Ku Klux Klan media star admits lying being an Iraqi war veteran: "I am a media whore"

By Nate Thayer

December 21, 2017

A prominent Ku Klux Klan leader has admitted lying he is a combat veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Steven Shane Howard, the Imperial Wizard of the North Mississippi White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan and a member of the National Socialist Movement, the largest neo-Nazi organization in America, didn't act alone. Howard detailed payments by national media fabricating racist events, according to documents and interviews with the Klan leader.

Numerous major media outlets have featured Howard as a disgruntled Iraqi and Afghan war veteran. Howard admitted in interviews these were lies. "I told all that stuff about being in Iraq because that is what the TV people wanted me to say. I wanted to be the next Duck Dynasty. I wanted to be the next David Duke. I wanted them calling my name at the next presidential debate," Howard said in interviews after confronted with his official U.S. government military service records.

Howard detailed manufacturing cross burnings and other Ku Klux Klan public confrontations in exchange for cash payments from multiple national media groups.

Howard acknowledged he never was a U.S. Marine. "I was kicked out of the marines for abusing pain pills. I am not going to lie to you anymore. I was kicked out of the military for opiates," he said in interviews from his new home in Washington State after denying he had lied in several previous interviews. "But I have never been to the penitentiary."

Official Marine Corps records from the Department of Defense Manpower Data Center and Howard's official DD-214 U.S. government military record, show Howard never served in the United States military and was expelled for drug abuse from Marine Corps boot camp within weeks of enlisting in 1998.

"We initiated a search of the files maintained by the Management Records & Performance Branch (MRPB), but they could not identify Mr. Howard as a member or former member of the U.S. Marine Corps or Marine Corps Reserves," said the Department of the Navy and Headquarters United States Marine Corps on January 27, 2017 in a reply to a request for Howard's military records.

After being confronted with these and other U.S. government documents, Howard said "I don't want everything about my military service record to get out there," pleading with a reporter that his true military history not be made public and blaming major media television networks for luring him into lying for interviews in exchange for money. "I told all that stuff about being in Iraq because that is what the TV people wanted me to say."

Howard acknowledged he has lied for years about his military service. "I made a little fib about the military," he said. "Everybody tells war stories about their service. I told all that stuff about being in Iraq because that is what the TV people wanted me to say. We won't ever get our story out if we don't get our names in public."

"I was kicked out of the Marines because I was on pain pills. You already got my DD-214's," he said, referring to his official U.S. government military records. "I enlisted. It was not for long. I did serve my country."

That is not what Howard has been telling numerous media outlets in recent years who have flocked to Mississippi and paid him to broadcast his racist rhetoric as the public face of his now defunct Klan organization, the North Mississippi White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan.

"I lost a lot of good friends of mine fighting in Iraq for this country for nothing—for nothing, all because of the U.S. government. I am way mad at the government. I got a lot of hate in me, a lot of hate for nothing. I got a lot built up in me. A lot of hurt," Howard told ABC News correspondent Cynthia McFadden in an interview aired on ABC Nightline in 2013. "I became a very angry person after I served."

"When they strung them up on the bridge and shit, his body burning and shit, that's when I was over there," Howard told VICE News in reference to Americans who were killed near the Iraqi city of Fallujah. Howard also told VICE News he was a U.S military veteran of the war in Afghanistan.

On March 31, 2004 Iraqi insurgents in Fallujah ambushed American military contractors guarding a convoy carrying kitchen supplies to a U.S. military base. Four Americans were dragged from their cars, beaten, and set on fire, their corpses dragged through the streets before being hung from a bridge over the Euphrates river. In response, US Marines entered the city and intense battles resulted in the deaths of at least 40 US Marines and more than 700 Iraqis.

"God give us men who will not flinch at duty and will not lie! Amen?" Howard exhorted Ku Klux Klansmen dressed in robes in a 2013 VICE News program titled 'How the KKK preys on American veterans'. "Klansmen! For God! Klansmen! For the United States Marine Corps!," he preached as followers repeated his words at a Mississippi cross burning.

http://www.sajhavideo.com/nepalifmvideo/vidoedetailsone.aspx?url=nXIYQxMN9-4&title=How%20the%20KKK%20Preys%20on

"I became a very angry person when I served and I still have a lot of problems with my anger because of it," Howard told VICE news. "You train in the Marine Corps to be a killer. That is what you train to be. You train to be a strong man and a strong leader. I'm not a follower. I am a leader. That's what I am. I stand tall for what I believe in. I will go to prison for what I believe in."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6e2Qz_07qw8

"The government fears ex veterans. They fear us because we can train an army. We can train people to do things," Howard said. While Howard was firing a gun for the VICE News cameras, his left hand was seen shaking uncontrollably. Howard looked at the camera and said "PTSD. Do you see what it does to me? I shake uncontrollably sometimes."

Interviews with seven members of Howard's Mississippi Ku Klux Klan faction, all who requested anonymity, say that in 2013 he was abusing methamphetamines and attributed his shaking to drug abuse. "Everybody knows he is a meth head," said one senior Northern Mississippi White Knights of the KKK officer in an interview. "No one believed that Steven was a combat vet. That was all for the TV cameras." Howard denied he abuses illegal drugs. "I don't do meth. I have smoked weed." But Howard's criminal arrest record and several of his top Klan lieutenants say otherwise.

When asked in a radio interview if he was "forced to take lives while you were engaged in combat as a U.S. marine serving in Iraq?" Howard answered "Yes I did. I was in Fallujah."

"I got in the Marine Corps in 1998 and finally got my discharge papers in 2003, I think" he told VICE News.

But U.S. Marines did not enter Fallujah until March of 2004, prompting this journalist to inquire into Howard's claims of being a combatant in Iraq.

"I have a lot of anger. I have a lot of anger and a lot of mental issues—not really mental issues but things that bother me—I am very quiet in the things I do sometimes and what brings out my true heart is doing this stuff. I really enjoy doing this stuff. This stuff reminds me a lot of my Marine Corps brothers and stuff. When I got out of the service I didn't have anything. I didn't have people I could get back into, back into my brothers. The Klan is my medication. It soothes me in a lot of ways," Howard told VICE news.

In an ABC television interview, Howard praised a Nazi flag claiming the U.S. Marine Corps in Iraq used it. "This SS flag is my pride and joy. It was Adolph Hitler's personal flag of the 3rd Reich personal security officers. But the United States Marine Corps took that and made it its own. Scout Sniper is what the SS means in the United States Marine Corp…a lot of people don't know."

"The Marines was what I wanted to do, to fight for my country. I love my country. I don't agree with the government," Howard said in another television interview. "You can hate your government-and I despise my government-but I love the United States of America."

Howard's fake personal résumé was encouraged and abetted by major U.S. television media.

Howard had dissolved the North Mississippi White knights of the KKK when he was approached to be a TV star by the A&E network in 2016. In a series of 2017 interviews with Howard, he detailed being paid by the A&E television network, ABC News, VICE, and others to stage events for cameras and portray an extremist white racist leader.

But Howard had already left the Ku Klux Klan when approached by the A&E network to be a TV star.

"The National Socialist Movement is pleased to announce a major addition to our Southern forces. The addition of a well-known Klan Leader and spokesperson to the ranks of the NSM will bolster our strength in the Southern States, and will certainly send a chill through the cold hearts of the enemies of our Race and Nation," reads a press release by the National Socialist Movement in April 2016, the same month that Howard contracted with the A&E film crew to star in their reality TV series. "The National Socialist Movement is rising throughout America and we are witnessing the Re-Birth of our nation as organizational differences and tactics are falling along the wayside and men and women are uniting to fight under the NSM Banner."

"I was no longer Klan when A&E contacted me. I was NSM already. I went back to Mississippi and put back together the Klan because A&E asked me to. I did that just because A&E asked me to," Howard said. "I want to be famous. I knew the whole time I was doing the A&E show that I could never be successful being part of the Klan. Being in the Klan is kind of like a sickness, brother. Once it is in you, it is hard to get it out of you. I control the media now. I am the Klan now, ever since the A&E thing."

A 2015 radio interview with Howard reads:

Q: You have made it abundantly clear you were a Klansman and will remain a Klansman until the day you die

A: Until the day I die

Q: Having said that, who were you while in Iraq—were you a U.S. marine carrying out orders to protect your fellow marines or were you a Klansman anxiously awaiting an opportunity to kill what you call 'sand niggers'?

A: When you take the oath to join the military you take the oath of the constitution to defend anything foreign and domestic. I have to defend the constitution of the United States of America. I was a United States Marine defending my orders and did what I was told to do by my superiors.

But television news correspondents who interviewed Howard dispute the assertion that they were complicit in Howard's lies. "We certainly didn't ask him to say anything, of course," said Australian ABC U.S. correspondent Aaron Thomas who featured Howard in a broadcast on the rise of the KKK in America. "Of course I am happy to confirm I did not ask him to say anything. He volunteered he was a Marine Corps veteran."

Vice News also denied that VICE had instructed Howard to falsely claim he was a U.S. military combat veteran. "If I had known he wasn't a veteran I would have walked. Nothing he told us would have aired," said one VICE correspondent in an interview.

American ABC News correspondent Cynthia McFadden did not respond to interview requests.

But in at least one case, Howard is telling the truth, according to a series of documents between Howard and the A&E broadcast network obtained during this investigation. Howard exchanged multiple emails with senior executives and field producers contracted by the A&E broadcast network to film the "documentary" series "Generation Hate" on the Ku Klux Klan which was cancelled earlier this year amidst impending public revelations of scandal.

Documents show Howard was paid at least $21,150 by the network.

"I have done it like this with Vice and many other news outlets. I charge $2000. That will pay for the robes for the kids and getting everything ready for a ceremony. The burlap itself is over $200 and fuel. I will give u my checking account number and routing number. You can wire the money to my account. It takes minutes," Howard wrote Heather Downie, the director of development for "This is Just a Test" production company in February 2016. "For me to do this I must have the money up front and I'll sign whatever I need. But I charge $2000 no matter what."

"Do you know where I could get some hoods made for your girls? We'd love to get them for you," Downie wrote in an email to the Klan leader on February 2, 2016. "We can pay them directly."

In other emails titled "What we will Shoot/Things to set up" Downie and other senior producers sent instructions to set up scenes for upcoming camera shoots. "Steven's kids opening their new robes excitedly," read one.

On February 11, Downie wrote Howard an email titled "WHAT WE WILL SHOOT/THINGS TO SET UP: 1. Kids Klan Meeting (His kids and their friends)-8-10 kids total would be amazing! 2. 2nd degree cross lighting ceremony (sword is presented) 3. Steven's kids opening their new robes excitedly. 4. Steven organizes a Klan protest speaking with Bullhorn protesting an NAACP event (Does he have a bullhorn? If not we'll bring one) possibly outside of Kenneth Mayfield's office who wants to take down the confederate flag 5. Sit Down with person to discuss what leaving Klan would look like 6. Interviews with each family member."

"I can take care of that" responded Howard.

"That would be great. And we can pay them directly," replied Downie. "There will be no cost for you. You will be paid."

"As I am sure most people in this room are aware, there was a team from the A&E network that appeared today," said the mayor of Tupelo Mississippi on July 30, 2016. "The A&E network is apparently doing a documentary on one of the white supremacist groups that was in town today. We want to make clear that we have not been in contact with the A&E network and we are not coordinating any of their coverage. They are, in our eyes, in the same category as the protestors and demonstrators themselves."

"I literally heard them talk about dividing the money up between Howard and old Bill (the guy whose property we were on)," said Ku Klux Klan member John Cox in a December 27 email.

A few days later, Paul Lima, A&E chief field producer for the television series, emailed Howard and Downie "We discussed his daughters getting robes from him as a gift so they can participate in the night ceremony. We need to make sure all his girls have robes," according to emails obtained in this investigation. Paul Lima, the Director of Development and casting producer for the A&E contracted production company, This is Just a Test (TIJAT).

When A&E launched their public relations campaign unveiling the four one-hour episodes of "Generation KKK" on December 19, 2016 scheduled to first air on January 10, 2017, the television executives portrayed the series as a "pure documentary."

"This is not a reality show starring the KKK," said Rob Sharenow, executive Vice President of A&E. "This show is not rehearsed or prepackaged. This is not a gotcha show. There were no secrets. This is really a pure documentary series, and that's what the approach was," said Sharenow. "This is a pure documentary that looks at a previously hidden part of the world."

But in interviews with more than two dozen Klansmen in 7 states featured in the A&E documentary series, all detailed being presented with pre-scripted narratives by the network they had to adhere to in order to be compensated, instructions from A&E what to say and what scenes to set up, and under the table cash payments to avoid paying taxes while working for the network.

More than a dozen members of the Ku Klux Klan detailed being paid in cash lump sums and signing contracts which guaranteed them payment if they agreed to a filmed pre-scripted reality show for which they would be paid only if they agreed to leave the Klan. KKK participants say they agreed to the terms but had no intention of leaving the Ku Klux Klan.

"I made pretty good money," said Jeremy Philips, the Imperial Wizard of the North Georgia White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan who was first approached in 2016 by a producer for This is Just a Test production company. "It was right around six figures. They paid me in cash," Philips said in an interview.

Philips contract with the A & E production company prohibits him from speaking of the arrangement. "I will get back to you after talking with my attorney. It was a right amount of good money. A&E have already paid me but I'm not allowed to talk about it." Philips said part of the written contract required him to "give up my robes" and cease involvement in the Klan filmed on camera by A&E for the series.

The A&E series "Generation KKK" featured four Ku Klux Klan members and their families: Chris Buckley, a Grand Nighthawk—or chief of security- with the North Georgia White Knights; Steve Howard, the Imperial Wizard—or national leader—of the Mississippi White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan; Dan Elmquist, the Imperial Wizard of the Kentucky based Nordic Order Knights of the Ku Klux Klan; Richard Nichols, the Grand Dragon—or state leader—of the Tennessee White Knights of the Invisible Empire of the Ku Klux Klan; and Jeremy Philips, the Imperial Wizard of the North Georgia White Knights of the KKK.

The A&E series also recruited and paid dozens of Klan sympathizers from Ohio, Georgia, Mississippi, Tennessee, Ohio, and Indiana, including an Indiana Grand Dragon they knew through criminal background checks is a convicted sex offender who spent years in prison for assaulting an underage girl

"I made pretty good money off of it. We met A&E through the Stone Mountain (Georgia) rally. Afterwards they came down for a week and filmed here. They paid us in cash. It was a right amount of money, around six figures. Heather (Downie) and a producing crew and cameraman came with about 18-20 people," said Philips in an interview.

Philips was referring to Heather Downie, Director of Development for Casting/Production for the production company This is Just a Test who were contracted by the A&E network to produce the now cancelled TV series.

"Heather Downie contacted me twice over the last year to ask if I wanted to work on the documentary. I asked her how much we would get paid. She said 'We don't have a budget right now, but when we have one we will see that you get paid'," said Daryl Davis, a black professional blues musician and chronicler of the modern-day Klan who has spent decades meeting with Klan leaders in an effort to understand the white nationalist movement. "She wanted me to reach out to my Klan sources to see if they would participate. It was a scripted Hollywood reality show. If I were part of it, it would undermine any credibility. What I do is real. I turned them down."

The most prominently featured Klan leader in the TV series was Imperial Wizard of the North Mississippi White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan Steven Howard.

But Howard had disbanded his Ku Klux Klan outfit when A&E contacted him. Documents show the A&E network recreated the defunct Klan group and organized and paid for racist gatherings of the Ku Klux Klan and the neo Nazi National Socialist Movement in Georgia, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, Indiana, Washington state, and Mississippi, according to documents and interviews with 23 participants in the rallies.

"A&E showed up with post hole diggers, drill bits, they went and bought the right screws to make the cross and swastika. They paid for the food—hot dogs, burgers, pork chops. They had to get all beef hot dogs because Jeff Schoep doesn't eat pork," said one NSM member present for the August 2016 gathering in Mississippi of Nazis and Klansmen. Jeff Schoep is the national leader of the National Socialist Movement. "A&E paid for everything at Tupelo. They reimbursed everyone in cash who bought stuff. They put Steve Howard up in a fancy hotel. Howard told me himself he got paid by A&E," he said in a 2017 interview.

"A&E had a big old Mercedes pop up production vehicle. They even had a $5000 drone. They made us re-shoot putting up the wooden Swastika on a pole 5 times," he said. "There were at least 10-15 people from A&E at the cross lighting."

"A&E paid for the NSM rally (in Mississippi) in August 2016 and they paid for Howard and all the North Mississippi White Knights crew at the big rally in Harrisburg (Pennsylvania) in November 2016. They also flew us out to his wedding in Washington (state) which they paid for," said another member of the North Mississippi White Knights. "They flew us out and paid for our hotel rooms and gave us cash."

At the time of the A&E filming in the fall of 2016 of the NMWK outside of Tupelo, Mississippi, the Klan group had already been disbanded, according to senior NMWK Klan officers. Klan members and Howard say that A&E insisted on re-creating the racist organization for the television series. "A&E paid for Howard to fly back from Washington. They paid cash to use a friends truck when he came to Tupelo—they paid the friend $500 a day. They paid Howard and his girlfriend to put up in a fancy hotel. There was no Klan at the time until A&E paid to re-create it," said a KKK officer of the group in Mississippi. "All of our time was wasted. I don't want to be portrayed as a bunch of rednecks who fuck their cousins."

"They was trying to focus on Klan and family. All it was was Klan busting. It was a reality show with a script," said Richard Nichols, the Imperial Wizard of the Tennessee White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan who was featured in the A&E TV reality series during separate filming near Pulaski, Tennessee.

"My family was a founding member of the Klan. A&E said they wanted to give us a platform. All we wanted to show is how the Klan lives. My son died over two years ago. They wanted me to pass the torch to him. They pretty much had me when they said they wanted someone in the family to pass the torch to. A Klan organization today is a money machine. I feel responsible for the hate in this country. Maybe we can put this shit to rest. The Klan has long outlived its day. That is not something you have heard anyone in the Klan say before."

Nichols detailed his interaction with A&E. "One day I got up and I had an email: 'We want to show everyone the real truth about the Klan.' First Heather contacted me. Then Paul came out and a Miss Brandice. We signed a contract and they told us what to say and what they needed to film and we followed their orders."

"I wouldn't say it was all fake. I gave them interviews, a history lesson. If they would have run that the American people would have known the real Klan. The show would have been a success," said Nichols. "I dealt with the nigger Daryl Jenkins and the Nazi Byron Widenor who was all tatted up that A&E sent out here."

"After your article came out in Variety, Paul Lima called me and told me 'do not talk to this Nate Thayer,'" Nichols recalled.

"I had a friend of mine portraying himself as my son and say he wanted out. They knew he wasn't my son or a Klan member and he didn't want to be." Nichols was paid in cash "and I filled out their paperwork, too. They paid me $600 a day for everyday they shot. It averaged 3-8 days at a time" over several months of shooting.

"We were betrayed by A&E," said Nichols. "They wanted people with kids. They wanted me with my son. They said they wanted someone in the family to pass the torch onto. I am only one who has direct family ties to the founding members of the Klan in Pulaski Tennessee. But A&E knew that my son died 2 years ago, so they had us make someone up to say he was Klan. Then my friend portrayed my son. Then they changed it from my son to a 'family friend'. He told them from the first day he would never join the Ku Klux Klan. They said 'We just want you to say 'I have doubts.'"

Nichols detailed how the A&E "documentary" was pre-scripted. "They would give me a scenario. They kept asking me to use the word nigger. I was sitting on camera with a lighting backdrop and referring to 'blacks' they kept saying "no, we want you to use the word nigger!' That was (chief field producer) Paul Lima telling me that. Everybody thinks I am a big bad racist. They wanted to make us out to be like ignorant rednecks."

The president of the Hollywood production company contracted by A&E to film the reality TV series, Aengus James, disputed Nichols account.

"I just listened to a recorded conversation with (producer) Paul Lima and (Nichols 'son') Cody on which Cody says that Richard told him to lie and say the show was fake," wrote Aengus James in a December 30 2016 email. "We have been told that Richard's life has been threatened over this series because he embarrassed the Klan publicly by Cody rejecting the Klan - and that's why he's trying to disparage it."

"I urge you to not release this article. From the points you sent over, it contains inaccurate information and we urge you restraint and time to join us in looking into this. Please consider the effects of releasing inaccurate information that is being manipulated by members of the KKK," wrote James. "Again, for months we thought Cody was Richard's son. We are the ones who found out this was a lie and pushed them to tell the truth."

But final footage of the reality TV series "Generation KKK" show the network referring to Cody Hutt as Nichols "son".

"Paul Lima did take pictures of me holding cash.They gave the pictures to a guy named Nick. Nick was the one with the money. He kept all the records for payments. Paul would say 'Nick is going to come see you and pay you', said Cody Hutt in an interview. "They told me that they wanted me to play Richard's son. It was all scripted—telling me what to do what to say. There was a guy named Paul and a girl we called Miss B. Nick was the one who paid me. He paid me cash everyday. He paid everybody, " said Hutt. "From the first day I told them I had no interest in joining the Klan. They kept telling us that they wanted to make a documentary with 'real life scenarios'. The Klan cross burning and naturalization was all their idea. During the ceremony they had me go through all the steps and at the last moment they wanted to film me saying I din't want to join. It was all prescripted—the whole thing. I had to reshoot the scenes over and over again. If it wasn't what they wanted they made me do it all over."

"There was a signing of a contract—but they never gave me a copy. I asked for one and they promised to send it but they never did. But I remember I wrote my real birthday. They knew I wasn't '17 going on 18′ which is what they said on the filming. I was 22. I am 23 now," Hutt said. "They had two cross burnings. They said they had to re shoot it because they needed to re do some scenes. They had me dress up in white solid robes with a blue ribbon tied around the waist a bunch of times. That was all their idea. When me and Richard had a fall out and he was mad because I wouldn't join—A&E staged that. When I left the house then I walked down the driveway-that was all staged.. We reshot that scene 4 or 5 times."

"They arranged for the ex racist skinhead Brian to meet me around June, I think. I told Brian the first day "I hope you know I have no real intention of the joining the Klan," Hutt said."They filmed Brian saying he was going to help me get out of the Klan which was funny because I was never in. They did script everything. And they did pay us. When they would wrap up shooting Paul would say they had to go show A&E what they shot so that they didn't have to reshoot it again. They would say 'We have to take these scenes and show them to A&E'. Paul said that."

"Hey, I loved the money. Don't get me wrong. I wanted them to come back. Now, I don't want anything to do with them," said Hutt. "The guy who paid was Nick. He had a blue money bag with a zipper on top. It was rectangular. He would pull out a few bills and pay me from that. Sometimes it was 100 dollar bills, sometimes 50's. Paul would say 'Nick is going to come pay you.'"

Hutt said "They had me say I was '17 going on 18′. At that time I was 22. I told them from the start I was 22. They knew that exactly. I live with my mom. I am not working now. I dropped out of high school which I now know was a stupid thing. I am trying to get my GED."

"They told me to find someone who was family that was against my beliefs. My wife is Klan, so we had the wife of my Knight hawk 'act' as the anti Klan. A&E said she is my cousin, which she isn't. They never did pay his wife either as they agreed to," said Dan Elmquist, the Imperial Wizard of the Nordic order of the KKK. "They paid me $500 in cash to allow them to film me and my wife at our home. We had to sign a contract. They paid us in cash saying that way we didn't have to pay taxes on it. We just did it as a way to rip-off the media, really."

"They were trying to get my wife and me to say that my wife didn't like me involved in Klan stuff," Elmquist said. "The whole thing was a joke, really. They were telling us what they wanted us to do and say."

Chris Brasher, the Imperial Knight Hawk of Nordic order confirmed Elmquist's story. "A&E would give me an order. It was scripted. My wife isn't a member of the Klan. A&E was telling her to say to me 'If you don't leave the Klan I am going to leave you. I don't want to leave my husband, but if he doesn't leave the Klan I will leave you.' It was a joke, really. My wife and I get along fine. She was never going to leave me because I am in the Klan. That was all made up by A&E who told us to say that."

"They promised me $500, but they actually never paid me. They said they would pay me next time," said Brasher in a telephone interview. " Honey, how much did they say they were going to pay us?' $3-500 a day plus $200 for the kid, right?" he asked his wife during an interview with this journalist. "They were trying to make it look like she didn't want me to join the Klan and then make the kids pressure me to allow them to join the Klan. That is exactly what A&E told us to act out on film."

"Once they had me sitting on my bed cleaning my gun and had my little boy walk in and say 'Daddy, I want to join the Ku Klux Klan. Daddy, can I see your Klan robes.' And then I would say 'Why, do you want to join the Klan.' They told my boy to say those words. That part was all scripted. Really? C'mon! Who is going to be sitting on their bed cleaning their guns and their little boy pops in and says 'Daddy, can I see your robes.'? Who is going to believe that?"

"I made pretty good money off of it. We met them through the Stone Mountain rally. Afterwards they came down for a week and filmed here. They paid us in cash. It was a right amount of money, around six figures. Heather and a producing crew and cameraman came with about 18-20 people," said North Georgia White Knights Imperial Wizard Jeremy Philips. "We met the production TV people at the Stone Mountain rally. They paid me in cash. It was a right amount of money. Chris Buckley did the right thing. He got paid some cash, too, but they paid for him to get some counseling. They came with Heather and a producing crew, cameraman and producer and about 18- 20 people all together. They spent a week filming and then we took them to Mississippi."

"Jeremy called me and told me he wanted to turn the NGWK over to me and make me the Imperial Wizard because the TV show wanted to pay him a lot of money but he had to agree to give up his robes on camera," said a former Georgia Exalted Cyclops Klansman. "Jeremy said 'they would give me a bonus if I hung up my robes.' Jeremy told me he would become Grand Giant or Emperor. Jeremy wanted me to join the documentary. He said 'They want you to have a kid in the first year of filming.'"

"Jeremy called me back in March and wanted to turn the NGWK over to me—make me Imperial Wizard," he said. "'They said they would give me a bonus if I hung up my robes and resigned from the Klan'. He wanted to become Imperial Giant or Emperor but in no way was he giving up control of his Klan. That was just for the TV show. He had to sign a contract and to get paid agree to resign from the Klan by the end of the filming."

"Then Chris Buckley was suddenly appointed NGWK Imperial Knight Hawk. I had banished Buckley months before when he was an Exalted Cyclops. Chris has been to jail a half dozen times for beating up his wife. He is a meth head, a convicted felon, and wife beater. He used to be a prison guard but was fired for bringing drugs into the Georgia prison he worked as a guard in," said Wilder.

"Heather Downie from A&E contacted me twice over the last year to ask if I wanted to work on the documentary. I asked her how much we would get paid. She said 'We don't have a budget right now, but when we have one we will see that you get paid'," said Daryl Davis, a professional black blues musician and chronicler of the modern-day Klan who has spent decades meeting with Klansmen to understand the mindset of the white nationalist political movement. "She wanted me to reach out to my Klan sources to see if they would participate. It was a scripted Hollywood reality show. If I were part of it, it would undermine any credibility. What I do is real. I turned them down."

In addition to documents from the A&E TV production crew and interviews with more than 100 Ku Klux Klan participants and employees of the television series detailing illegal cash payments to the KKK to avoid IRS detection, the Disney owned broadcast network paid for Klan robes for underage children; recruited at least 13 previously not KKK members to be initiated into the Klan in pre-staged events for the A&E cameras; A&E staging of public demonstrations in front of local NAACP offices in Mississippi which cost local taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars in local law enforcement security arrangements; the staging of public demonstrations organized by the network in Indiana; A&E purchasing, and delivering lumber, burlap, and diesel fuel for cross burnings in at least four states; A&E renting busses to truck paid non-Klan members from other states to be initiated into the Ku Klux Klan for staged cross burnings in Tennessee paid for by A&E; and staged Klan demonstrations in Indiana led by a convicted registered sex offender who was paid by the broadcasting network to leaflet the home of an Indiana police chief.

A&E's film crew paid the convicted sex offender and Indiana KKK Grand Dragon Charles Snowden to "rent" his private property to film, purchased all materials to stage Klan events on his rented Indiana land, bought the lumber, burlap, bolts, twine for the KKK wooden crosses, the power tools to construct them, and the diesel fuel and kerosene to burn them, according to documents. A&E rented vehicles to transport Klan sympathizers from other states to maximize the attendance at gatherings, purchased food for outdoor Klan events, paid for hotel rooms to house them, and underwrote other "expenses" to ensure maximal KKK participation caught by their cameras, according to documents and multiple interviews of Klan members involved.

The A&E film production team also requested Snowden's twin sons, who they paid to be filmed on their 18th birthday joining the Ku Klux Klan, and rented a Cadillac Escalade and large mini-buses to transport them to equally pre-scripted Klan events held in Tennessee where they were filmed in KKK ceremonies initiating new members. A second Tennessee cross burning was held at the request of the production crew to re-shoot scenes, some as many as six times, which included repeating exact dialogue instructed by television executives to tell the story of the Klan as envisioned in Hollywood and New York.

Charles Snowden and his twin 18-year old sons signed written contracts with A&E to secure the usage of the film and paid them in cash for their participation, according to documents obtained in this investigation. The Snowden's were required to sign non-disclosure agreements which stated that they would each be liable to pay A&E $200,000 if they spoke publicly about the details of the making of the series and forfeited any legal right to contest payment of the penalty.

Charges of "Battery Resulting in Bodily Injury" were filed in Randolph, Indiana Superior Court against Charles K Snowden on June 3, 2016 when A&E had contracted the Snowdens. The police report charged Snowden senior with assaulting his stepson, Paul Farrow and "struck him with a knife causing bodily injury" and causing "cuts to two fingers," according to court documents. The police report said Snowden "lunged at him and he blocked the knife from going into his chest…and he got cut on two of his fingers. Paul stated that Charles also came after him with a shovel. Carolyn Mullens told deputies 'Charles did grab her by the throat' but refused 'sign a battery affidavit saying he did so'".

Dozens of other participants in the year and a half long A&E filming in at least nine states told similar stories.

A&E abruptly cancelled the reality TV series within hours of being contacted by this reporter in December 2016. Aengus James, the head of the A&E production company "This is Just a Test", said he aimed to have the television series "shine a spotlight on the insidious recruiting tactics" of the KKK.

Early on Wednesday evening August 24, 2016 a father and his two sons held a Ku Klux Klan rally on the courthouse steps in the small town of Winchester, Indiana. An eight-person television crew accompanied them and told local residents they were filming a documentary for the A&E network. The television crew outnumbered the three Klan members they had paid to stage the event, which brought out the entire six-person town police force and the mayor who dispersed the demonstrators after a spontaneous crowd of more than 100 citizens quickly gathered and confronted the KKK members yelling, "Get out of our town!"

Ten miles away from Winchester, Indiana, a KKK wooden cross was burned on a property in the rural county of Randolph near the Ohio and Kentucky state lines.

The isolated piece of land on the outskirts of Lynn, population 1097, is marked by rusted barbed wire fencing around the perimeter and the dirt driveway notable by unwelcoming signage warning "No Trespassing," "Beware of Dog" and "Private Property."

The name of the tenant, Charles Kevin Snowden, is spray-painted on the exterior aluminum siding of what Randolph County records describe as "a dilapidated mobile home" on the property.

The Snowden's, like all the Klan members and their families prominently featured in the TV series, were required to sign documents giving permission to A&E to conduct criminal background checks, according to more than 30 KKK members interviewed who participated in the making of the television series.

The unannounced event brought out the entire six-person town police force and the mayor who dispersed the demonstrators after a spontaneous crowd of more than 100 citizens quickly gathered and confronted the KKK members yelling, "Get out of our town!"

Four nights before and ten miles away from the unusual event in Winchester, a KKK wooden cross was burned on a property in the rural county of Randolph in southeastern Indiana near the Ohio and Kentucky state lines.

The isolated piece of land on the outskirts of Lynn, population 1097, is marked by rusted barbed wire fencing around the perimeter and the dirt driveway notable by unwelcoming signage warning "No Trespassing," "Beware of Dog" and "Private Property."

The same night of the cross burning, the town of Lynn was targeted in the pre-dawn early morning hours by a Klan recruiting drive of leaflets placed in plastic baggies weighted down by rocks and thrown on the lawns and front porches of residents, including one placed on the marked police car parked outside the home of the town police chief.

In the early morning hours of August 21 "I got one of those on my porch, and on my police car. I said, 'Are you kidding me?'" said Lynn police chief Brad Fisher. "Because it is definitely not welcome in our community. "

What linked all three events was they were staged at the request of the television series producers, according to KKK participants, law enforcement, and local officials.

"Of course the three events were all staged by A&E. That is what bothered me," said Randolph County Sheriff Ken Hendrickson in a January 5 interview. "The A&E news crews put on these Klan events so they could film them. How did they even know that they would happen? And how come they were already here?" asked Hendrickson. "A big film crew just doesn't happen to pass through rural Indiana that often. They arrived and left with the Klan. Of course the camera people were part of the KKK group. It was all staged for the cameras. That is our information."

Charles Snowden is well known to local Indiana law enforcement, according to interviews with Randolph County authorities, Lynn police, and Indiana and Ohio arrest and court records.

What A&E and the film production team neglected to reveal is that Charles Kevin Snowden is a registered sex offender in Indiana who was sentenced to four years in the Indiana state penitentiary in January 2003 for "sexual misconduct with a minor" and has been charged multiple times with physically assaulting both his sons and his wife, among other criminal charges and arrests in Indiana and Ohio spanning over the last 20 years through the present, according to Indiana and Ohio police and court records.

Law enforcement have been called several times to the property for "domestics and arguments between father and son," according to Lynn police Marshall Brad Fisher in an October 2016 interview with the Indiana Star Press newspaper.

The Snowden's, like all the Klan members and their families prominently featured in the TV series, were required to sign documents giving permission to A&E to conduct professional background checks, including of their criminal history, according to more than 30 KKK members who participated in the making of the television series and interviewed since late December.The television producers did give contracts and pay Klan members to say they were leaving the Klan. "They offered us cash bonuses if we agreed to give up our robes on camera", said Jeremy Philips, the Imperial Wizard of the North Georgia White Knights of the KKK. TV producers did present contracts of payment to Klan members if they would allow being filmed saying they were leaving the Klan

Other Klan members echoed Philips assertion.

"Filming starts June 18 (2016) in Pulaski TN. If you agree to come to Pulaski TN, I need a head count and I'll arrange a charter bus. Free camping and hiking, horse back riding, but I got to know by Monday morning about the buses," wrote the Ohio based Old Glory Knights of the KKK Imperial Wizard Chad Burris to the Imperial Wizard of the Traditionalist American Knights of the KKK in Missouri. "I told you brother give me a chance and I would get us a TV show and a movie shot and I did. I'll tell you a sneak peek-13 cross lightings, a huge circle around the ceremony grounds with 1000 torches lit up in a fiery circle with our drone footage from the sky. This is just the opening shots. We have an unlimited budget. They bought us 400 robes, like nicely done robes and a 1000 watt pa system. It's based on a Klansmen life and family, kinda like duck dynasty meets the KKK."

"Our understanding was that we we're going to get paid for the show," said Burris in an interview. "The only thing that they paid us for was to act as props for the camera. It was total lies and deception."

But documents show that James's production company paid Klan members to recite a pre-determined script approved by top A&E executives, using "insidious recruiting tactics."

"It appears the alt-right is united in celebrating this show as a hoax. How convenient for them," Aengus James wrote this reporter in response to a published article in Variety Magazine on December 30 2016 that caused the cancelling of the TV series. "I don't understand how you could run this article without saying the activists and crew you spoke to maintain its authenticity - or that Steven Howard did."

James was writing before Howard admitted he lied on the instruction of James's television production crew. "I realize and respect that television schedules and practices of pushing for results with a heavier hand may not fit your definition of authentic but it does for the vast majority of those who participated in this and in making it…I know no one who believes that it wasn't authentic."

"I have no desire to talk to you .You was lied to. I was never paid a dime but I wished they did. Whoever told you we was paid is lying and if you put out anything on me I will sue your ass," Howard wrote in a December 24, 2016 message.

Once the article was published the Hollywood executive ratcheted up his public relations offensive attempting to squash further reporting of the story.

"I urge you to not release this article. From the points you sent over, it contains inaccurate information and we urge you restraint and time to join us in looking into this. Please consider the effects of releasing inaccurate information that is being manipulated by members of the KKK," wrote Aengus James. "Thank you for considering this.

After the article was published, the A&E production company wrote "Mr. Thayer, I am receiving complaints that you are harassing staff, freelancers, and others associated with this series. Multiple people have told me that they've asked you to stop contacting them and have said they've asked you to stop lying about them. Where is your decency? You have a preconceived narrative that you are chasing. It is deeply unprofessional. Please stop harassing people in connection with this series as well as ex employees and others who are not even affiliated with this series," wrote James on January 2, 2017. "I respect your efforts to get people to comment but your actions are far beyond what is okay."

James CC'd the editor in chief of Variety Magazine, Andrew Wallenstein, in an effort to inhibit further reporting. "Andy, we look to you for support as well."

Aengus James told Broadcast.com the series was about "getting out of the Klan. We talked to dozens of families inside the Klan and focused on four families ultimately where we felt the struggle was most severe," said James. "We didn't film a lot of Klan members and families where there wasn't that internal debate about leaving. We wanted to be able to show how destructive that world is."

But none of the featured Klan members were "looking to leave the Klan", according more than 30 Klan members who participated in the making of the television series who were interviewed since late December.

At the time, Ku Klux Klan leader Steven Howard was sending threatening messages to James and A&E demanding payment saying he would go public with the networks practices unless "I get at least $100,000."

Dozens of documents, receipts, payments, text messages, emails, cashiers checks, and airline tickets show A&E and their production company paid for numerous members of the North Mississippi White Knights of the KKK to travel to racist gatherings in Pennsylvania Washington state, and Mississippi, as well as attending Howard's wedding in Washington State, when A&E paid for the wedding cake, the stretch limousine, and the hotels and travel expenses of Howard's KKK friends to come from Mississippi.

The network paid Howard in cash and deposited money in his wife's grandmother's bank account to launder the payments, according to bank and other documents obtained in this investigation.

After the publication of initial allegations in Variety magazine in December 2016, the A&E production company sent an IRS 1099 form to Howard in February 2017 showing payments of $21,150 to him after telling him for a year that the cash payments were not subject to IRS declaration, according to Howard and documents.

In March 2017, Howard complained, arguing he was now liable for several thousand dollars in taxes that the Hollywood network had assured him he did not have to pay and the television production company sent Howard several thousand dollars in blank U.S. Post Office money orders to cover the taxes Howard was now liable for, according to copies of the blank money orders, the 1099 IRS form sent to Howard, and interviews with Howard earlier this year.

"They just treated us like we were ignorant white trailer trash," Howard said. "And I am pissed."

A&E maintains they knew nothing about payments made to Ku Klux Klan participants in the 'documentary' series ''generation KKK". But the assertions are contradicted by documents exchanged between the network and the field production crew.

"Hey guys -Just spoke to Aengus & CCing him on this. On the network side, Evan Lerner will need to be sent all he hot sheets: [email protected]," wrote TIJAT senior executive Lauren Taylor in an email titled "Field Notes & Hot Sheet Distro" in June 2016.

Evan Lerner is a senior Vice President for A&E and Executive Producer Non-fiction/Alternative Programming at A&E Television in charge of the networks documentary division.

Several employees of TIJAT contracted and paid by A&E contacted this reporter to detail how the "documentary" they worked on was fabricated.

"The way TIJAT works is that they produce everything. Every moment is orchestrated as far as my observations have been. Telling people what to say is a normal practice as I experienced it," wrote one producer who requested anonymity. "I overheard Aengus discussing how payments were made to the Klan. I also overheard him saying they were misleading the group to think one thing when the series was to be televised as something completely different. This is unethical in producing. It is never OK to lie to the talent. It was only a matter of time before this would catch up to them. If it wasn't this series it would be another. He as warned paying the group was a bad idea on SO many levels."

"'Generation KKK' is produced for A&E Network by This Is Just A Test (TIJAT). Executive producers for TIJAT are Aengus James, Colin King Miller, Cynthia Childs and Paul Lima. Executive producers for A&E Network are Elaine Frontain Bryant, Amy Savitsky and Evan Lerner. A+E Networks holds international distribution rights for 'Generation KKK.' The series will premiere across A&E and Crime + Investigation channels in over 100 territories worldwide," reads an A&E official promotion released in December 2016.

"Our goal with this series has always been to expose and combat racism and hatred in all its forms," A&E said in a statement December 24, 2016. "However, A&E learned last night from the third-party producers who made the documentary that cash payments — which we currently understand to be nominal — were made in the field to some participants in order to facilitate access. While we stand behind the intent of the series and the seriousness of the content, these payments are a direct violation of A&E's policies and practices for a documentary. We had previously provided assurances to the public and to our core partners that no payment was made to hate group members, and we believed that to be the case at the time. We have now decided not to move forward with airing this project."

The network added "A&E takes the authenticity of its documentary programming and the subject of racism, hatred and violence very seriously. Just because this particular show goes away, the issues of hate in America do not. We will still seek to fight hate in America through on-air programming including town halls and documentary programs produced in partnership with civil rights organizations, as well as continue to work with the civil rights community to facilitate a deeper dialogue on ending hate through comprehensive educational and outreach campaigns."

A&E still denies they paid any Klan member for anything and maintain that the documentary series was a "pure documentary".

The allegations that "Generation KKK" film executives and producers paid Klan members to participate, instructed them on what to say in pre-scripted dialogue and narratives staged for cameras, are true, according to interviews with more than two-dozen Ku Klux Klan members who participated in the year and a half long filming in at least nine states.

Filming took place over more than a year across the country, and Klan participants who were filmed in Georgia, Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Washington state, and Ohio were interviewed. They said that producers routinely re-shot scenes in which paid KKK members were given specific dialogue by the film makers who asked them to repeat their lines verbatim during re-shooting of scenes; that non Klan members were portrayed as being members of the group; that teenagers were asked to become members and filmed participating in KKK ritual ceremonies including cross burnings performed to initiate new members; that family members who were members of the Klan were portrayed as non-members; that non-members of the Klan were portrayed as members; that producers asked members to falsely represent themselves as opposed to their family members involvement in the group; among other fictionalized filming designed to fit the pre-determined chosen narrative of the television producers to portray family tensions where some were being pressured to join the group and others were attempting to leave the KKK.

When A&E launched their heavily promoted public relations campaign on December 19 unveiling the eight one-hour episodes of the "Generation KKK" television series scheduled to first air January 10, 2017, the television executives portrayed the series as a "pure documentary."

Aengus James of This is Just a Test (TIJAT) said the series was about "getting out of the Klan. We talked to dozens of families inside the Klan and focused on four families ultimately where we felt the struggle was most severe," said James in a December interview with Broadcast.com. "We didn't [film] a lot of Klan members and families where there wasn't that internal debate [about leaving]. We wanted to be able to show how destructive that world is."

But according more than 30 Klan members who participated in the making of the television series who were interviewed since late December, none of the featured Klan members were "looking to leave the Klan."

But Klan Imperial Wizard Steven Howard says A&E asked him to recreate the NMWK and went into detail how he had already left the Klan when A&E approached him to star in the show. Howard provided an IRS 1099 tax form showing they paid him $21,150 in cash sent to him by the A&E production company addressed to Mississippi but which was sent to his new actual home in Washington State.

"If these Jews want me to work for them I deserve to be paid," said Howard. "I control the media. Ever since the A&E show, I control the Klan. I am the Klan," he boasted during one telephone interview.

"I don't want you to make me look good. I am not asking you to take my side. I respect you have a job to do. Just be honest and be fair. Don't throw me under the bus if I don't deserve it," Steven Howard said. "I told A&E from day one I needed to be paid. I told them I wanted to be famous. I told them I wanted to be the next Kardashian, the next Duck Dynasty." ■

Originally published on nate-thayer.com (Dec 2017). Recovered via the Wayback Machine.