miller asks where are the good stories? Where
Speaker 1: have our heroes gone? Writing quote At one time, we
Speaker 1: could discern right from wrong because stories promoted truth, justice,
Speaker 1: and liberty. The world felt good when they ended happily,
Speaker 1: or inspired us to overcome when they did not. They
Speaker 1: made us want to be better people and live in
Speaker 1: a better world, a world built by our European American brethren.
Speaker 1: But after working in Hollywood, he came to realize that
Speaker 1: Hollywood was in the business of killing those heroes, of
Speaker 1: killing that American dream and propagandizing for a new world order.
Speaker 1: Hollywood doesn't represent traditional Americans. Instead, it quote seeks to
Speaker 1: destroy our European American heritage and our Christian based traditional values,
Speaker 1: place them with values that debase these traditional values and
Speaker 1: elevate minorities as paragons of virtue and wisdom. He complains
Speaker 1: that despite graduating from a prestigious film school program, the
Speaker 1: industry had no place for people like him, people with
Speaker 1: traditional values who refused to denigrate Christianity and participate in
Speaker 1: the Jewish controlled media. Americana Pictures could be an alternative
Speaker 1: to Hollywood, making pro white movies for pro wide audiences,
Speaker 1: developing their own talent by running screenwriting workshops. When Americana
Speaker 1: Pictures launched in two thousand and nine, Miller had two
Speaker 1: projects in mind, that unfunded film about the USS liberty
Speaker 1: that he'd been working on for years, and one that
Speaker 1: he tentatively titled The Liberator. The Liberator was a retelling
Speaker 1: of the story of Arminius, the Germanic chieftain who commanded
Speaker 1: a coalition of forces against the Romans at the Battle
Speaker 1: of tutors Forrest in nine AD. As part of an
Speaker 1: effort to drum up financial support for the films, Miller
Speaker 1: published a piece in The Barnes Review later that same year.
Speaker 1: I know I'm always telling you about this seemingly infinite
Speaker 1: number of conspiracy theory blogs and Nazi newsletters and racist magazines,
Speaker 1: and they all probably run together. But the Barnes Review
Speaker 1: has been described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as
Speaker 1: one of the most virulent anti Semitic organizations around, and
Speaker 1: most issues feature several articles devoted to Holocaust denial. I mean,
Speaker 1: you'd think you'd run out of ways to talk about it,
Speaker 1: but they haven't. This particular issue included the text of
Speaker 1: a speech made by Hitler in nineteen forty one, two
Speaker 1: articles about Hitler, an interview with the founder of a
Speaker 1: Greek fascist party, and an essay by Ingrid Zundel, wife
Speaker 1: of famous Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel. Miller's piece was about
Speaker 1: the historical figure of our Minius, and there was just
Speaker 1: a little box of text on the side of one
Speaker 1: page announcing that he would be making a film to
Speaker 1: tell this incredible story. Okay, I'll admit I don't ever
Speaker 1: think about the Roman Empire. That's just never on my mind.
Speaker 1: I don't know the story of Arminius. I don't have
Speaker 1: the tiniest bit of interest in knowing more about how
Speaker 1: Publius Quintilius Verus committed suicide out of shame at having
Speaker 1: lost three Roman legions at the Battle of Tuteburg Forest.
Speaker 1: I couldn't tell you if Merlin Miller's retelling of those
Speaker 1: events is historically accurate. Maybe he's a Roman history buff.
Speaker 1: I don't know, but I do think it's worth considering
Speaker 1: that his interest in the story of Arminius might be
Speaker 1: less about a love of two thousand year old Roman
Speaker 1: history and more about an interest in some slightly more
Speaker 1: recent history. Arminius has long been a symbol of German
Speaker 1: national identity and German nationalism. Two plays written in the
Speaker 1: nineteenth century dramatizing the events of the Battle of Tuderberg Forest, confusingly,
Speaker 1: both called the Hermannschlacht, were so wildly popular in Germany
Speaker 1: in the nineteen thirties and forties that it was shameful
Speaker 1: and scandalous to put them on stage for decades after
Speaker 1: the war. In January of nineteen thirty three, just weeks
Speaker 1: before Hitler was appointed Chancellor, a party official gave him
Speaker 1: a gift, an illustrated copy of The Hermannschlacht. Hitler not
Speaker 1: only loved the gift, but he responded, that's the idea
Speaker 1: a second Battle of Tudeberg Forest. That same week, Hitler
Speaker 1: gave a speech comparing himself to Arminius, and when the
Speaker 1: text of that speech was published at a Nazi Party newspaper.
Speaker 1: It was accompanied by a picture of a statue of
Speaker 1: Arminius surrounded by swastikas. Nazi Party election posters in nineteen
Speaker 1: thirty three feature this imagery prominently, along with slogans like
Speaker 1: Machtrei dos Hermannsland free Hermann's country. Hermann is the German
Speaker 1: variation of Arminius. I picked up a copy of Arminius
Speaker 1: the Liberator, Myth and Ideology, a book by Martin Winkler,
Speaker 1: a classics professor at George Mason University, to get a
Speaker 1: better idea of where Arminius lives in the nationalist imagination.
Speaker 1: It's four hundred pages long. I didn't have time to
Speaker 1: do more than skim it, admittedly, but it seems pretty
Speaker 1: clear the popularity of this story was at an all
Speaker 1: time high when it was rep purist in Nazi propaganda
Speaker 1: in nineteen thirties Germany. I found what I needed in
Speaker 1: the book, but as I was flipping to the back
Speaker 1: to see if the last chapter was a convenient summary,
Speaker 1: which is often the case in academic texts, I found
Speaker 1: something else.
Speaker 4: Entirely.
Speaker 1: The final chapter of Winkler's book is not a summary.
Speaker 1: It's called arminious and white supremacy, and it's about this.
Speaker 1: It's about this article by Merlin Miller. There's a picture
Speaker 1: of the front cover of this two thousand and nine
Speaker 1: issue of The Barnes Review. Winkler writes of Miller's article, quote,
Speaker 1: Miller explicitly but unconvincingly rejects propagandizing by means of falsehood,
Speaker 1: But he also implies that Miller himself doesn't seem to
Speaker 1: realize that he's building his own story on a foundation
Speaker 1: of propagandized false hoods. In comparing Miller's use of the
Speaker 1: story to that Nazi propaganda, Winkler writes, quote, the similarities
Speaker 1: are astonishing or rather predictable. The only difference is that
Speaker 1: Nazis saw Jews as the root of all their evils,
Speaker 1: while Miller is obsessed with non white and racially mixed globalism.
Speaker 1: To the Nazis, as to Miller, Arminius had laid the
Speaker 1: foundation of a superior West. Later generations, especially contemporary ones,
Speaker 1: have lost this heritage and become victims of decadence and
Speaker 1: domination by others. That spring two thousand and nine issue
Speaker 1: of The Barnes Review is dedicated almost entirely to Arminius.
Speaker 1: It's not just Merlin Miller's article. Immediately following Miller's piece
Speaker 1: is the one by Ingrid Zundel. In two thousand and nine,
Speaker 1: her husband, Ernst Zundel was still in a German prison.
Speaker 1: He'd been convicted of incitement of racial hatred, and she
Speaker 1: writes that during his imprisonment, she felt moved to rekindle
Speaker 1: the spiritual flame by reviving the story of Arminius, and
Speaker 1: her company, Soaring Eagles Studios, published a book about Arminius
Speaker 1: that had come out that year, and it wasn't just
Speaker 1: a book project. I didn't find an actual copy of
Speaker 1: this book, but I found one for sale on eBay,
Speaker 1: and I saw a picture of the cover, and the
Speaker 1: cover bears a picture of that Arminia statue, the same
Speaker 1: one featured in Nazi propaganda posters in nineteen thirty three.
Speaker 1: But across Arminius's chest there's text that reads soon to
Speaker 1: be a major motion picture. Ingrid Zundel wrote in that
Speaker 1: Barnes Review article that she'd been having intense meetings with
Speaker 1: Merlin Miller and they were collaborating on the film adaptation
Speaker 1: of the book. In December two thousand and nine, he
Speaker 1: even scouted locations. The pair hoped to film in Herman, Missouri,
Speaker 1: a small town settled by German immigrants and named after Arminius.
Speaker 1: Locals and Herman were horrified to learn that the independent
Speaker 1: filmmaker wandering around town was a member of the Council
Speaker 1: of Conservative Citizens, and the local newspaper printed a quote
Speaker 1: from Miller about his opposition to interracial marriage. They didn't
Speaker 1: really need to worry, though. The movie never got made.
Speaker 1: Americana Pictures never made any movies at all. Both of
Speaker 1: the projects he'd hoped to produce, False Flag and The
Speaker 1: Liberator were someone else's idea. They were someone else's obsession.
Speaker 1: He wasn't a subject matter expert on the USS liberty,
Speaker 1: he didn't have any meaningful connection to Arminius as a
Speaker 1: symbol of German nationalism. But he presented himself in these
Speaker 1: circles as someone who was going to break the system
Speaker 1: and make propaganda films for the white supremacist movement. And
Speaker 1: I think he really wanted to. He wanted to make movies.
Speaker 1: It had been his dream since childhood. It just never
Speaker 1: came together. But what I've been trying to get to
Speaker 1: all this time was his run for president. On January third,
Speaker 1: twenty twelve, he posted a candidate statement on Merlin Miller
Speaker 1: twenty twelve dot com. It's nothing special. He's fighting back
Speaker 1: against the new World Order and the global elites. He's
Speaker 1: very concerned about the ongoing demographic assault against traditional America,
Speaker 1: which is just a few extra words for white genocide.
Speaker 1: He's outraged that patriots are being silenced by political correctness,
Speaker 1: et cetera. At the bottom of the statement, he links
Speaker 1: to the party's website, but only after dropping a link
Speaker 1: to the site for Americana Pictures. A week later, the
Speaker 1: party's chairman, William Daniel Johnson, issued the party's official press relief.
Speaker 1: His language is more explicit, writing the American Third Position
Speaker 1: Party believes the time has come for a strong political
Speaker 1: party that explicitly advocates for the interests of white Americans.
Speaker 1: And posts started popping up on stormfront, but it wasn't
Speaker 1: really a hot topic. Most of the people posting enthusiastically
Speaker 1: about his candidacy on those stormfront threads are people I
Speaker 1: can identify as party members, like a thread from Harry Bertram,
Speaker 1: the party's frequent candidate in West Virginia, offering to pay
Speaker 1: Stormfront members a dollar per name if they'll go out
Speaker 1: and collect signatures for the campaign. In February of twenty twelve,
Speaker 1: a month into the campaign's existence online, the party filed
Speaker 1: paperwork with the Federal Election Commission, or at least they
Speaker 1: tried to. They filed a statement of organization for a
Speaker 1: committee called Merlin Miller for President twenty twelve, but they
Speaker 1: failed to fill out the part of the form where
Speaker 1: you say who the candidate is and on the page
Speaker 1: where you check a box to indicate whether the committee
Speaker 1: is a candidate committee or a party committee. They checked both.
Speaker 1: The FEC responded with aid request for additional information, and
Speaker 1: they tried again. It wasn't until April that they filed
Speaker 1: forms to register the party itself with the FEC, and
Speaker 1: they didn't actually file a statement of candidacy for Miller
Speaker 1: until July. It's a bit of a mess. Almost everything
Speaker 1: they've ever filed is quickly followed by a reply from
Speaker 1: the FEC that they've done it wrong and they only
Speaker 1: ever raised eighty seven hundred dollars. As the party is
Speaker 1: fumbling with the paperwork, behind the scenes, Merlin Miller is
Speaker 1: out there as the face of the party. The American
Speaker 1: third position party is running for president. In every campaign
Speaker 1: interview I listened to, he talks about himself a lot.
Speaker 1: That's normal for a candidate, right, I mean, who is
Speaker 1: this guy? Why should I vote for him? But someone
Speaker 1: should have sat him down and broken the news that
Speaker 1: making two independent films over a decade ago and being
Speaker 1: really mad about the Federal Reserve aren't enough. And it's
Speaker 1: just confusing that you keep rambling on about how you
Speaker 1: knew David Petraeus in college, but he does it every time.
Speaker 1: Most of these interviews are with friendly outlets, white nationalist
Speaker 1: fringe podcasts and conspiracy theorists who make Alex Jones look
Speaker 1: like a level headed and professional broadcaster, so he can
Speaker 1: regurgitate the talking points from the website without really getting cornered.
Speaker 1: For the most part, no one's asking him hard questions.
Speaker 1: But in one interview in February, someone does ask a
Speaker 1: question that I'd actually spend hours searching for an answer
Speaker 1: to on the party's website. Why third position?
Speaker 5: Tell us a little bit about the third position? You know,
Speaker 5: I think some people might be a little confused by
Speaker 5: that term. I know when I hear third position, I
Speaker 5: almost think third way or takes me back to the
Speaker 5: nineteen thirties or twenties or something. But I don't know.
Speaker 5: I mean, why did you choose that name? And what
Speaker 5: are you trying to evoke by calling yourself a third position?
Speaker 1: That's Richard Spencer. By twenty twelve, he was already the
Speaker 1: director of the National Policy Institute, and he was the
Speaker 1: editor of his Alternative Right dot com website, having coined
Speaker 1: the term alright a few years earlier, at least by
Speaker 1: his account, and for all the evil that man has
Speaker 1: visited upon this world and my hometown in particular, he's
Speaker 1: not stupid. I mean, he's not the brilliant philosopher he
Speaker 1: believes himself to be, don't get me wrong, But he's
Speaker 1: read some books. He is at least conversant in the
Speaker 1: political theory he's working with. This is a question with
Speaker 1: an actual answer, And Merlin Miller didn't know that.
Speaker 3: You know, actually the founding members of Bill Johnson William Johnson,
Speaker 3: an LA attorney, as the chairman of the American Third
Speaker 3: Position Party, and I believe it was a bill that
Speaker 3: came up with the name American Third Position, and a
Speaker 3: year and a half, two years ago, I actually recommended
Speaker 3: he used the Americana Party because I didn't actually understand
Speaker 3: his reasoning for the American third at that time. I've
Speaker 3: since grown not only accustomed to it, but I do
Speaker 3: like it because I see the Republican and the Democratic
Speaker 3: parties as really being two heads of the same monster.
Speaker 3: And we really don't have a voice party that represents
Speaker 3: the interests of the American people anymore.
Speaker 1: Oh, dear, no, No, that wasn't the end, Sir Richard
Speaker 1: Spencer was looking for. It wasn't the answer I was
Speaker 1: looking for. Third position isn't just some generic term for
Speaker 1: third party. It doesn't mean the party is offering itself
Speaker 1: up just generally is some kind of third option. He
Speaker 1: seems to think that third position just means not Republican,
Speaker 1: not Democrat, but a secret third thing. I guess, come
Speaker 1: to think of it, you know, in the spirit of
Speaker 1: the secret third thing meme kind of does the secret
Speaker 1: third thing? Here is fascism. Here's another member of the
Speaker 1: party offering his definition.
Speaker 4: Third positionism is not centrism. Third positionists understand the false
Speaker 4: dialectic that liberal capitalist regimes established to split the electorate
Speaker 4: and maintain their all holigarchic rule through fiscal power. This
Speaker 4: capitalist dialectic separates nationalism from socialism, ensuring that two positions
Speaker 4: are never united under one political party.
Speaker 1: Now, I think he probably thinks he sounds very clever here,
Speaker 1: but I'm not sure he actually comprehends the words he's using.
Speaker 1: But it is closer, He's a little closer. That's Nathan
Speaker 1: Dimigo speaking at the party's national convention earlier this year.
Speaker 1: And if you're familiar with Nathan Dimigo's name, you may
Speaker 1: remember him as the founder of Identity Europa, the neo
Speaker 1: Nazi organization that started popping up on college campuses and
Speaker 1: was marching here in Charlottesville in their white polo shirts
Speaker 1: in twenty seventeen. But he actually has a very long
Speaker 1: history with the American Third Position Party. But that's something
Speaker 1: we'll get to itother day. The problem that Nathan Dimigo
Speaker 1: and Merlin Miller and others in the party are running
Speaker 1: into when they try to define third positionism is that
Speaker 1: most people aren't using it sincerely. I mean, maybe they
Speaker 1: don't actually know what it means at all, like Merlin Miller,
Speaker 1: or they're just using it as a branding strategy because
Speaker 1: it sounds more intellectual and more rooted in history and
Speaker 1: tradition and less crude than saying I'm an ultra nationalist
Speaker 1: neo fascist. And you'll also see a lot of disingenuous
Speaker 1: descriptions of the third position as being a sort of
Speaker 1: ideological melding of both left wing and right wing ideas.
Speaker 1: It's not a left or right wing ideology. It combines
Speaker 1: a bit of both. Like Merlin Miller was saying, it's
Speaker 1: not aligned with either of the two traditional polls. It's
Speaker 1: not democrat or republican. It's neither left nor right. But
Speaker 1: that's a lie. It is. I'm sorry it is, and
Speaker 1: I think most people who say that know it. I'm
Speaker 1: no political theorist, but advocating for policies that benefit the
Speaker 1: working class, but only the white working class, because everyone
Speaker 1: else is dead, deported, disenfranchised, or enslaved. That's not a
Speaker 1: left wing policy idea. The anti capitalism and anti imperialism
Speaker 1: of a third positionist isn't inherently left wing. It's in
Speaker 1: service of nationalism. The socialism in national socialism wasn't sincere,
Speaker 1: and it wasn't for everyone. When these people say that
Speaker 1: they aren't left or right, they mean they're so far
Speaker 1: right you can't see them on the spectrum anymore. They're fascists.
Speaker 1: American fascists like Tom Metzger in the eighties and Matthew
Speaker 1: Heinbach in the twenty tens both pushed ideas that you
Speaker 1: could describe as third positionist, though I believe Heinbach specifically
Speaker 1: called himself a Strostrist, which I guess is technically a
Speaker 1: slightly separate thing. It's sometimes described as a precursor to
Speaker 1: third positionism, but they're used so interchangeably by guys who
Speaker 1: are trying to bring an air of intellectualism to their
Speaker 1: ethno state manifestos that honestly, I don't think it matters.
Speaker 1: Don't email me about it. At the nineteen eighty seven
Speaker 1: Aryan World Congress, Tom Metzger, the leader of White Arian Resistance,
Speaker 1: was talking about third positionism when he said this quote.
Speaker 1: War is dedicated to the white working people, the farmers,
Speaker 1: the white poor. This is a working class movement. Our
Speaker 1: problem is with monopoly capitalism. The Jews first went with
Speaker 1: capitalism and then created their Marxist game. You go for
Speaker 1: the throat of the capitalist. You must go for the
Speaker 1: throat of the corporates. You take the game away from
Speaker 1: the left. It's our game. We're not going to fight
Speaker 1: your whore wars anymore. We've got one war, and that's
Speaker 1: right here, the same war the essay fought in Germany,
Speaker 1: right here in the streets of America. There's plenty to
Speaker 1: be written on the actual historical origin of the term.
Speaker 1: In post war Europe. There are third positionist fascist nationalist
Speaker 1: groups in Italy, the UK, Germany, and France, and it's
Speaker 1: a little bit different everywhere you go. For the most part,
Speaker 1: it's branding. I think if you had to trace an
Speaker 1: ideological lineage, the American Third Position is most closely connected
Speaker 1: to the British fascist group International Third Position. That group
Speaker 1: was founded by Nick Griffin after he split with National Affront,
Speaker 1: though he eventually left Third Position two had joined the
Speaker 1: British National Party, but in the early days of the
Speaker 1: American Third Position Party, Nick Griffin was on their conference calls.
Speaker 1: When Merlin Miller was asked about the party's name again
Speaker 1: in an interview with Russian Tabloid a week before the election,
Speaker 1: he said they were thinking of changing it as soon
Speaker 1: as the election was over, and that did end up happening.
Speaker 1: They rebranded as the American Freedom Party just a few
Speaker 1: months later. All that to say, Merlin Miller is hardly
Speaker 1: some innocent rube who got tricked into joining a Nazi party.
Speaker 1: He knew what he was doing. He hung around with
Speaker 1: these people for years before he put his name on
Speaker 1: that paperwork. He's willing to say that he's a nationalist,
Speaker 1: and he openly advocates for all of the race based
Speaker 1: nationalist policies that would make someone a white nationalist, but
Speaker 1: he said that he doesn't care for the label because
Speaker 1: it has too much baggage. I'm not saying he doesn't
Speaker 1: know what he's advocating for. He does, but I do
Speaker 1: think that he did not know that third position was
Speaker 1: an actual political ideology and not just a fun name.
Speaker 1: I mean, he wanted to call the party the Americana Party,
Speaker 1: the same name he gave his pro white film company,
Speaker 1: and I think that tells us something too, that one
Speaker 1: little comment he thought the party should have the same
Speaker 1: name as his film company. He links to his film
Speaker 1: company website. On his official campaign materials, he mentions that
Speaker 1: he's looking for funding for his movie False Flag. In
Speaker 1: every interview. In September of twenty twelve, when he was
Speaker 1: in the home stretch of his presidential campaign, he spent
Speaker 1: a week in Tehran trying to pitch the movie to
Speaker 1: Iranian investors. In a segment on Iranian TV that week,
Speaker 1: he spent more time talking about the movie than the
Speaker 1: party he wanted to sell the movie. This was a
Speaker 1: convenient press junket. That's the vibe I get anyway. I
Speaker 1: don't know, n surprised he did not win. He only
Speaker 1: made it onto the ballot as the American third position
Speaker 1: party candidate in Colorado and New Jersey, but he appeared
Speaker 1: on ballots in Tennessee as an independent candidate. He also
Speaker 1: got a handful of write in votes in Maryland and
Speaker 1: New York. All told, Merlin Miller was the preferred presidential
Speaker 1: candidate of two thousand, seven hundred and one people. That's
Speaker 1: zero point zero percent of the vote. The FEC only
Speaker 1: calculates it to one decimal place. A month after the election,
Speaker 1: Merlin Miller was invited to speak to a student group
Speaker 1: at a university campus in Maryland. Matthew Heinbach was a
Speaker 1: senior at Towson University and he'd recently formed a white
Speaker 1: student union. It wasn't his first foreign into white nationalism,
Speaker 1: and I wish it had been his last. He was
Speaker 1: already a member of the American Third Position Party, and
Speaker 1: he would go on to and lead the Traditionalist Worker Party,
Speaker 1: perhaps following in this group's footsteps by actually registering his
Speaker 1: Nazi group with the Federal Election Commission. You can look
Speaker 1: at committee filings on the FEC's website to show that
Speaker 1: they expensed to the party the helmets that they wore
Speaker 1: to the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville. But again
Speaker 1: a story for another day. But after all this, Merlin
Speaker 1: Miller sort of drifted away from this now rebranded American
Speaker 1: Freedom Party. He appeared on an episode of the party's
Speaker 1: official podcast in May of twenty thirteen. When the party
Speaker 1: held a conference in July, I don't think he was there.
Speaker 1: His absence wasn't specifically noted, but I found video of
Speaker 1: quite a few of the speeches, and not only was
Speaker 1: he not one of them, but I was kind of
Speaker 1: surprised that the speeches didn't really talk about the campaign.
Speaker 1: Even a failed campaign is something to talk about, you know,
Speaker 1: A good leader would praise members of the organization for
Speaker 1: their hard work and a tough situation, talk about lessons
Speaker 1: learned and what they'll do differently next time. Appreciate the
Speaker 1: sacrifice made by your candidate something I don't know. It
Speaker 1: struck me as odd, but maybe I'm reading too much
Speaker 1: into it. By twenty fourteen, Merlin Miller had officially parted
Speaker 1: ways with the American Freedom Party. He formed his own party,
Speaker 1: calling it the American Eagle Party. There's no public animosity here.
Speaker 1: In a few speeches during this time period, Miller mentions
Speaker 1: in passing that he left his old party, which he
Speaker 1: doesn't usually name, because their focus was too narrow. In
Speaker 1: one video, American Freedom Party chairman William Johnson says pretty
Speaker 1: plainly that his party speaks explicitly, and Miller wanted to
Speaker 1: be more implicit about the same ideas. So it's not
Speaker 1: an ideological shift. He's just using a different communication style.
Speaker 1: But the American Eagle Party was not long for this world.
Speaker 1: It never ran a candidate, and the only money had
Speaker 1: ever raised came in the form of a couple of
Speaker 1: donations from friends. An overwhelming majority of the funds raised
Speaker 1: by the group in its less than two years of
Speaker 1: existence was from one man, an attorney in Baltimore named
Speaker 1: Glenn Keith Allen. In the summer of twenty sixteen, as
Speaker 1: he's involved in Miller's American Eagle Party and making donations.
Speaker 1: The Southern Poverty Law Center wrote an article about Glen Allen.
Speaker 1: He'd been in the movement for years, but he'd never
Speaker 1: been publicly identified before. The SBLC had obtained internal accounting
Speaker 1: records from the neo Nazi organization National Alliance, and those
Speaker 1: documents included receipts showing that Glenn Allen had been a
Speaker 1: dues pay member for years. At the time they published
Speaker 1: the article, Allen was working as an attorney for the
Speaker 1: Baltimore Police Department, a job he quickly lost. And this
Speaker 1: is actually when I first encountered Merlin Miller. It wasn't
Speaker 1: in the context of the American Third Position Party or
Speaker 1: the American Freedom Party or the American Eagle Party. I
Speaker 1: saw Merlin Miller's name for the first time years ago
Speaker 1: while I was putting together notes about Glenn Allen. Merlin
Speaker 1: Miller is on the board of directors at a nonprofit
Speaker 1: Allan founded in twenty eighteen with the stated purpose of
Speaker 1: providing legal assistance to victims of the thought Police. His words,
Speaker 1: not mine. As an attorney, Glenn Allen has bravely defended
Speaker 1: the free speech rights of clients like Warren Baylaw, the
Speaker 1: Nazi who tried to sue the City of Charlottesville for
Speaker 1: failing to roll out the red carpet for his Nazi rally,
Speaker 1: members of Patriot Front who were sued for defacing a
Speaker 1: mural of black Tennis legend Arthur Ashe members of the
Speaker 1: Goham Defense League, and he wrote amicus briefs for members
Speaker 1: of the Rise Above movement. His foundation has also been
Speaker 1: used to solicit donations for legal defense in cases they
Speaker 1: didn't officially take on, like the criminal prosecution of Patriot
Speaker 1: Front leader Thomas Rousseau here in Albmarole County, Virginia last year.
Speaker 1: Allan is currently representing Nathan Dimigo in his bankruptcy court
Speaker 1: battle to discharge the debt from a civil court judgment,
Speaker 1: a lawsuit filed against him as an organizer of the
Speaker 1: deadly Unite the Right rally. And I actually mentioned Glenn
Speaker 1: Allen briefly last week. He's co counsel on William Daniel
Speaker 1: Johnson's dried seaweed tariff case. I am on the edge
Speaker 1: of my seat waiting for a ruling on that one.
Speaker 1: Merlin Miller is to this day on the board of
Speaker 1: directors at Allen's Foundation, where his bio describes him as
Speaker 1: a filmmaker. He never did make any more movies, but
Speaker 1: according to his personal website, he still hopes to make
Speaker 1: False Flag of Reality someday. Merlin Miller ran for president
Speaker 1: on the ticket of a Nazi party in twenty twelve,
Speaker 1: but his heart was never really in it. I don't think.
Speaker 1: I think he just wanted to get on TV and
Speaker 1: talk about how the Jewish controlled media wouldn't let him
Speaker 1: make his movies. The American Freedom Party, though, they moved
Speaker 1: on too. When I started researching these episodes, all the
Speaker 1: articles about the group were old. It looked like they
Speaker 1: were more or less defunct, but I just wasn't looking
Speaker 1: in the right places. Admittedly, I wasted a lot of
Speaker 1: time this week reading about Arminius, so I didn't get
Speaker 1: as far into the story as I'd intended. But what
Speaker 1: I actually spent most of this week doing was listening
Speaker 1: to interviews with the new generation of the party's leadership.
Speaker 1: In March of this year, the American Freedom Party recommitted.
Speaker 1: They gathered at the castle in West Virginia owned by
Speaker 1: white nationalists publisher Peter Brimlaw and they're talking about making
Speaker 1: a real comeback.
Speaker 5: Weed.
Speaker 1: Little Guys is a production of Polso Media and iHeart Radio.
Speaker 1: It's researched, written and recorded by me, Molly Conger. Our
Speaker 1: executive producers are Sophie Litcherman and Robert Evans. The show
Speaker 1: is edited by the wildly talented Bory Gaigan. That theme
Speaker 1: music was composed by Brad Dickard. You can email me
Speaker 1: at Riddula Guys Podcast at gmail dot com. I would
Speaker 1: definitely read it by I probably won't answer, it's nothing personal.
Speaker 1: You can exchange conspiracy theories about the show with other
Speaker 1: listeners on the Red Lily Guy sub reddit. Just don't
Speaker 1: post anything that's gonna make you on my ru Little
Speaker 1: Guys h