UPDATE: (Oct. 25, 2023 3:07 p.m. ET): Mayoral candidate Gabrielle Hanson lost by a wide margin to incumbent Mayor Ken Moore, Tuesday night. Moore won 79.4% of the vote, compared to Hanson’s 20.6%.
About 20 miles south of Nashville, where earlier this year the nation watched the protracted drama surrounding Tennessee House Reps. Justin Jones and Justin J. Pearson, is the idyllic main street town of Franklin. Typically a town of genteel politics, the mayoral race there has turned sinister.
Gabrielle Hanson, a MAGA-linked conspiracy theorist running for mayor, showed up at an Oct. 2 candidate forum under the protection of white supremacists.
Town alderman Gabrielle Hanson, a MAGA-linked conspiracy theorist running for mayor, showed up at an Oct. 2 candidate forum under the protection of white supremacists. According to award-winning veteran Nashville reporter Phil Williams, of WTVF-TV, Hanson, who’s running an anti-LGBTQ campaign, and her husband, Tom Hanson, arrived at that forum with members of a group called the “Tennessee Active Club,” which the Southern Poverty Law Center has identified as a white power hate group. Other members of the group stood outside the building, as one man concealing his face told Williams: “Making sure everything goes well.”
Following an on-air report on the controversy by Williams, Franklin’s Board of Mayor and Aldermen denounced what had happened. According to The Tennessean, the board’s statement reads: “We, the Board of Mayor and Aldermen, are deeply concerned and disturbed by the events that unfolded at Monday night’s candidate forum for the upcoming city election.” It goes on to say: “Individuals identifying as neo-Nazi’s and self-admitted supporters of Gabrielle Hanson threatened both our citizens and members of the media during and after this important civic event.”
The Tennessean also noted that Hanson was the only member of the board whose name did not appear on that statement.
Hanson did respond in an Instagram post stating in part, “I did not hire the group that showed up at the debate the other night, nor did I ask them to participate as security for the event.” She also added, “Furthermore, I want to state categorically that I am not, nor have I ever been associated with any white supremacy or Nazi-affiliated group.”
The “Tennessee Active Club” also denied being hired by the candidate.
The Southern Poverty Law Center said that the network of so-called “Active” clubs are white power hate groups that “train in mixed martial arts to fight against what they perceive as an anti-white system” whose members believe “physical strength will position them to stand up to the forces they believe weaken America and European nations, including Islam, Judaism and racial diversity.”
The SPLC identifies Sean Kauffmann as the group’s leader. According to Phil Williams, a man among those supporting Hanson at Monday night’s forum introduced himself by that name.
Williams’ report notes that the watchdog group “Stop Antisemitism” has described Kauffman as “a disturbed neo-Nazi and Holocaust denier with a documented history of violence and a massive cache of firearms.” Video footage and reports from journalists indicate that the same Sean Kauffmann was recorded outside a drag protest in Cookeville, Tennessee, in January, giving a “Heil Hitler” greeting.
Hours after Hanson stated on social media that she has no association with any white supremacy or Nazi-affiliated group, she shared a post from the “Tennessee Active Club” accusing her opponent in the race of being linked with Antifa. The post also cryptically stated, “Remember, there is no political solution.”
White supremacist groups have a long history of political involvement in the American South formalizing with the Reconstruction era after the Civil War. In recent decades, their influence had diminished and been largely kept from public view. The arrival of Donald Trump changed all that. This right-wing, neo-Nazi resurgence in American politics culminated in 2017 when Trump infamously said that there were “very fine people on both sides“ of a deadly clash between demonstrators and tiki torch-bearing white supremacists in Charlottesville, Virginia.
Since that time, Trump-loving politicians and some government officials have repeatedly been linked — both subtly and overtly — with white supremacists. Hanson is merely the latest example. Republicans Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona were re-elected after speaking at an event organized by a white supremacist. In April 2021, Punchbowl News reported that far-right Republicans on Capitol Hill were considering the formation of an “America First Caucus” with the goal of proclaiming America to be a nation with a culture “strengthened by a common respect for uniquely Anglo-Saxon political traditions.” Republicans Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona were re-elected after speaking at an event organized by a white supremacist in February 2022. In July, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was forced to fire a campaign staffer who shared on social media a video that the staffer had secretly created featuring DeSantis’ face and a Nazi symbol. Now this right-wing rot has seeped all the way down to the picturesque streets of a Tennessee town, in the form of what Trump might describe as “very fine people” menacing citizens and the media in support of a MAGA-loving mayoral candidate. At the end of last month, Hanson’s colleagues on the Franklin board inexplicably failed to censure her for some of her past incendiary remarks. According to The Tennessean, one official said with tears in her eyes, “The voters should speak.” In races across the country, those in power seem to be hoping the voters will be the ones to keep candidates like Hanson out of office. The voters of Franklin, it seems, will be the last and only line of defense between the town mayor’s office and the kind of MAGA-loving candidate who makes a reporter ask the question, “Why would you have someone providing security who describes himself as a literal Nazi?”
Nick Ramsey
Nick Ramsey is a senior producer with MSNBC’s “The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell.” 
