(Ken Silva, Headline USA) The New Yorker published an exposé on the white nationalist group Patriot Front on Sunday, rehashing the group’s history, as well as that of the larger American radical right-wing movement.
Much of the New Yorker’s story has already been reported by Headline USA and other outlets. But along with revealing that a Patriot Front member was involved in the harassment of a North Carolina journalist, the news outlet also reported new information about the group’s relationship with the FBI.
According to the New Yorker, the Patriot Front may have provided information to the FBI about a left-wing Antifa member who infiltrated and doxxed members of the group. That Antifa member posed as a Patriot Front recruit code-named Vincent Washington, but his real name, at least at birth, was David Alan Capito, Jr.
“The exposed Patriot Front members were furious at Vincent [after he doxed the group]. To strike back, they appear to have enlisted an unlikely ally: the F.B.I.,” the New Yorker reported.
“A former friend of his told me about receiving a phone call, in the spring of 2023, from an agent investigating whether Vincent was a dangerous left-wing extremist with access to ghost guns.”
The biggest revelation from the New Yorker's exposé on the Patriot Front, in my mind, is that the group provided information to the FBI about Antifa
This is the same excuse libertarian-turned-Nazi Chris Cantwell used when he was revealed to be an FBI informant… pic.twitter.com/YfKPPtDyN0— Ken Silva (@JD_Cashless) August 19, 2024
An FBI agent apparently calling about Vincent/Capito was the only information the New Yorker reported about the matter. Lawyers Glen Allen and Jason Lee Van Dyke—who both have represented Patriot Front members in court—didn’t immediately respond to messages seeking comment.
Cooperating with the FBI against Antifa has long been a divisive subject in the radical right.
In 2017, for example, neo-Nazi Andrew “weev” Auernheimer released private messages between him and Chris Cantwell, in which Cantwell admitted to talking to law enforcement.
Cantwell, who was booted from the Free State Project in New Hampshire for calling for violence against federal agents, insisted that he was only talking to law enforcement about Antifa. Nevertheless, Auernheimer deemed Cantwell’s actions “shitty scumbag behavior,” and his fellow Nazis began to attack Cantwell for talking to the feds.
Auernheimer’s disclosures prompted Cantwell to publish a March 24, 2018, article titled, I Am a Federal Informant, where he attempted to explain himself.
Tensions between Cantwell and other neo-Nazis ratcheted from there, and Cantwell was eventually charged with threatening to rape one of the neo-Nazi’s wives.
It turned out, the neo-Nazis were right to be suspicious of Cantwell talking to the feds. Another Nazi in prison accused Cantwell of being an informant, alleging in court documents that Cantwell approached him with an offer on behalf of the U.S. government: Get out of jail early in exchange for becoming an FBI informant-provocateur.
While admitting to informing on Antifa, Cantwell has denied the allegations that he’s snitched on his fellow Nazis. Those allegations are detailed here.
Meanwhile, Patriot Front members are suing Vincent/Capito for doxing them. According to the New Yorker, Capito has since changed his name yet again to Ryan Smith.
Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/jd_cashless.
