|
| “ | Jews will not replace us! | „ |
| ~ Cantwell at the Unite the Right rally. |
Christopher Charles Cantwell is an American Neo-Nazi associated with the Alt-Right. He is best known for his appearance at the Unite the Right rally held by Jason Kessler in 2017, and the subsequent manhunt. He has also garnered criticism from other Alt-Right members for being a government informant, although he claims he only did this to get back at the notorious Left-wing terror group Antifa.
Background
Cantwell was born on November 21, 1980, and grew up in New York. His father was an air traffic controller and his mother a homemaker.
Views
Cantwell is considered a major figure within the Alt-Right, and has described himself as both a fascist and a libertarian. Both the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League consider Cantwell to be a white nationalist.
Cantwell is also known for his militantly anti-police views.
Though Cantwell was initially a supporter of Donald Trump, he later rescinded his support for Trump, claiming that Trump "wasn't racist enough" and not liking the fact that his daughter, Ivanka, was married to Jared Kushner, a Jew.
Unite the Right Rally and aftermath
During the rally, Cantwell was filmed shouting "Jews will not replace us!" with a crowd of other White Supremacists. He also began ranting about how the Alt-Right are not nonviolent, and threatened to kill several protestors. He also allegedly pepper-sprayed several counter-protestors. Following the rally, a warrant was put out for Cantwell's arrest due to his actions during the rally. On his podcast Radical Agenda, Cantwell published a video of him talking about the warrant during which he struggled to hold back tears, resulting in widespread mockery of Cantwell and earning him the nickname "The Crying Nazi".
Cantwell turned himself in on the 24th of August, and was indicted on counts of unlawful bodily injury, assault and battery, malicious injury with a caustic substance and public intoxication. He pleaded guilty to public intoxication, and received a fine of $116. The charges of unlawful bodily and malicious injury with a caustic substance were later dropped on the grounds that so many people at the rally had pepper spray it was impossible to tell if Cantwell was responsible. He later pleaded guilty to assault and battery, and served seven months in jail. He was also banned from entering the State of Virginia for five years.
Cantwell has also been convicted of drunk driving, illegal possession of a weapon and possession of stolen property, and is currently in a feud with Andrew Auernheimer, alleged webmaster of the Alt-Right website The Daily Stormer.
Cantwell writes essays on his personal blog about topics including white supremacy, alt-right politics, libertarianism, and the men's rights movement. He has written for and republished essays about the men's rights movement to A Voice for Men, a men's rights and antifeminist website. In 2013 and 2014, he wrote and republished his anti-police essays as a volunteer for Cop Block, a police accountability organization.
Cantwell co-hosted the anarcho-capitalist radio show Free Talk Live but was suspended in 2015 after tweeting a racial slur against an African American person who criticized him. He later was removed from the position permanently. Meanwhile, in December 2013, Cantwell began what he called Some Garbage Podcast, disseminated through YouTube and elsewhere, and in April 2015 renamed it Radical Agenda, subtitled "a show about common sense extremism".