A Premier Financier Of The Alt-Right Descends From A Chicago Textile Magnate
By Stephen Gossett in News on Jul 27, 2017 9:33PM
An alt-right supporter demonstrates in Saint Paul, Minnesota / Wikipedia
For some Chicagoans, the Regnery surname might ring a bell—perhaps an alarm bell. The late William H. Regnery, Sr. built a fortune in the Chicago textile industry, but he made a more infamous mark as one of the founders of the America First Committee, the locally headquartered organization committed to keeping U.S. forces from fighting Nazi Germany (and whose name was notably echoed in one of President Donald Trump's slogans). Now seven decades later, Regnery's grandson, William H. Regnery II, has emerged as one of the chief financier's of the "alt-right" movement he helped foment.
The fact that Regnery—who advocates for a white-only "ethnostate"—proffers racist views and has supports the growth of white nationalism isn't a revelation. Regnery founded the notoriously secretive Charles Martel Society—named after a Frankish military leader who battled invading Muslims in Western Europe—which he dubbed the "home of Western Nationalism," according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. And he founded the white-supremacist think tank National Policy Institute in 2005.
The NPI's prominence of course skyrocketed last year alongside that of Richard Spencer, the fashy-sporting poster child of the alt-right. (Spencer and Regnery speak at least weekly, according to Mother Jones. "I don’t think I would do a big thing without consulting him," Spencer told the magazine.) Regnery's press aversion runs completely opposite of Spencer's limelight-courting, but a recent Buzzfeed investigation shines a light on just how much financial influence Regnery, who has since relocated to Boca Raton from Illinois, hold: the old-money investor shelled out more than $550,000 to the alt-right groups between 2001 and 2015.
The figure underscores how, even as the alt-right heyday flourished in the anonymous, organic corners of Reddit and 8chan's /pol/ trolldom, there was a huge cash investment being poured into the ideology as well.
You can read Buzzfeed's profile, which amazingly includes on-the-record quotes from the publicity-shy Regnery here.