Why Law Enforcement Needs to Classify Far-right Groups as Gangs by Matthew Valasik and Shannon Reid | May 12, 2021
Photo of members of the Proud Boys group in DC by Geoff Livingston (Source: Flickr, CC).
On January 6, 2021, following former President Trump’s public ranting at the “Save America March” a collection of Trump supporters, intertwined with alt-right gangs (e.g., Proud Boys), anti-government “militias” (e.g., Oath Keepers), accelerationists (e.g., Boogaloo Bois), and Internet trolls (e.g., Groypers) stormed the U.S. Capitol Building in an attempt to prevent the 2020 election’s certification. The images reported were eerily reminiscent of the “Unite the Right” in Charlottesville, Virginia in 2017. While both events are now watershed moments in history, they also underscore the unevenness of law enforcement responses to far-right groups across jurisdictional levels: unequal at best and lacking at worst.