George Hawley, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Alabama and author of the recent book “Making Sense of the Alt-Right,” said that in his view the funding issue has always made the TWP’s community outreach plan seem “implausible.”
“In theory, the idea of gaining social support by providing useful services makes sense. That requires resources, however,” he said, noting that groups like Hezbollah and the Irish Republican Army, both of which Heimbach sites as influences for the TWP, “enjoyed significant financial assistance from the outside.”
“Perhaps Heimbach and his colleagues have some deep-pocketed sponsors that we don’t know about,” Hawley offered. “But it looks to me like a shoestring operation, and their members don’t appear to be doing any better financially than the people they would seek to assist.”
According to the FEC, 100 percent of donations to the TWP’s National Committee during the 2016 election cycle came from individuals, with the majority of “large” donors spending between $200 to $400 at a time (the maximum annual amount an individual can donate to a national party is $30,800). The party’s biggest single donation, a whopping $979, came from William Johnson, the head of the white nationalist American Freedom Party, who was selected by the Trump campaign to serve as one of its California delegates during the Republican presidential primaries. Johnson was ultimately removed from Trump’s list of California delegates after his white supremacist views were highlighted in the press, with the campaign blaming his acceptance on a “database error.”
Hawley went on to explain that, in terms of financing the broader white nationalist movement, the “TWP’s situation is not unique.”
“There are some wealthy people that support radical right causes that we know of, but they are few in number, and their contributions seem comparatively small,” he said. “There is no alt-right equivalent to the Koch brothers, so these groups are always strapped for cash.”
“We are not going to see a major alt-right think tank break ground in the Beltway anytime soon,” he continued. “Nor will the alt-right enjoy well-funded and well-organized grassroots groups equivalent to the conservative tea party.”
…Either that, or he’s painted himself so far into a corner that he simply can’t back out now. Regardless, Heimbach is hardly the only one whose participation in this movement has come at a cost. At its core, the TWP is centered on the claim that American society has deprived young white people, men in particular, of the right to community and economic opportunity. But for an overwhelming majority of the group’s members I’ve talked to, it’s their affiliation with white nationalism, more than anything, that has resulted in alienation by family, friends and even employers.
As Hovater, who lost his job as a restaurant cook after the Times article, told me, “At some point you become unemployable in the movement.”
