HispanicVista Columnists

Centennial, CO - Bill Winter, candidate for U.S. Congress, today called on Rep. Tom Tancredo to sever his long-standing ties to racists and white supremacist organizations. Winter is calling for Tancredo to return all of the donations he has received from a litany of well-known leaders in the White Power movement, to repudiate hate groups with whom he has associated, and to publicly denounce their support. Winter also challenged Tancredo to make a public pledge to never again accept donations or appear with groups or individuals that have known racist ties and to denounce the objectives and message of these organizations.

Winter has sent a request to the Congressional Ethics Committee requesting a review of Tancredo’s ties to organizations whose stated goals are in opposition to the Constitution of the United States and whether he has abused his influence to promote members of these groups.

“It is unfortunate that during his time in office, Representative Tancredo has consistently ignored the needs of his district and has chosen instead to foster relationships with people who hold values so contrary to those of the Constitution and his constituents” remarked Winter.

Since coming into office, Tancredo has been traveling around the country soliciting donations from known racists and rallying the attendees at hate group gatherings. During his tenure in office, Tancredo has accepted significant donations from a varied group of individuals and organizations with white supremacist ties.

Winter Campaign Manager Berrick Abramson commented, “Tancredo says that he cannot control who attends his rallies, but he can control from whom he accepts invitations and donations”, Abramson continued, “Tancredo would like for us to think that these ties do not reflect on him or his legislative choices, but as the saying goes, ‘He who pays the piper gets to call the tune.’”

One of Tancredo’s largest donors has been John Tanton of Petoskey, Michigan. In the past seven years, Tancredo and his PAC (Team America PAC) have received $22,000 from Tanton and his US Immigration Reform PAC. Tanton has founded or funded 13 anti-immigration groups, three of which are classified as hate groups. His ubiquitous presence in the hate community has earned him the nickname of “The Puppeteer”. One of these groups is the Foundation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), whose Tennessee conference Tancredo addressed in 2002. FAIR has received over $1.2 million dollars from the pro-eugenics Pioneer Fund.

The Pioneer Fund was started in 1937 by a consortium of doctors and businessmen seeking to continue the eugenics research begun by Nazi doctors. The stated goal of the Pioneer Fund is to encourage “racial betterment” and aid people “primarily descended from white persons.”

In a 1986 memo, Tanton outlined his strategy to “infiltrate the Judiciary Committee” and “secure appointments for our friends.” Two staff members from Tanton’s NumbersUSA, Rosemary Jenks and Linda Purdue, have boasted that they operate out of Tancredo’s office and identify themselves as “virtual staffers” for the Congressman. Another rising figure from the FAIR organization is Cordia Strom, who was once FAIR's legal director and is now counsel to the director and coordinator of congressional affairs for the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

“If what these women claimed is true, this is abuse of power of the highest degree and cries out for investigation by the Ethics Committee,” said Abramson, continuing that, “If Mr. Tancredo has in fact been complicit in furthering Tanton’s agenda of infiltrating offices of our government with his agents, intent on pushing his racist agenda and rolling back a half century of progress to pursue the ambitions of the Pioneer Fund and going back to one of the darkest chapters of modern history, then this is more than a gross betrayal of the voters of Colorado who elected him, this is a betrayal of everything that America stands for.”

Another group with which Tancredo has strong ties is the Council of Concerned Citizens (CCC), whose website has referred to African-Americans as “a retrograde species of humanity”. One of the CCC’s most visible members is Barbara Coe of Huntington Beach, California, who has hosted a fundraiser for Tancredo and made contributions to his campaigns. Coe is the founder and head of the California Coalition of Immigration Reform (CCIR) and was recently quoted as saying “We are suffering robbery, rape and murder of law-abiding citizens at the hands of illegal barbarians... who are cutting off heads and appendages of blind, white, disabled gringos”. Coe and Tancredo have appeared together at numerous events and even embraced after the CCIR issued an award to Tancredo for his anti-immigration efforts.

At one event, Tancredo was listed as the “Honored Guest” for a fundraiser hosted by CCIR and Save our State (SOS). In the “About us” section of its website, SOS states that “Years of inculcation by the doctrines of political correctness have left you emasculated and impotent, silenced by the thunderous chants of "racist" and "bigot." And there you stand and watch, paralyzed by fear, as your community is ravaged by the illegal alien invasion and turned into a Third World cesspool.”

In past interviews about Tancredo’s ties to racist organizations and white supremacists, Tancredo’s press secretary has acknowledged that the Congressman has attended events organized by Barbara Coe’s groups, but insisted that they were not fundraisers, assertions that Winter dismisses as “a blatant misrepresentation of the truth, given that Ms. Coe publicly advertised her gathering as ‘a fund-raising event to Keep Tom in Congress!’”

Following Tancredo’s recent appearance with the League of the South, Tancredo was seen carrying the CCC publication “Citizens Informer,” which published the opinion that minorities were turning the United States into “slimy brown mass of glop”. One of the Editorial Board members of the Citizen’s Informer is Virginia Abernathy, who is regularly quoted by Tancredo as an “expert” on immigration reform. Abernathy rejects the title of “White Supremacist”, preferring instead to call herself a “White Separationist” who “prefers to be with my own kind.” Abernathy is on the editorial board of The Occidental Quarterly, a publication that the New Community has described as a “racist and anti-Semitic “scholarly” journal.” The journal’s statement of principles assert that “Immigration should be restricted to selected people of European ancestry.”

Another Tancredo supporter is Glenn Spencer, founder of the Tanton-funded American Border Patrol and Voices of Citizens Together, which is also listed as a hate group. Tancredo’s Immigration Reform Caucus has in the past prominently displayed a link to the American Border Patrol website. On his website, Spencer has declared that “The United States has as its founders people who came here for intellectual reasons, freedom of religion. Mexico was founded by a group of people who came to plunder…” and “The Mexican culture is based on deceit. Chicanos and Mexicanos lie as a means of survival.” Spencer was a keynote speaker at American Renaissance Magazine’s 2002 conference, which was also attended by members of Stormfront, the KKK, and the Neo-Nazi group National Alliance. One of the more colorful characters in the pantheon of Tancredo supporters, in 2002 Spencer pled guilty to a class 6 felony after he went on a shooting rampage in his residential neighborhood, which ended when he struck a home with a young child inside. Spencer claimed that Mexicans were coming to attack him.

Tancredo’s spokesperson has said that no one can be held responsible for a few “bad apples,” and that Tancredo was not aware of the radical positions taken and statements made by Coe and Spencer. Public records however show ongoing ties, appearances with and donations accepted by Tancredo from these alleged “bad apples” before and after Tancredo’s office made those statements.

Abramson concluded, “For too long, Tancredo has been publicly distancing himself from these shameful associations and claiming ignorance of their motives while privately accepting and encouraging their support. But as the depth of this network of hate becomes evident, it is no longer acceptable to dismiss it, as the Congressman’s spokesman would have us believe, as ‘a few bad apples.’”

Additional information and full documentation will be available at www.winterforcongress.com.

U.S. Marine and Navy veteran Bill Winter is a practicing attorney in Castle Rock, where he previously taught and coached in the public schools. A former staffer for U.S. Senator John McCain, Winter grew up in Colorado and attended Littleton High School and the University of Colorado. More information about Bill Winter, his position on the issues and race against Tom Tancredo is available at www.winterforcongress.com