Capping four years of explosive growth sparked by the election of America\u2019s first black president and anger over the economy, the number of conspiracy-minded antigovernment \u201cPatriot\u201d groups reached an all-time high of 1,360 in 2012, while the number of hard-core hate groups remained above 1,000. As President Obama enters his second term with an agenda of gun control and immigration reform, the rage on the right is likely to intensify.<\/p>\n
The furious reaction to the Obama administration\u2019s gun control proposals is reminiscent of the anger that greeted the passage of the 1993 Brady Bill and the 1994 ban on assault weapons supported by another relatively liberal Democrat \u2014 Bill Clinton. The passage of those bills, along with what was seen by the right as the federal government\u2019s violent suppression of political dissidents at Waco, Texas, and Ruby Ridge, Idaho, in the early 1990s, led to the first wave of the Patriot movement that burst into public consciousness with the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing. The number of Patriot groups in that era peaked in 1996 at 858, more than 500 groups fewer than the number active in 2012.<\/p>\n
For many, the election of America\u2019s first black president symbolizes the country\u2019s changing demographics, with the loss of its white majority predicted by 2043. (In 2011, for the first time, non-white births outnumbered the births of white children.) But the backlash to that trend predates Obama\u2019s presidency by many years. Between 2000 and 2010, the number of hate groups rose from 602 to more than 1,000, where the count remains today. Now that comprehensive immigration reform is poised to legitimize and potentially accelerate the country\u2019s demographic change, the backlash to that change may accelerate as well.<\/p>\n
While the number of hate groups remained essentially unchanged last year \u2014 going from 1,018 in 2011 to 1,007 in 2012 \u2014 the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) count of 1,360 Patriot groups in 2012 was up about 7% from the 1,274 active in 2011. And that was only the latest growth spurt in the Patriot movement, which generally believes that the federal government is conspiring to take Americans\u2019 guns and destroy their liberties as it paves the way for a global \u201cone-world government.\u201d From a mere 149 organizations in 2008, the number of Patriot groups shot up to 512 in 2009, jumped again to 824 in 2010, and then skyrocketed to 1,274 in 2011 before hitting their all-time high last year.<\/p>\n