by a VA-07 voter
Virginia’s 7th District Rep. Dave Brat (R) has been outed as an extremist – not by his opponent, but by his friends.
Brat and four of the most extreme white nationalists, racists and conspiracy theorists in American politics are the only 2018 candidates supported by the U.S. Immigration Reform PAC. The USIR PAC was founded by individuals (e.g., “white nationalist John Tanton”) with views so extreme that organizations they lead have been designated “hate groups” by the Southern Poverty Law Center (the SPLC).
In addition to Brat, the USIR PAC supports Iowa Congressman Steve King, who recently was publicly dumped by the National Republican Congressional Committee, fellow members of Congress and major corporate contributors due to his “white supremacy and hate.” Other 2018 Republicans who receive contributions from the USIR PAC include candidates who claimed Democrats are waging a “war on whites”; one who runs another SPLC designated hate group; and a candidate who had to apologize recently for a swastika that appeared in one of his TV ads.
The U.S. Immigration Reform PAC was founded by John Tanton, one of the leaders of the fringe anti-immigration movement for the last three decades. Tanton is a founder of the Social Contract Press, an organization that has been designated a hate group by the SPLC for “routinely publish[ing] race-baiting articles penned by white nationalists.”
Given all that, to paraphrase Florida’s Andrew Gillum, “I’m not calling Dave Brat is an Extremist. Extremists are calling Dave Brat an Extremist.”
BRAT AND OTHER EXTREMIST CANDIDATES FUNDED BY USIR PAC
In addition to Brat, the five candidates supported by the USIR PAC include (as noted above) Steve King, the far-right Iowa Congressman who has lost the support of the National Republican Congressional Committee and has been widely criticized by some Republicans because of his support for white supremacists and other far-right causes.
Corporations like the pet food company Purina, Chip maker Intel and dairy company Land O’ Lakes have withdrawn their support over King’s incendiary racial remarks. King recently tweeted an endorsement of Faith Goldy, a white supremacist running for mayor of Toronto described as a “white genocide” conspiracy theorist. King was also fired from a Canadian far-right website for appearing on a neo-Nazi podcast.
Along with Brat and King, the other three candidates supported by the PAC have been in the news this year for their extremist beliefs.
- Lou Barletta – (Candidate for Senate in Pennsylvania) – who is currently on the board of the a group labeled a “hate group” by the Southern Poverty Law Center
- Mo Brooks – (AL-06) who called American policy a “war on whites”
- John James – (Candidate for Senate in Michigan) who had to apologize after a swastika appeared in background of a TV ad and suggested he might be guilty under the #metoo movement because he was breast fed.
THE U.S. IMMIGRATION REFORM PAC
According to CNN and the ADL, John Tanton “has openly embraced eugenics, the science of improving the genetic quality of the human population by encouraging selective breeding and at times, advocating for the sterilization of genetically undesirable groups.”
The New York Times said of Tanton: “Rarely has one person done so much to structure a major cause or done it so far from the public eye. Dr. Tanton has raised millions of dollars, groomed protegees and bequeathed institutions.
Other contributors to the PAC include past and current directors of both the Social Contract press and other organizations designated as hate Groups by the SPLC.
K.C. and Louise McAlpin, two of the contributors to the PAC, also made individual contributions to Dave Brat’s campaign in 2018.
THE CONNECTION TO BRAT
While neither Brat nor Tanton are talking about their connection, it may be related to Brat’s belief that the economic success of Protestant-led countries is related to their religious beliefs.
Brat believes that Protestant religious beliefs are a key to the success of economies. In his 2004 paper “Economic Growth and Institutions: The Rise and Fall of the Protestant Ethic?”, Brat stated, “the religion variable may be the strongest ex ante, exogenous [i.e., external and unaffected by other factors] institutional variable in the literature.” The theory has been largely debunked by economists, but it is consistent with some of the radical anti-immigration and population control beliefs of the founders of the U.S. Immigration Reform PAC and the candidates it supports.
Tanton and others in the USIR PAC believe that controlling immigration, and even the genetics, of a country is key to a country’s culture. According to the NY Times, Tanton warned a friend that “for European-American society and culture to persist requires a European-American majority, and a clear one at that.”
Brat chaired the economics department at Randolph-Macon College, and has an extensive curriculum vitae documenting two decades of academic research. But none of that research has appeared in any mainstream economic journals that reach a national audience, and little if any of his published work is peer-reviewed. Brat’s also a plagiarizer, a fact that he clearly doesn’t want to answer for, given his panicked flight from a college student the other day who asked him about it.
No matter how you look at it – extremist, plagiarizer, believer in debunked economic theories – one thing’s for sure: Dave Brat absolutely should not be representing Virginia’s 7th district in Congress. On Tuesday, if you are a VA-07 voter, make sure you cast your ballot instead for Abigail Spanberger, someone who will make us all proud – not ashamed, like Brat does.
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