Neo-Nazis and anti-immigration extremists responded to a highly publicized wave of immigration reform demonstrations in major U.S. cities with open calls for terrorist violence, including truck bombs, machine gun attacks, and assassinations of U.S. senators and members of Congress.
"All of you who think there's a peaceful solution to these invaders are wrong. We're going to have to start killing these people," neo-Nazi radio host Hal Turner posted to his website the day after 500,000 immigrant rights activists marched through downtown Los Angeles.
"I advocate using extreme violence against illegal aliens. Clean your guns. Have plenty of ammunition. Find out where the largest gathering of illegal aliens will be near you. Go to the area well in advance, scope out several places to position yourself and then do what has to be done."
Turner linked the post to a website titled "Ka-Fucking-Boom!" that provides detailed instructions on constructing pipe bombs, ammonium nitrate "fertilizer bombs," car bombs, chlorine gas bombs, and dozens of other homemade explosive devices.
"We are headed for civil war, folks. Are you ready?" wrote a neo-Nazi using the pseudonym "Mr. 88" (88 is movement shorthand for "Heil Hitler") in a post on the white supremacist website Stormfront. "We have to start killing in massive numbers so that the savages of the world have fear of the almighty white man again! Killing is the only way to cure these ills!"
Elected officials were also targeted for death after a U.S. Senate panel backed President Bush's guest worker plan on March 27, the Monday following a weekend of pro-immigrant street demonstrations including 20,000 people in Phoenix, 50,000 in Denver, and 50,000 in Detroit.
Hal Turner promoted a survey on his website that asked, "What method of 'communication' would be best understood by members of the United States House of Representatives and The United States Senate so they know not to give ILLEGAL ALIENS Amnesty?"
The response options included, "Pull a fire alarm in the U.S. Capitol and Machine gun them to death as they evacuate?" (earning 22 percent of more than 1,000 votes, according to Turner); "Fire Bomb their District Offices as a warning; then their private homes if they go ahead with the plan?" (31 percent); and "Park several Timothy McVeigh type truck bombs next to the House and Senate Office Buildings and Detonate them?" (13 percent).
Members of the California-based, anti-immigration hate group Save Our State added their voices to the bloodthirsty chorus. "I see people with vans driving by, gunning them down on street corners, and leaving them to feed the buzzards and worms," wrote Save Our State activist "Cazamigrante" ("Migrant hunter"). Another Save Our State member posted, "Just a friendly reminder: There is no Brady Bill on bow and arrow. There is also no report or muzzle flash to give away position."
Jim Gilchrist, co-founder of the "citizens border patrol" Minuteman Project, stopped just short of calling for his followers to pick up their guns.
"I'm not going to promote insurrection, but if it happens, it will be on the conscience of the members of Congress who are doing this," he told the Orange County Register ."I will not promote violence in resolving this, but I will not stop others who might pursue that."
The same day the Senate panel voted, more than 40,000 Los Angeles high school students walked out of classes to protest a bill in Congress that would make it a felony to be in the country illegally (it's now a federal infraction). After several hundred of the students blocked a freeway, anti-immigration hardliners posting to the "Close Borders" Yahoo user group advocated killing the young protesters by running them over with cars. "If I was on that freeway, there would be some flattened kids," wrote "GoHomeIllegals."
Another Close Borders user wrote, "When violent responses occur, the amount of support they receive will amaze you. Furthermore, when people see how utterly unable to stop them the government is, it will incite further acts, and so, until it snowballs into a full-scale shooting war. Picture every major city within 500 miles of Mexico turned into Beirut in 1983. All that's missing is the spark, and it won't be long in coming."
Extremists of many stripes interpreted the widely broadcast images of hundreds of thousands of mostly Latino demonstrators marching in the streets as unmistakable evidence that a long-awaited race war had finally begun.
"The bad news is many whites will die," wrote one neo-Nazi on Vanguard News Network. "It is imperative that you make proper connections NOW and form networks of like minded armed whites to defend yourselves... It will be grand. More exciting then the Zombie flicks. If you have a good defense line and lots of ammo the carnage will be orgasmic."
Original: Racist extremists advocate "killing" Mexicans