The Daily Beast Podcast - The Scariest Part of the Proud Boys Isn’t The Violence

Episode Date: October 2, 2022

HuffPost reporter Andy Campbell and author of the brand new book on the group called We Are Proud Boys joins New Abnormal host Andy Levy for a riveting interview about what the far-right group is up to these days after many members have been charged with sedition for Jan. 6, how Trump and GOP officials came to know about the group, and back them, and what we have to fear about these guys the most. Plus! In this episode, actor Paul F. Tompkins explains why he stays away from politics in comedy and that the MAGA-aligned actors who complain about being blackmailed aren’t being shut out, they just suck. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi, I'm Andy Levy, former Fox News and CNN-HLN guy and current cable news conscientious objector. I'm a former libertarian who now sits pretty comfortably on the left. And I'm producer Jesse Kennan, and I'm here to make sure things don't go too far off the rails. We're here to have fun, smart conversations with some great guest co-hosts, as well as some of the most knowledgeable and entertaining people in politics, media, and beyond. Our goal is to try to make some sense of our current crazy world, our new abnormal, and hopefully even make you laugh through the tears. Hello and welcome to another Sunday bonus episode of The New Abnormal.

And we thank you so much for being here. Today we have two extra special guests. First, we're going to talk to Andy Campbell, who's a journalist at the Huffington Post and author of the amazing new book, We Are Proud Boys, how a right-wing street gang ushered in a new era of American extremism. And he's going to tell us all about his book, as well as what's going on with that wacky bunch of boys.

But first, we have an extra special guest with Paul F. Tompkins, a comedian and actor who you of course know from his roles in Mr. Show, Bojack Horseman, there will be blood. The guy does it all. Paul, thank you so much for joining us. This is sort of an inaugural attempt at doing this sort of segment. So I appreciate you being our, I was told not to say guinea pig, but I'm saying guinea pig. Obviously, that's an insult to my Italian heritage.

But I'm used to it. But look, Andy, I love inauguration, so here I am. All right, so I need to start with this. this is generally a political podcast, so I want to touch on politics for a bit. You're in so many things that it would take up all the time we have for me to go ahead and list them all. I may do that if this whole thing goes pear-shaped.

I may have to resort to that, but hopefully not. But before I get to the politics stuff, I have to bring this up. Somehow, I had no idea you're playing Gallagher in the Weird Al biopic? I guess I forgot that there would be an IMDB and you could look up who's who, But yeah, there's a party scene and I got to play Gallagher.

And it was what a wonderful day that was to be surrounded by a bunch of other funny people playing other weirdos. It was a really wonderful day on set. That's absolutely amazing. But so you didn't get to like smash a watermelon or anything like that? You'll have to see the movie. Oh, okay, fair enough. You don't talk about politics much. I mean, I think that's fair to say.

And I think it's possibly out of cowardice, but that is not for me to say. I mean, to be fair, I do rant a lot online. No, you do. You absolutely do rant a lot online. And in the past, you have described yourself as MAGA curious. And I never could figure out what that meant. That's the thing. I can't figure out what it means either. And I keep hearing this phrase. And I feel like it leads back. And I'll put my tinfoil hat on. I feel like it leads back to Trump. Really? Yeah. Research that I've been doing, I feel like it's somehow that phrase has something to do with Donald Trump. I think it might, and I'm not entirely sure, because it's something I actually completely made up, and I'm kidding. Of course, you are not MAGA curious. You know, I think it's fair to say you are comfortably on the left and out there with your, you know, your holly weird cronies and your Bel Air mentions. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Drinking adrenachrome, absolutely. Exactly. Sort of what I meant is you're not like politics guy, and I'm making air quotes when I say that. And what I mean is like it's not the core of what you do. It's not that you're not open about your beliefs. you are. None of that was a question. It was more of a confusing compound sentence.

I'm not Mark Ruffalo. That's what people need to know. Yes, exactly. Is it a conscious choice for you to not be like a political comedian or it's just that you have no interest in that? But yeah, you're absolutely, you know, it's not like you're hiding your politics. It's just not like what you're into comedically. Honestly, the thing that keeps me from being a political comedian, I guess, because over the years my interest in politics has grown steadily because as I matured emotionally, I began to see how much politics affects my fellow human beings in this great country of ours. The problem is making politics funny is extremely difficult. And if it's not your innate thing to begin with, to try to suddenly pivot to that, I think,

is kind of a fool's errand because it's just really hard. to not make the most obvious jokes. It's hard not to just be, you know, ranting for applause. It's hard to actually say something, like have a point about a political thing and be really funny at the same time is extremely hard. And very few people are able to actually do it. The time that I feel like it was the most successful where I remember like really laughing out loud at something political was the Colbert rapport. And I wonder even now how much that would hold up if I were to watch it again.

You know, as my politics have progressed, you'll forgive the term. Right. To the left, would I find it as palatable today? But yeah, I would like to. Like, anytime I tweet something like a political joke, I regret it. Almost instantly, I'm like, nah, that was corny.

But sometimes, you know, you just get mad at shit and you just can't help yourself. and your thumbs are moving before you're even aware that that's happening. Yeah, I have to say when you said, you know, the one thing that you really liked the political comedy thing was the Colbert Report. I was kind of hoping you were going to say my tweets, but obviously, look, you went another way, and that's fine. We'll still, we'll continue with the interview anyway. I didn't want to embarrass you. No, I appreciate that. And I think, I think it's clear that that's the only reason you didn't say that because you knew it would make me uncomfortable.

Because like a lot of people, I don't like to be called a hero. It makes me scor. and so I just prefer to keep a low profile. See, I love it. I wish more people would call me a hero. Really? Yeah. It makes me feel good. That's really interesting.

I'm an interesting guy, Andy. You are an interesting guy, and... Thank you. See, love hearing that. And in many ways, I would say you are heroic. Well, now, you've fallen into my trap. I got you to say it. You did.

You got me to say it. And suddenly your mic goes dead and you are gone. Mission accomplished. You talked about ranting for applause, and yeah, there really is, like there's nothing worse than, I think it was Seth Myers who coined the term Clappter. And it's just, and you see it so much these days. It's one of those things that I do see on both the right and the left, where it's just, it's purportedly telling a joke, but the point is not to get the laugh.

It's, well, as you would expect from the name, Clappter, it's to get the applause. And look, it's very tempting. What's more validating than saying something? Have a bunch of people applaud, you know? Right. Of course, it's very alluring to get up there and feel like you have something worth saying to begin with, which is the delusion of all stand-up comedians. That's how you end up being successful. And that's what keeps you doing it is that you have this weird belief that, no, people need to hear what I have to say.

Right. And then to add that into it, when you start feeling a certain way about things, you're passionate about something. Because I'm going to give everybody the benefit of the doubt. It's like, I don't think anybody starts out thinking, I want to get people to applaud for me. I think by and large, they come from a place of, this matters to me, this is important to me, this is the way I see things. I'm going to express it this way.

And when people applaud, it's very validating, and it feels like I am right. I was on the right track here. I was right to do this. because look, people agree with me, but it's just not funny. Obviously, the problem arises when it sort of takes the place of the funny. Yes. It's fine to say something that's legitimately funny or clever or smart and get applause for it because of that.

But it's when you start, you know, it's sort of a dissent. I don't think anyone starts out looking for a claptor, really. Yeah, I agree. I think, like you said, it becomes like it's almost like a drug. Like you get applause a couple of times for legitimately funny things. And then the applause part becomes more important than, say, the legitimately funny thing. Yeah.

And you don't really realize that it's happening. In your mind, you've just made a transition of going from one type of topic to another, and this is what your material is now, but it ends up being,

it ended up meaning like the bare minimum for comedy, but really is 99% a speech. Yeah, and I remember a lot of people saying when, you know, when Trump first got elected, it was like, oh, this is going to be great for comedy.

And I just remember thinking, will it? Yeah. And I'm not sure. There are obviously some very funny people that came out of the Trump era for political jokes, but there's so much more of it that's just so tedious. For sure. The way that the beginning of the Trump era, well, and we're still in it, but when it started

and how silly it all was and where we are now, where it's so demoralizing. You know, it's not that he is the worst guy that's ever been in that office. It's not that he's done the worst things that any president has ever done. It's that he's such a fucking asshole and was, and loved talking. And hearing him talk was so demoralizing. It was such a drag that, you know, it just, it stopped being funny real fast. Yeah, no, totally agree. And along those lines, so you actually did just recently, I think, in the last couple months,

you did some stuff for the Los Angeles, DSA, the Democratic Socialists of America. Yeah. Is that something, are you going to, do you see yourself doing, like, more of that and getting into stuff like that, or is it something you've been doing for a long time? And I just happened to notice that you did it recently. I've done a couple benefits for them, I should say, been a part of a couple benefits for them for candidates. I really enjoyed it. It was astonishing how much fun and how good it felt to be a part of that, like to be backstage with other people and we were all there for the same reason and really believing in what we were doing was really

enjoyable. And I definitely want to do more of that stuff. I joined the DSA. I'm literally a card member. I do want to get more involved. And, you know, because I do feel like it starts, it starts locally and L.A. being such a huge city, it's an interesting microcosm of national politics and how important it is to be involved at your, at your local level. And yeah, I want to, I, I don't know what I'll find and I don't know how I'll feel about it, but I do want to get more involved. Is there a chance that Los Angeles will sort of break the streak of our nation's biggest cities, New York, Chicago, L.A., having just the crappiest mayors. Man, I hope so. I was delighted that Rick Caruso tried to outright buy the mayoralty.

Right. And it didn't work. That was fun. That was a fun day when he didn't just get enough votes to take it in the primary and spent all that money. It was great. I mean, it doesn't, it's not like he feels it personally, but still, it was nice to know that he couldn't do it. So we'll, we'll see happens, but man, oh man, I, it would be nice. Yeah, it's just, it's so fucking annoying how all these big, powerful cities just keep electing these, just the worst people. I mean, it hasn't stopped here in New York. We have Eric Adams, who is God-awful. And, you know, I'm obviously really hoping that Caruso doesn't win in the general. So, yeah, it would just be nice to break that streak. Shifting gears a little bit, this is something we hear a lot, these.

Wait, wait, wait. Do you play the, do you play the, the gear shift sound effect? No, we don't. We're not a morning zoo. You don't. Oh. Yeah. No, I left. I was misinformed, but I apologize. No, I left. No, I left the morning zoo. When? God, 2019, I think. It's been a while. Andy, they're still playing clips of you. Are they really? I thought you were still on the show. Yes. They're still playing clips of you. They have chopped up your old audio to make it seem like you're still in studio with the gang. I have to get my lawyers to look at this because that's, no, I left them. I don't speak to the gang anymore.

Oh, my God. Well, they speak to you. They speak to recordings of you. Frida, the moleman. They're all talking to you. Oh, all right. So I am going to switch gears here quickly. So we hear a lot these days from conservative actors, writers, people out in Hollywood or in the

entertainment business in general, how they can't get work in the biz because of their politics. When you hear that, like, what is it that you think? How tiresome is it? Or is there some truth to it? I don't think there's any truth to it. Because basically, if you're a nice person, everyone wants to work with you, right? Right. And you can even be an asshole as long as you are considered some kind of genius or some kind of undeniable box office star.

But Kevin Sorbo was already done. Right. And it had nothing to do with his politics. James Woods, I don't think, is the nicest guy in the world. and I think that time wore on. And there's plenty of people in Hollywood who aren't working at James Woods' age who are Democrats.

You know what I mean? Used to work as much as he did and don't anymore. And it's not because of their politics. It's because that's Hollywood, baby. It's such a lie. It's such a lie. And these guys love to be victims so much. But they should know better

because that's the nature of this business. But there is a hard thing when you are successful for a while, you know, at the level that these guys were, if you're Kevin Sorbo, you're the lead of a show that was very successful, and then that ends, and then people are like, well, this guy's

actually not that great as an actor, you know what I mean? There's not a ton of, he's not a chameleon, you know what I mean? So, you know, that people moved on. And, you know, although Hercules was a successful show, it ran for many years in syndication,

it was a sort of niche kind of thing, and it's not, I don't think he ever crossed over into the mainstream, in that way, you know, as other people have done. And it's like the parts that I don't get, I absolutely blame anything I can except me. Right. But I'm sorry to say it has nothing to do with politics. Mel Gibson is working again.

You know what I mean? I always bring that up. It's like every time I look, Mel Gibson's in another movie. And he actually is not just like, oh, he's got some bad politics. He did really shitty stuff. He said some of the books. Yeah. Horrific things that we all heard.

Yeah. And he had to go to sit in a corner for a few years. Right. And then he's back. And it's like, not only is he back, it's like nothing ever happened. Yeah. And look, he's a super talented guy. And I, you know, I, sadly, I enjoy a lot of his films.

But there's no doubt that if you were going to like blackball someone, you know, strictly for their views and for the things that they've said, it would be him. Yeah. If you were going to blackball someone and feel extremely confident that you had a case, right? It would be Mel Gibson. But, yeah, these other guys. it's just, that's just the way it goes.

It also sort of strikes me, and it struck me as you were talking about him, but someone like Kevin Sorbo might actually be learning what it's like to be a woman in Hollywood, where when he was young and a pinup guy, he was getting work. And now he's older, and it's not that he looks bad for his age or anything. He absolutely doesn't. He looks great. But he ain't in his 20s. He ain't in his 30s.

And what do you know, it's getting harder for him to find work. Just like, you might say it is in general for women out there. In Hollywood, ageism is ageism, and if you can't become a character actor, then you're done. Right. Hollywood has no, once you stop being pretty, Hollywood has no use for you. Right. Especially if you can, if you're not like the strongest actor, let's say. Right, exactly.

Absolutely. Along those lines, have you seen my son Hunter yet? I just, I want to point out to our audience that you laughed at me when I told you I was watching it. Yes. I tweeted something like vaguely mysterious, like I'm watching what I think might be the worst movie I've ever seen, and you DM'd me on Twitter saying, I had to know what you said?

You had to know, and I told you. And your response was just like in all caps. Ah, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. I forgot that that thing existed. It caught me by surprise. I was thinking it was going to be like a typical Hollywood release, but the fact was my son Hunter. I believe you said it's not worth watching.

right? It's not. We all know there are movies that are so bad they're enjoyable to watch. Yeah. This was not one of them. Or things that are just like a kind of a curiosity. And you're saying it doesn't even approach that level. It doesn't. There's like a couple of times where you think it might be going in that direction and you get excited. And like there's some sort of weird little fantasy scene where what's her name, Gina Carrano? Yes. Beapapoo. Yeah. She's a Secret Service agent. And there's like some little fantasy scene where the actor playing Joe Biden has like his arms around her and is sniffing her hair

and it's like a little gauzy and like it could have gotten like a very twin peaksy direction but it didn't it didn't and mostly it's just honestly it was a lot of really boring speech making and a lot of putting weird graphics on

the screen Adam McKay has a lot to answer for for this movie because obviously it's not its fault but they ripped off his you know latter-day filmmaking style, but without any of the skill. Are people talking to the camera? Yes.

Oh, Gina Carrano talks to the camera all the time. Oh. Yeah, she sort of narrates you through the film in a lot of ways. She's the Jiminy Cricket of my son, Hunter. Yes. Yes, exactly. No, it's a painful movie and don't watch it.

I was just curious if you had. I want to talk about you and all the stuff you do. You do, it's insane. You do stand-up. You do live vera. variety shows. You did the thrilling adventure hour, which was this amazing thing that was like old-timey radio plays. You're the voice for, I did an accurate count, and it's a bazillion animated characters. And you do, you know, live action acting, you write. And my question to you is, why? Can you just be

chill? Man. Do you know how many jobs you're taking away from people? I understand, but nobody understands how big the hole inside me is, Andy. And they refused to. to believe me when I tell them that it is terrifying. I've looked inside it many times. It's looked back at me, which is unpleasant. And this is what I got to do. It's just what I got to do, baby. See, now you fell into my trap. I wanted you to admit you had a giant hole inside you. But no, it really is amazing all the things you do. And they're all good. That's what's so annoying. Like, every time you do something, I'm like, I finally, he's going to suck at this. And I'll feel a little better about myself. And then, no, you're just great at it.

is very flattering and I appreciate that. And I do have to say that I am extremely lucky that I have gotten to do a lot of really fun things. And I, whenever I'm, I'm bummed out about, you know, not getting a job or not getting to do certain things, I have to remember that. Even stuff that that most people don't see, I get to do a show at UCB or whatever and have a great time. And, you know, that's why I started doing it when I was younger. And that was the goal was to have a job where I get to have fun and, you know, and to be able to do so many varied things with so many cool people and to, like, you know, podcasting came along and, you know, it's like a medium that I love. And then I got to make friends as a result of it is really wild to me. And it's not lost on me that I have a very fun life. Yeah, it's incredible. And all the stuff you do with Lauren Lapkis is just so good. Thank you. I love it. I love it so much. me too. Lastly, before I let you go, tell me about a varietopia.

Yeah, it's a variety show, like a modern variety show. It's not like a throwback thing. It is just me hosting comedy and music and whatever else. It's my favorite thing to do. It's a big show with like a big live band. It's just a ball. I do, it's getting me back into doing stand-up again. I took like a long hiatus from stand-up, but I'm gathering material now through doing the monologues on the variety show and getting to do, sketches and songs with immensely talented people. And it's really fun. I do it every other month in Los Angeles. And then I'm coming to New York back to the Bell House, my favorite venue in America. In November, I believe it's the 18th and 19th. We're doing a whole weekend of Riotopia. Two shows each night, different shows, both nights. And I can't wait. Oh, I can't. I know you're about to ask me to be

part of the New York shows, but I actually can't those nights. I'm so sorry. Oh, that's too bad, Andy. I'll figure something out. How do you replace the irreplaceable? Just a moment of silence, I think. That actually would probably work. Bathroom break for the audience. Paul, thank you so, so much for coming on. It was great having you, great talking to you,

and I'm just, I'm so grateful that you were willing to do this for little old me. Oh, man, literally anytime, Andy, this was a blast. And now we have Andy Campbell, journalist at the Huffington Post, an author of the amazing new book, We Are Proud Boys, how a right-wing street gang ushered in a new era of American extremism. Hey, Andy, thanks for coming on. I really appreciate it. Oh, thanks for having me, guys. So I want to start with the most sort of basic question possible, because I do think a lot of folks these days are, unfortunately now aware of the proud boys, but I think maybe they're unclear as to exactly what they are.

And in your book, you have a quote, you call them one of the most dangerous and influential extremist groups in America. So why do you say that? Yeah, I mean, they've kind of transformed over the years. You know, they started out as this street gang that was acting based off of Trump and Fox News's rhetoric. They, you know, they wanted to go out in the street and fight for GOP causes. And over the years, they've grown to sidle up to the top levels of the GOP. They have friends within the media. and in law enforcement. And so they've become more of a political monster over the years. So now, instead of just going out to fight, they are also making inroads with the GOP.

So I call them, you know, the TLDR version, is that they are a far-right street gang, hell-bent on political violence for GOP causes. Okay, so the Proud Boys were formed by Gavin McGuinness, who unfortunately, I'm all too familiar. familiar with. But he famously, and he said this for years, even before he formed the proud boys, he would call himself a Western chauvinist. And the proud boy's oath is, I am a Western chauvinist, and I refuse to apologize for creating the modern world. So what's the interpretation of that that we're looking for here? Yeah, the baseline here is strict nationalism. But Gavin McGinnis ties the nationalism that they have in a sort of tongue-in-cheek bow. He makes everything he says, has a little snarky attitude behind it.

Right. But I think the thing that people overlook partly to do with the fact that they have members of color is that this is white supremacist in nature, too. He also said that anyone can join the gang as long as they agree and accept that a Western chauvinist is essentially a white man and that white men have an overwhelming role in the success of Western culture. So as long as they accept that, they can join up. And I think that gets missed a lot that the roots here are nationalist and racist. Yeah, exactly. And I agree with you. I think it's really important to keep hammering at that because it does get sort of overlooked a lot. I was reading through your book and there was a quote in the intro. It's a little long, but I'm going to read it because I think it's important. You write, these were the types of bizarre alliances that formed in Trump's early days back when it felt unusual to see,

far-right gangs in makeshift body armor, internet Nazis, and your conservative aunt all hanging out in the park together at a political rally. By the end of Trump's term, that image was completely unremarkable. So when I was reading your book, I literally stopped after I read that because it is so true and so unbelievable and so important. We're talking about something that was basically unthinkable six, seven years ago. And now, if you'll pardon me, it's the new abnormal. How did all of this become normalized so quickly? And what role did the proud boys play in that? Did they play an outsized role in that?

Yeah. And I think, you know, the playbook that they show here is how to go from, you know, just a hate group that was at Unite the Right to a political force. And so while they've gone on this six-year parade of violence through the country, Daily Beast has done a really good job covering it. You know, there are a number of us who have been following them from the beginning. beginning. But while they were on this parade of violence, they are also building these relationships in the GOP and positioning themselves as Trump's de facto enforcement arm. They wanted to do what

crusty old white Republicans won't do and get out in the street and fight. And the GOP, especially Trumpian GOP, was ready to embrace that because Trump loves having people in the street for him, especially if they're fighting for him, right? So Trump's circle is embracing what they are doing in the street, either tacitly by not rebuffing them or fully endorsing them. I mean, after January 6th and Coulter writes a blog titled, Thank God for the Proud Boys, and she sort of salivates over them as her defenders against the anti for threat.

But what was happening here is that they were normalizing political violence for everyday Americans to the point where you're going to go to any political event, this election, next election, you're going to see. guys in body armor, in fatigues, you know, makeshift weaponry. And that's going to be totally normal because a huge swath of Americans see this as a justified option in political discourse today. And the probways had a big part of that. And Enrique Tario told me that after, you know, Unite the Right, he looked at the other sort of hate groups dissolving. And he was like, we need to get more political or we're going to be going down with them.

You say that in the book. You say that after Charlottesville, after Unite the Right. a lot of the far right groups, or a good number of them anyway, sort of disappeared and either dissolved or went silent. But the opposite has been true for the proud boys. They have only grown. And I had written like a really long-winded question about this. And then I realized it all boiled down to why. How did we get to the point where we now have the president of the United States during a presidential debate saying, proud boys, stand back and stand by? And I know what you mean about the, the GOP, like sort of, loving this sort of thing. But what was the actual connection that allowed the proud boys? Is it like, is it a Roger Stone thing? Was he the Nexus? Or was there something else? Or was there nothing specific? Roger Stone was a huge part of it. I mean, he has been friends with Enrique Tario since, you know, back in at least 2017. And he admitted to me in an interview that he had been advising the proud boys politically as Enrique Tario pushes them to become more political, run for office,

throw their weight behind GOP officials who share their ideology. But I honestly think that it is an entire machine that sort of normalizes this. You have the GOP embracing the proud boys. You have far right media, not only celebrating them, but continuously blaming Antifa. I mean, Tucker Carlson still maintains that Antifa did January 6th, right? Right. And so you have this whole machine supporting it. And that ends up translating to everyday Americans also supporting it. Not only are everyday Americans the ones who have been donating to their go-fundemies whenever they go-to-jail or the January 6 defendants go-funds. I was talking to a reporter. He told me about his time in D.C. right before January 6.

And he said he could see the shift from just Trump rhetoric, just Fox News rhetoric to everyday people when he got punched in the face by a proud boy in December before January 6. And he looked out into the crowd of just regular MAGA folks. And a woman who he said could have been his mom turns to him and says, you deserve that. And he was like, that's when I knew that Trump, you know, pointing at the back of the rafters and saying the media is your enemy. Right. That had translated to people believing it. And going forward, that's the fear is whether we now accept this as the normal. Yeah, it's shocking how violent rhetoric turns into actual violence.

Who would expect that? Yeah. And the pipeline is shorter and shorter. I mean, I remember Trump rhetoric leading to bombs showing up. at Democratic officials. And now you have Trump railing against the FBI for going through his stuff at Mar-a-Lago. And within what, was it a day, a guy showed up to an FBI office and tried to shoot it up? I mean, it is a short pipeline now. Let's talk about you brought up January 6th. So let me ask you this.

How much of what we saw that day was Proud Boys related? Just scratching the surface of sort of what they contributed to not just the perpetration of that day's events, but also the organization. Certainly, when Trump said stand back, stand by, they took it as marching orders. They start raising money, gathering equipment, and getting ready for what they called their last stand for Trump. I think it was Joe Biggs who published a blog called This Is Civil War. So they were gearing up. I was even surprised to learn that, you know, certainly the proud boys had an outsized role in the execution of the insurrection or may have been a hundred there. But when the Justice Department brought down sedition charges, they showed us the 1776 returns document, which was a plan into.

Tario's hands, December 30th, before January 6th, to occupy different buildings in D.C. And that was the first time that we really had concrete evidence that there was a plan in place prior to January 6th. Before that, Republicans were saying, well, it was just a random swell of violence or it was Antifa. Now we know there's a plan and that Enrique Aterio had it. And so going into the sedition trials, it's going to be so interesting to see not only how much did they plan it, maybe it'll illuminate their relationship with people like Roger Stone, but also probably are testifying against each other. That's going to be super interesting. Yeah. Several have agreed to roll over on the other proud boys to lessen their charges.

And we may learn a lot. Yeah, definitely. So you've mentioned Enrico Tario a bunch of times. I just want to clarify that he, well, he was the leader of the proud boys around the January 6th stuff. He's now in prison, correct? Right. But people still take cues from the guy. And he isn't in jail awaiting his sedition trial. Has anyone rebuffed him? Is he still the chairman? You know, not much has changed, I don't think. And, you know, the gang is still working as directed without him there. It remains to be seen whether, and this always happens with big proud boys events. A bunch of their leaders go to jail. The gang keeps working as directed. So it remains to be seen how much his jail time will actually affect the overall group. Yeah, absolutely. And along those same lines, so Gavin McInnis, who formed the proud boys, he sort of famously resigned from them in 2018. Does end? Anyone believe, do you believe that that was the end of his association with them? Because that seems unlikely to me. No, absolutely not. And in fact, he said in that very speech where he said he was

resigning, he said, I'm only doing this to somehow alleviate the charges of the guys who were arrested in that assault in Manhattan. And we've seen, even after January 6th, him wearing proud boys' colors on his show, raising money for them, advising them. I don't think he's gone. He has too big of an ego to be totally gone. And we're going to learn a lot about that during this edition trial, too, because it's somebody reported recently that he's going to be a character witness for Enrique in the gang. So I'm surprised that he has never faced any consequences for this thing he's unleashed on the world, but he may implicate himself further going forward. He is.

He's always one of those people that sort of skates from consequences. And is that because, like you said, he sort of, he does everything with that sort of very 21st century layer of irony, where he can sort of claim afterwards, oh, I'm just a provocateur, you know, the big thing. or I was joking. Is that what enables him to skate from all this stuff? Because if you look at all the things that he said, I mean, he outright has called for violence. He's talked about, you know, if you see someone anti-Maga choke them.

And he says stuff like that on the regular. Right. And this goes to show you how scary it is and how hard it is for law enforcement and anyone to respond to these right-wing loud mouths who are fermenting violence everywhere. I mean, the fact that he's been able to call for violence directly and make it a rule that doing a big act of violence for the cause is the top rank that you can get in the gang. And he doesn't face any consequences. This is something that a whole bunch of popular right-wingers are taking cues from, you know,

the libs of TikTok of the world, the Tucker Carlson's. You know, these people know, if they add a thin layer of plausible deniability, they are not going to face any consequences. Because the only reason Gavin, I feel like, hasn't faced any charges is because he's just never out there. He's making orders from his studio in upstate New York. Right. But it is scary going forward that people know that they can do this and totally get away with it. Yeah. And you know, you mentioned his studio. And I guess it was a few weeks ago now. He pulled a stunt where he made it seem like he'd been arrested while he was recording his show. And then it turned out that he'd actually

got on vacation with his family. It seemed like at least at the time, that pissed off some of his allies. So do you think that has hurt him or is that the kind of thing that's sort of quickly forgiven and forgotten? I think it's forgiven and forgotten. And I think that the spirit of the proud boys is such that they are completely untethered by McGinnis and Tario now. Like I said, they're working on the GOP's grievances now. McGinnis may or may not be barking orders from, you know, a microphone. But the proud boys are looking at Tucker Carlson's rhetoric and Trump's rhetoric and activating based off of that. You had all summer Fox News whining and raging about LGBTQ and drag queens and trans issues. And the proud boys were following suit by showing up at

children's hospitals and abortion clinics and drag queen story hours. And they're still doing that to this day. So whether or not it hurts McGinnis, I think that the proud boys are a machine on their own now. And going forward, we can expect to see them at anything, Tucker Carlson or Donald Trump point their finger out. Going forward, like, into the future, what would you say is the, again, we've got Tario in prison. McGinnis has, you know, claims he's not involved anymore. You don't see the proud boys as being diminished in any way. And I'm curious, you know, we've got an election, midterm elections are coming up in a little over a month. And obviously in 2024, there's another presidential election. Are we going to see proud boys? Are they going to be doing shit outside of,

like, voting places and stuff like that? Yeah, I mean, you know, even if the proud boys, dissolved tomorrow or changed their name and rebranded, you know, there is such overlap with them and all the other groups there, neo-Nazis in there, oathkeepers, Q and on. It's all sort of one big force that's ready to mobilize, right? And we have GOP officials all over the country who are not only aligned with these guys. Joe Kent, a household full in Washington State, donated $11,000 to a pod boy for consulting fees. But you have officials who are calling for for violence and intimidation. Right.

Several officials in Arizona have very directly called for vigilantes to go to ballot boxes and watch them. I mean, this is, it's always going to be proud boys. They're always going to be in orbit. But we have a whole gamut of extremists and everyday Americans ready to mobilize based on that stuff. It's not a secret anymore. It's not a, there's no distance between the rhetoric and the violence like we were talking about.

So yes, I'm very worried about our future of political violence. And again, I'm worried about how much this has spilled into everyday life, not just MAGA rallies, not just BLM rallies. This is every facet of American civic life is affected by this now. Do you see a path for us to sort of, I guess the only way I can put this is to unfuck ourselves? Or are we just sort of stuck with this and hope that it burns out on its own maybe? Because I don't know what to do, you know? The communities I spoke to, you know, that have been affected by these guys, want a full culture shift. because we have to get to a point where law enforcement doesn't allow far-right extremists in their ranks

and have a system set up to push them out. Same with the military. Same with politicians. And so you're right. I mean, it is a hugely uphill battle because of how normalized it is. And really, the people doing the most work right now are the activists and researchers putting together dossiers on all these guys. I mean, activists and researchers are the ones who put all the dossiers together on 700 January 6th defendants, right? So I think there's some, hope there, but, you know, I also think it's a hugely uphill battle. You know, the clan didn't lose power because people rebuffed them. The clan lost power because the whole country shared, enough of the country shared that ideology that it was, they were unneeded as a force, right? Right. And so you have to worry that this is where we're headed with, with our new era of extremism. Well, okay, let's end on that uplifting note. Andy Campbell, thank you so much for joining us. The book is,

proud boys. It's a fantastic read and a really important read, I think. So everyone please go out and buy it. And don't just buy it. Read it. Andy, thanks so much. Really appreciate it. Thank you. What a great conversation. Thanks for having it. Hope you enjoyed checking out this episode of The New Abnormal. We're back every Tuesday, Friday, and Sunday. If you enjoyed it, please share it with a friend and keep the conversation going. See you next time. Want more great listens? Check out our comedy podcast, The Last Laugh, and our star-studded The Daily Beast podcast at the Daily Beast.com slash podcasts. If you enjoyed this episode, consider becoming a Daily Beast subscriber. Subscribing is the best way to feed the beast and support all of your podcasts as we cover what might become the darkest timeline. Head to the DailyBeast.com slash membership slash podcast and sign up today.