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ADL Ran A "Multi-Dimensional Counterintelligence Operation" To Destroy The John Birch Society
The Anti-Defamation League ran an "extensive, multi-dimensional counterintelligence operation" complete with "undercover agents with code names" to destroy the influential anti-communist John Birch Society, internal ADL documents reveal.
George Washington University professor Matthew Dallek was given access to "some" of the ADL's records on the spying operation from their historical archive for his new book, "Birchers: How the John Birch Society Radicalized the American Right."
From The Jewish Telegraphic Agency, "The historian who uncovered the ADL's spying operation against the far-right John Birch Society":
[Mathew] Dallek, who grew up in a Reform Jewish household in Los Angeles, recently sat with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency to discuss the rise of the Birchers, how the ADL infiltrated their ranks and whether such tactics are justified in the name of fighting extremism.
[...] JTA: Before we get into the Jewish aspect of the book, meaning the chapter on the Anti-Defamation League's relationship with the John Birch Society, let's take a step back. Who are so-called Birchers? Why do they matter?
Mathew Dallek: The John Birch Society was a household name in the 1960s, becoming the emblem of far-right extremism. It didn't have huge numbers, but it did penetrate the culture and the national consciousness...
As you were researching, you came across a trove of historical internal documents from the ADL in the archives of the American Jewish Historical Society in New York. Why did you devote a chapter to what you found in those documents? What did those files reveal to you about the John Birch Society?
These papers are a goldmine. They're this incredible and often detailed window into the far-right and, in particular, the John Birch Society. They show the ADL had an extensive, multi-dimensional counterintelligence operation that they were running against the Birch Society.
People knew at the time that the ADL was attending events where Birchers were speaking. But the ADL also had undercover agents with code names, who were able to infiltrate the society's headquarters in Belmont, Massachusetts, and various chapter officers. They dug up financial and employment information about individual Birchers. And they not only used the material for their own newsletters and press releases, but they also fed information to the media...
There certainly were other threats at the time, but the Birch Society was seen by liberal critics, including the ADL, as a very secretive group that promoted conspiracy theories about communists who often became conflated with Jews.
Would you consider the ADL successful in its campaign against the Birchers?
They were successful. They used surreptitious and in some cases underhanded means to expose the antisemitism...
The ADL was at the tip of the spear of a liberal coalition that included the White House, sometimes the Department of Justice, depending on the issue, the NAACP, Americans for Democratic Action, labor unions, the union-backed Group Research Inc., which was tracking the far-right as well. The ADL was one of the most, if not the most effective at constraining and discrediting the society...
Former FBI Director James Comey in 2014 delivered a speech which he described as a "love letter" to the ADL and in 2017 he told ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt during another speech, "Three years later I can say, from the perspective of the FBI, we're still in love with you."
"You have advocated for voting rights and immigration issues," Comey said. "You have fought against anti-Muslim prejudice and cyber bullying. You have stood up for LGBT and gender equality. You have pushed and prodded for hate crime legislation. And you have helped us identify and track domestic and international terrorist threats. And for all of that, we are grateful."
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