Alt-right to release 'avalanche' of election campaign propaganda to help Fraser Anning

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Leaked messages have revealed the Australian alt-right's secret plan to use Queensland senator Fraser Anning to expand its extreme agenda in the Australian Parliament and beyond.

The texts, seen by Background Briefing, offer a rare insight into the strategy the movement intends to use to further its goals and spread its ideology.

Members of the group are seen discussing plans for confrontational racist stunts to be performed during the current federal election campaign.

The proposed stunts, designed to attract global attention and help Senator Anning get re-elected, include performing in "blackface and other taboos" and "burning the Koran".

Another stated goal is "obtaining and accessing a giant email and SMS database" in order to send messages that are "extremely right-wing".

Andrew Wilson, who has a long history with Australia's white nationalist movement, is one of the men identified in conversations.

In one message, Mr Wilson claims to be working for Senator Anning as an online content producer.

He also states he is recruiting members for his fledgling Conservative National Party, which Senator Anning denies.

The party is just the latest organisation to be targeted by a group of white nationalists with a long track record of covertly infiltrating politics and institutions to gain access to their platform and assets.

''A far-right political operative is born''

Located in the heart of progressive inner-city Sydney, the NSW Humanist Society was an unlikely target for a white supremacist takeover bid.

The organisation's ideals are based on the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. There is even a rainbow painted on the exterior of their community hall.

But in the mid-2000s a shadowy group called Klub Nation rented out the facility to host neo-Nazi forums.

One of the attendees had been in prison for killing his mother and throwing her body, weighted down with concrete blocks, into Canberra's Lake Burley Griffin.

Another man, a white supremacist who dreamed of bombing a shopping centre, was also there. He was later found guilty of weapons and child sex offences and remains in jail.

Mr Wilson went along to the forums, too.

In 2009, he and 30 other Klub Nation members signed up to the NSW Humanist Society and hijacked its annual general meeting.

One of the Society's founders, Fred Flatow, is convinced the group's members voted themselves onto the committee to access the organisation's assets, worth more than $500,000.

After a tip-off from the public, Mr Flatow discovered Klub Nation had been promoting the Society's meetings on Stormfront, a neo-Nazi forum.

The original members of the Society fought back by calling the police and eventually expelling Mr Wilson and his co-conspirators.

''Andrew Wilson aspired to local government''

Mr Wilson was undeterred.

In 2017, he entered the Mosman Park Council elections in Perth.

Mr Wilson, who was previously unknown to the community, soon attracted media attention for his unusual tactics.

He campaigned on a controversial platform of evicting all public housing tenants from the area.

Around the same time, a young candidate named Georgie Carey had become the target of online abuse.

Her comments about the older members of council being "male, pale, and stale" were posted on an alt-right website called Abhorrent Australian Memes.

Its users discussed ways to bombard Ms Carey with hateful messages by sharing her phone number on the bulletin board 4Chan.

Within 24 hours, she began receiving abusive calls from unknown numbers.

Her Facebook page was subjected to thousands of aggressive posts targeting her for being "anti-white" and discriminating against men.

At this stage, Mr Wilson was in a business relationship with Radomir Kobryn-Coletti, who would later become Senator Anning's media advisor.

Mr Kobryn-Coletti also scrutineered Mr Wilson's vote.

It is not clear who coordinated the campaign against Ms Carey but she was ultimately elected to council and Mr Wilson was not.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-04-18/fraser-annings-alt-right-staff-have-secret-plan-nazis/11025260

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''The Nazification of Clive Palmer''

Around the same time Mr Wilson was running for council, he and Mr Kobryn-Coletti were honing their skills in political messaging by producing online content for Clive Palmer.

When Mr Palmer was staging a return to federal politics in 2017, he employed Mr Kobryn-Coletti to create animated videos of his quotes set to music.

Mr Wilson was separately producing videos shared by Mr Palmer's official Facebook page.

But later that year something strange happened to the page.

A post depicting Mr Palmer in a Nazi uniform gassing a room full of his political opponents appeared.

Other users began competing with each other to share the most offensive Hitler-related memes.

The messages seen by Background Briefing show Mr Wilson boasted he was behind the anti-Semitic content.

A spokesperson for Mr Palmer's United Australia Party told the ABC they did not have any record of Mr Wilson working for their leader.

Mr Palmer does not endorse the images shared on his page, they said.

Mr Kobryn-Coletti's contract was not extended, the spokesperson added, because "his views were extreme".

''The New Guard''

Last June, a manifesto appeared in a closed Australian fascist Facebook group called The New Guard.

The manifesto laid out the group's plans for influencing mainstream politics and institutions.

Their tactics included creating propaganda, building wealth by opening businesses and amassing property, and helping to elect state and federal parliamentarians.

Members of The New Guard alternated between sharing white supremacist memes and plotting to infiltrate Australian politics.

Background Briefing gained access to the group before it was shut down and exposed an attempt to seize control of the NSW Young Nationals.

The party expelled 22 members as a result, banning them for life.

Background Briefing can now reveal Mr Wilson and Mr Kobryn-Coletti belonged to The New Guard.

So too did Zack Newton, an electoral officer for Senator Anning.

When contacted by the ABC, Mr Newton denied any involvement and subsequently deleted his Facebook account.

"If in fact my name appears in such a Facebook group, I can only assume it was added by someone else without my knowledge or permission," he said.

"I have never sought to join or work with any groups bearing that name or holding those views."

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-04-18/fraser-annings-alt-right-staff-have-secret-plan-nazis/11025260

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''Zack Newton 'shitposting' from Parliament''

Online, Mr Newton strikes a controversial tone.

Last October, on the same day a far-right terrorist stormed into a Pittsburgh synagogue and killed 11 people, Mr Newton posted a meme using the last words the shooter posted: "Screw your optics, I'm going in."

Another user accused Mr Newton of disrespecting the victims, suggesting he should have waited at least a day before distributing the meme.

Mr Newton replied: "Waiting a day and lose all edge factor? Not a chance."

When asked about the post, Mr Newton told Background Briefing it was a reference to a video game and to imply anything else was manifestly false.

In the last sitting week before the federal election was called, Mr Newton was reflecting on his increased access and influence since being hired by Senator Anning.

"Amusing to think I went from shitposting at home and now I'm shitposting in parliament, but here I am lmao," he wrote.

Mr Newton's arrival in Canberra has not gone unnoticed.

In parliamentary footage, Mr Newton is seen just behind Greens senators Larissa Waters and Mehreen Faruqi during a recent debate in the Senate chamber over whether to censure Senator Anning for his comments linking the Christchurch massacre to Muslim migration.

Soon after he left the chamber, a photo of the two senators appeared on an alt-right Facebook page called Abhorrent Australian Memes Did Nothing Wrong.

It appears the photo was taken exactly where Mr Newton had been sitting, although he maintains he has no knowledge of the image.

The office enforcing the rules of the Senate said the photo amounted to a potential breach of the rules.

"We will continue to make enquiries in relation to this issue and take action as appropriate," a spokesperson said.

If it is established that a member of Senator Anning's staff took the photo, Senator Waters said she hoped their parliamentary pass would be revoked.

"There are clear rules about photography on the floor of the chamber and it appears those rules have been blatantly breached with the aim of disseminating the photo on social media as another way to spread the alt-right's message of hatred and division which Fraser Anning is now well known for," she said.

''Fraser Anning has 'direct links' to alt-right''

Andy Fleming, who researches fascism, said the fact Mr Newton and Mr Kobryn-Coletti are employed by Senator Anning is proof of a concrete connection between his office and the alt-right.

"If I were Andrew Wilson or one of his comrades, I'd be delighted," he said.

"Those who are members of this movement look to Anning and they know he is their guy."

Mr Fleming said the alt-right has been looking for a political home for years and the movement can gain power through Senator Anning.

He said it was Senator Anning's controversial "final solution" maiden speech that put him on the radar of white supremacists in Australia.

Richard Howard, the man who reportedly wrote the speech, is accused of being fascinated with Nazi Germany.

He denies being the author and is currently on leave from the Federal Department of Home Affairs.

Regardless of who wrote the speech, a burgeoning alt-right media scene began spruiking Senator Anning online.

"I think it's a mutually beneficial arrangement," Mr Fleming said.

"The alt-right activists look to Anning for inspiration and for resources.

"Anning is seeking to establish a political base not only in Queensland but across the country."

Senator Anning's election to Parliament was an accident of history unlikely to be repeated.

Should he fail to retain his position in the upper house, Mr Fleming warns the alt-right will find another target.

"These individuals don't just disappear, they carry on and reappear somewhere else," he said.

"They look for moments and opportunities across the board and will utilize them in a collective fashion whenever they think they can essentially get away with it."

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-04-18/fraser-annings-alt-right-staff-have-secret-plan-nazis/11025260