A far-right publishing home that publishes the works of historic and up to date fascists is internet hosting a “Coronation Ball” on the Watergate Resort in Washington, D.C., to have a good time Donald Trump’s second inauguration, that includes a visitor listing that’s a veritable who’s-who of MAGA influencers and so-called New Proper luminaries.
Passage Press will throw the confab within the Watergate Resort’s Moretti Ballroom on the night of Jan. 19, the evening earlier than Trump shall be inaugurated because the forty seventh president of the U.S., based on an occasions web page on the publishing home’s web site.
That the occasion’s title refers to Trump’s inauguration as a “coronation” — a phrase usually reserved for the crowning of kings and queens in monarchies — underscores the anti-democratic, authoritarian nature of the black-tie soiree.
“Celebrate the inauguration of Donald John Trump,” Passage Press tweeted Monday, the four-year anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol. “Be there as NRX is introduced to the MAGA brain trust. Be there as MAGA meets the Tech Right.”
“NRX” stands for “neoreactionary” and is used as a shorthand for “the Dark Enlightenment,” a far-right motion whose adherents are sometimes as specific of their distaste for democracy as they’re of their reverence for fascism and monarchism.
One among Passage Press’ greatest authors is Darkish Enlightenment figurehead Curtis Yarvin. The previous Silicon Valley programmer blogged for years underneath the pen identify “Mencius Moldbug” earlier than rising as a type of court docket thinker for reactionary tech billionaires and distinguished MAGA movers and shakers (together with Vice President-elect JD Vance).
Yarvin has advocated for a “national CEO, [or] what’s called a dictator” to be accountable for America. He’s scheduled to attend the Coronation Ball, based on a publish from Passage Press, as are Jack Posobiec, Mike Cernovich, Christopher Rufo, Steve Bannon, Anna Khachiyan and Dasha Nekrasova.
The publishing home later deleted its tweet itemizing the Coronation Ball’s “confirmed attendees.”
Motels, notably within the Washington space, have a historical past of canceling or refusing to host gatherings for white supremacists or different bigots.
Reached for remark about internet hosting a celebration whose organizers and distinguished attendees have espoused fascist views, the Watergate Resort — housed in the identical constructing the place former President Richard Nixon’s lackeys broke into the Democratic Nationwide Committee’s headquarters in 1972, precipitating Nixon’s resignation — despatched HuffPost the next assertion:
“The Watergate Hotel prides itself on being a luxury destination that reflects the values of inclusivity and respect. As a hotel with a long-standing reputation for excellence, we prioritize the safety, comfort, and dignity of our guests and our dedicated team of employees.”
What we learn about Passage Press comes largely from a exceptional Guardian exposé revealed by journalist Jason Wilson final yr. Within the piece, he unmasked the pinnacle of the corporate, a far-right influencer who glided by the identify “L0m3z,” as Jonathan Keeperman, a former English lecturer on the College of California, Irvine.
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As “L0m3z,” Keeperman accrued a following on X, the place he at present has 95,000 followers, partially by posting invective directed at anti-racist protesters, queer folks and journalists. He expressed help for Kyle Rittenhouse, the armed teenager who fatally shot two protesters in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in 2020, writing, “May a million Kyle Rittenhouses bloom.”
He additionally wrote the he was “coming around to the idea that the most powerful and effective political argument against the left in 2020 is probably simple as: shut up fag.”
And Keeperman as soon as appeared to advocate the mass execution of journalists. “The press are in fact the enemy,” he tweeted. “They are mewling midwit scum. Sniveling liars and desperate status junkies. My abiding contempt for them is only ever confirmed.” As Wilson reported, Keeperman additionally posted a listing of “policy proposals” that included the phrase “lamppost the journos” — an obvious name to kill reporters by hanging them.
Keeperman and Passage Press didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark about these statements, nor did they reply to questions in search of additional particulars in regards to the Coronation Ball.
Beneath Keeperman’s management, Passage Press has reprinted “out-of-print or public-domain books by historical fascist and reactionary writers,” Wilson wrote, together with works “by radical German nationalist and militarist Ernst Jünger; Peter Kemp, who fought as a volunteer in Francisco Franco’s army during the Spanish civil war; and two counter-revolutionary Russian aristocrats, White Russian general Pyotr Wrangel and Prince Serge Obolensky.”
Passage Press’ up to date authors embrace Steve Sailer, a blogger for the white supremacist web site VDARE. Sailer has written that Black folks “tend to possess poorer native judgment than members of better-educated groups” and “need stricter moral guidance from society.” Sailer’s guide for Passage Press, Noticing, is an anthology of his musings on, amongst different topics, “human biodiversity,” the popular white supremacist nomenclature for eugenics and so-called race science. (Former Fox Information host Tucker Carlson offered a fawning blurb for the guide, writing that “if the meritocracy were real, Steve Sailer would be one of the most famous writers in the world.”)
Passage Press additionally publishes {a magazine} known as Man’s World, which is edited and run by the pseudonymous misogynist “Raw Egg Nationalist.” Within the Fox Nation documentary “The End of Men,” hosted by Carlson, Uncooked Egg Nationalist argued that “globalists” had been manipulating meals provides to decrease testosterone ranges and emasculate males. Earlier than working with Passage Press, Uncooked Egg Nationalist revealed books with Antelope Hill, a neo-Nazi publishing home based mostly in Pennsylvania.
The Washington Publish by way of Getty Photographs
Keeperman has additionally fashioned relationships with main figures within the MAGA motion, together with Rufo, a fellow on the main conservative suppose tank the Manhattan Institute and shut ally of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. The Republican governor is identified for fanning the flames of concern surrounding “critical race theory” and “trans ideology,” which right-wing figures like Rufo declare are being taught in America’s colleges.
After Trump’s election victory in November, Rufo claimed he was set to fulfill with the president-elect at Mar-a-Lago to pitch him on coverage proposals.
Rufo is listed as an attendee of the Coronation Ball, based on a tweet from Passage Press, however didn’t instantly reply to a request to substantiate his attendance.
Rufo, Yarvin and Keeperman are sometimes thought of a part of the New Proper, a rebranding of acquainted counter-revolutionary and anti-democratic politics. It’s the identical ideology that animated the “alt-right,” the white supremacist motion that exploded into the general public consciousness for its shut relationship to the 2016 Trump marketing campaign, solely to break down within the wake of its lethal and disastrous “Unite The Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.
The Coronation Ball hearkens again to 2 alt-right gatherings in Washington D.C. celebrating Trump’s election win. In November 2016, the town hosted a convention held by the now-defunct Nationwide Coverage Institute, the fascist group helmed by suit-and-tie neo-Nazi Richard Spencer. Spencer completed his speech by declaring “Hail Victory!” — the English translation of the Nazi cry “Sieg Heil” — and “Hail Trump!” A viral video from the occasion captured Spencer’s supporters throwing up the stiff-armed Nazi salute in response.
There was additionally the Deploraball occasion in January 2017, on the eve of Trump’s first inauguration, attended by a slew of conspiracy theorists and bigots, together with the anti-Muslim activist Pamela Gellar; Gavin McInnes, the founding father of the violent fascist avenue gang the Proud Boys; white nationalist Lauren Southern; Jim Hoft, founding father of the misinformation-heavy information web site Gateway Pundit; Cernovich, a pundit and date rape denier; and Posobiec, a conspiracist with a protracted historical past of associating with extremists.
Cernovic and Posobiec are each scheduled to look at this month’s Coronation Ball, based on a tweet from Passage Press. Additionally they each confirmed that they’d attend in posts on X.
Posobiec’s path from PizzaGate influencer to fancy Watergate gala attendee is consultant of how Trump’s ascent in politics has catapulted a coterie of once-fringe media figures into highly effective positions in American politics.
He received his begin as a “Game of Thrones” blogger earlier than pivoting to selling a number of far-right conspiracy theories, all whereas growing intensive ties to white supremacists and publicly posting racist and antisemitic messages on-line.
Posobiec nonetheless grew to become a MAGA star and a distinguished pro-Trump propagandist, showing recurrently on Fox Information and on the Conservative Political Motion Convention, amongst different boards. Final yr he revealed the guide “Unhumans: The Secret History Of Communist Revolutions (And How To Crush Them),” wherein he argues that Individuals with left-of-center views are subhuman whereas praising the violent fascistic regimes of Franco in Spain and Augusto Pinochet in Chile. (Vance offered a blurb for the guide.)
“President Donald J. Trump is waiting in the wings,” Posobiec mentioned whereas selling ”Unhumans” on the Nationwide Conservatism Convention final yr. “And when he assumes office again, let me tell you, the globalists and their entire regime will be smashed to pieces and scattered to the winds.”
He then added: “We don’t negotiate with unhumans because that’s the stakes of this — humanity versus unhuman; populist nationalist versus atheistic Marxist; strength, beauty and genius versus weakness, ugliness and stupidity; civilization versus barbarism; crime and chaos versus law.”
Different anticipated company on the Coronation Ball, per Passage Press, embrace Joshua Lisec, a ghostwriter for right-wing influencers and a co-author with Posobiec of ”Unhumans.”
Steve Bannon is ready to attend, too, based on Passage Press. He cofounded Breitbart, which he known as the “platform for the alt-right,” earlier than operating Trump’s 2016 marketing campaign and later serving in Trump’s White Home. Bannon was just lately launched from jail after serving 4 months for refusing to adjust to a congressional subpoena from the committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 assault on the Capitol. He’s at present the host of the favored ”Conflict Room” podcast. Bannon didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark about whether or not he would attend the Coronation Ball, however his Conflict Room co-host, Natalie Winters, tweeted that she shall be on the occasion.
Two different well-liked podcasters, Khachiyan and Nekrasova, hosts of “Red Scare,” are additionally scheduled to attend the Coronation Ball, based on Passage Press. Khachiyan and Nekrasova began the podcast years in the past as a nominally left, socialist program, however finally emerged as apostles of the New Proper, cozying up to Yarvin and far-right tech billionaire Peter Thiel, together with the kind of conspiracy theorist they used to skewer — InfoWars’ Alex Jones. Neither Khachiyan or Nekrasova instantly responded to a request for remark.
Grimes, the well-known musician and ex-wife of Elon Musk — the world’s richest man and an in depth Trump ally, at present on a marketing campaign of embracing Europe’s most excessive right-wing and fascist political events — was listed by Passage Press as a “confirmed attendee,” however a consultant advised HuffPost she is not going to be in attendance.
Additionally listed as an attendee is Jeremy Carl, a fellow on the Claremont Institute, the influential MAGA suppose tank. Carl is the writer of the guide ”The Unprotected Class,” which ludicrously asserts that “anti-white racism is the most predominant and politically powerful form of racism in America today.” Carl didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.
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On Tuesday morning, Passage Press tweeted that the Coronation Ball was offered out. That tweet was deleted Tuesday afternoon, across the identical time the ticket value for the occasion on the Passage Press web site shot up from $250 to $875.
