School Shooter ‘Trained’ With Florida White Supremacist Group
The flag of the Republic of Florida, a white supremacist group that “trained” alleged school shooter Nikolas Cruz. Image by ADL
By Helen Chernikoff February 15, 2018
The alleged perpetrator of the most recent American mass shooting, which took place on Wednesday at a Florida high school, was a participant in a white supremacist group, reported the Anti-Defamation League.
A spokesman for the group Republic of Florida told the ADL that Nikolas Cruz, 19, had participated in training exercises conducted by the group Republic of Florida, which seeks to create a “white ethnostate” in Florida, according to the ADL.
Cruz has been charged with the shooting spree that killed 17 people and injured 14 at Majory Stoneman Douglas High School in Fort Lauderdale.
The Republic of Florida describes itself as a “white civil rights organization fighting for white identitarian politics,” and is a few years old, the ADL said.
The alleged murderer of a Jewish college student, Blaze Bernstein, in California had ties to Atomwaffen Division, a growing American Nazi organization that researchers call the most potentially violent neo-Nazi group operating in the country.
In December, a young white supremacist named William Atchison killed two students at a high school in New Mexico before killing himself, the ADL said.
Contact Helen Chernikoff at [email protected]
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
