Feb 12, 2020 - Politics & Policy

White supremacist propaganda in U.S. jumped 120% from 2018 to 2019

A marcher walking across the Brooklyn Bridge carrying a sign of "No to Anti-semitism or Racism Not Now, Not Here Nowhere Ever"

A marcher during New York City's No Hate No Fear Jewish Solidarity March on Jan. 1, 2020. Photo: Ira L. Black/Corbis/Getty Images

Incidents of white supremacist propaganda distributed across the U.S. jumped more than 120% from 2018 to 2019, the Anti-Defamation League found, per the AP.

The big picture: Oren Segal, director of the group's Center on Extremism told the AP that there has been greater use of more subtly biased rhetoric — including a focus on "patriotism" — "to make their hate more palatable for a 2020 audience."

  • 2019 is the second straight year to see the circulation of such propaganda material more than double.

The state of play: The group reported 2,713 cases of circulated propaganda from white supremacist groups in 2019 across 49 states. The circulation of the propaganda occurred most often in these 10 states:

  • California
  • Texas
  • New York
  • Massachusetts
  • New Jersey
  • Ohio
  • Virginia
  • Kentucky
  • Washington
  • Florida

Two-thirds of the propaganda was traced back to the group Patriot Front, which the ADL describes as "formed by disaffected members" of the white supremacist organization Vanguard America.

Go deeper: Hate crimes reach 16-year high according to FBI report

Go deeper