Two weeks ago, at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), Youth for Western Civilization hosted a panel titled, “Will Immigration Kill the GOP?”
Youth for Western Civilization (YWC) is a group that debuted at CPAC in 2009 and aims to defend western culture on college campuses.
According to Devin Saucier, the vice president of the national YWC chapter and president of the Vanderbilt chapter, “We also held a wildly successful panel discussion featuring Congressmen Tancredo, Goode, and Barletta, as well as Bay Buchanan and our president Kevin DeAnna on the subject of whether immigration will kill the GOP.”
Former U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo has been a prominent spokesperson for Youth for Western Civilization. In February 2009, YWC sponsored a lecture by Tancredo on the campus of American University in Washington, D.C. Tancredo spoke on “Immigration Reform and the Need for Assimilation.”
Tancredo founded the House Immigration Reform Caucus (IRC), an organization deeply tied to white nationalist John Tanton.
An array of anti-immigrant organizations founded or funded by John Tanton over the last 30 years has come to be known as the Tanton Network. Known for his promotion of racial eugenics, Tanton is also considered the father of today’s most powerful anti-immigrant movement.
Not only does YWC collaborate with Tanton Network leadership, its website recommends books by both Mark Krikorian of Center for Immigration Studies (another group founded by John Tanton) and Peter Brimelow, founder of white nationalist website Vdare.com.
Youth for Western Civilization is collaborating with the Tanton Network to bring anti-immigrant messages to college campuses. The group’s ideology represents a small fragment of political extremism that is attempting to interject itself into mainstream dialogue on immigration.
While the country grapples with immigration policy, groups like Youth for Western Civilization are framing important discussions about what it means to be an American and what America should look like.
YWC’s collaboration with the Tanton Network and white nationalists should raise concern on campuses across the country.