A Michigan Neo-Nazi chapter is getting a big dose of diversity due to a Black activist infiltrating the group's leadership ranks.
Per NBC News, James Hart Stern became the president and director of the National Socialist Movement (NSM) in January, replacing former leader Jeff Schoep.
Stern plans to disband the organization from the inside. The new leader filed court documents to weaken the group's defense against a lawsuit connected to its involvement in the fatal 2017 "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. He requested a federal court in Virginia to rule against the NSM ahead of one lawsuit going to trial.
It's unclear how the native of Moreno Valley, California, got the position with a Detroit-based Neo-Nazi group, but Stern had been reportedly trying to access the NSM for two years.
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The licensed and ordained minister revealed he shared a prison cell with Ku Klux Klan (KKK) Imperial Wizard Edgar Ray Killen, who is responsible for the "Mississippi Burning" killings. Stern was sentenced to five years in prison for wire fraud.
The reverend claims their relationship helped Killen change his beliefs. He also reported the former KKK leader gave him power-of-attorney of his estate, including a 40-acre plot. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), Stern dissolved the KKK chapter in Mississippi where Killen was once a member.
The Independent reported although a federal magistrate judge in Charlottesville ruled Stern cannot represent the group since he is not a licensed attorney, he still filed a request for summary judgment.
“It is the decision of the National Socialist Movement to plead liable to all causes of actions listed in the complaint against it,” he wrote in the request.
Stern's new leadership position is being compared to that of Ron Stallworth's, the African American police officer depicted in the Oscar-winning Spike Lee movie BlacKkKlansman for his work infiltrating the Ku Klux Klan.
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