White Advocacy Past and Present

“We need a white Jesse Jackson.”

That was my first thought when I confronted racial reality in the late 1980s. After growing up in a nearly all-white New England town, I quickly realized that blacks weren’t like they were portrayed in movies and on TV. The reverse was true as well: white Southerners, in general, were the nicest, most friendly, and most helpful people I had ever met—not the mean, violent monsters Hollywood depicts.

So, I learned early on that all American institutions were anti-white. I wanted to push back, so I decided to get involved. In 1996, after seeing an ad in American Renaissance, I joined the Council of Conservative Citizens (CofCC).

The CofCC was the only white advocacy group around at that time. I would later learn that many of its leaders had previously belonged to the Citizens Councils of America, a group that opposed the “civil rights” movement in the 1960s.

Through its local chapters across the country, the CofCC eventually built a network of dues-paying members in all 50 states, with active chapters in many of them. The organization distributed a bi-monthly newspaper, The Citizens Informer, to members, detailing the activities of each chapter. Meetings frequently featured speakers and local politicians who addressed the group. Some of the more active chapters organized rallies and protests either supporting or opposing legislation. The CofCC became especially known for defending Confederate flags and monuments threatened with removal by Leftists. It also protested immigration and demographic replacement, anti-white crimes, and affirmative action.

Though people mostly associated the CofCC with the South, the organization was headquartered in Missouri. Gordon Baum served as the group’s president, and I came to know him quite well. A veteran of George Wallace’s 1968 presidential campaign, he assumed much of the day-to-day leadership when the Council formed in the late 1980s. Gregarious and folksy, yet smart and dedicated, Gordon seemed like a character from a Mark Twain novel. He managed the organization while maintaining a career as a lawyer. Skilled at navigating the petty infighting that seems to plague all Right-wing movements, he also represented the group effectively in media interviews. Although he passed away in 2015, Gordon Baum remains an unsung hero of the Dissident Right.

The CofCC hosted two annual national meetings that drew hundreds of attendees. Sam Francis, Jared Taylor, and Sam Dickson regularly spoke at these events, while politicians such as Bob Barr and Kirk Fordice also addressed the group alongside numerous state-level representatives. Though retired from politics by then, John Rarick, Lester Maddox, and John Schmitz attended and spoke at several national and local meetings. Jesse Helms and Trent Lott never appeared as speakers, but both published columns (almost certainly written by their staff) in The Citizens Informer.

Sam Francis was in his element at CofCC events and consistently drew large crowds. As editor of The Citizens Informer, he played a central role in the organization, but more importantly, the Council embodied his grand strategy of mobilizing Middle American Radicals (MARs). In his 1997 book Revolution from the Middle, Sam defined MARs voters in terms that resembled the CofCC members I knew during the late 1990s and early 2000s:

Middle American Radicals are essentially middle-income, white, often ethnic voters who see themselves as an exploited and dispossessed group, excluded from meaningful political participation, threatened by the tax and trade policies of the government, victimized by its tolerance of crime, immigration, and social deviance, and ignored or ridiculed by the major cultural institutions of the media and education.

Sam Francis wrote a column about the CofCC that they used in recruiting efforts.

Much like Sam himself, the group embraced conservative positions on most issues. What set it apart, however, was its explicit defense of white people. Because of this, the CofCC attracted powerful enemies and was monitored by witch finders like the ADL and SPLC. In 1999, the organization attracted national attention—and condemnation from President Clinton—after reports surfaced that Rep. Bob Barr of Georgia had spoken at a 1998 meeting. Barr, of course, quickly backed down saying, “the racial views of the C.C.C. are repugnant to me, and I would never have spoken to the group had I known beforehand of its stand.”

This elicited the following quip from Joe Sobran: “It’s true I addressed them [the CofCC] some years ago. But I should state here, for the record, that I would never have accepted their invitation if I had known then of their associations with Republican leaders.”

Perhaps because of this media firestorm, C-SPAN covered the CofCC’s 1999 national conference in northern Virginia.

Today, the CofCC appears to be defunct as links to the website do not work. They last appeared in the news in 2015 when Dylan Roof revealed in his manifesto that he first learned the truth about black-on-white crime from the CofCC website. When pressed by the media, Earl Holt III, the president of the group at the time, condemned the attack but stated that their website “accurately and honestly reports black-on-white violent crime.”

The CofCC fought back for whites at a time when few did. Members of the group were ordinary middle- and working-class Americans. Yet they told the truth about race without regard to the consequences.

White Advocacy Today

A slogan the CofCC often used in its advertisements was “Fighting Back—and Winning!” While the CofCC certainly fought back, in truth they seldom won. White advocacy was taboo and there was not one institution on our side. But times are changing for the better.

The White Civil Advocacy Group was launched in March of this year. Under their mission statement they proclaim, “We believe that by working together for our own interests we can push back against discrimination and bias faced by White Americans in many areas of society. Our mission is to make White advocacy socially acceptable, politically relevant, and free from economic repercussions. We will lay the groundwork and pave the way for a new generation of professional and effective White advocacy in the United States.”

This certainly sounds promising. A look at the group’s website shows they are still in the organizing phase. Yet they plan to focus on things such as building a legal network to defend whites, organizing pressure campaigns targeting legislation and corporate initiatives, creating a political lobbying group for whites, and holding schools and universities accountable for anti-white discrimination.

They are recruiting volunteers and those interested can sign up for a newsletter or follow on X to keep track of their progress.

The founder of the group is C. Jay Engel, a paleoconservative who is a frequent guest on podcasts across the Dissident Right. In a recent interview with Kevin DeAnna, Engel explained that he asked Grok to identify organizations advocating for groups such as blacks, Asians, Muslims, Hispanics, and others. The AI tool quickly produced multiple organizations representing those interests. But when he asked it to identify groups advocating for whites, Grok couldn’t name any and instead directed him to the SPLC website!

Can the White Civil Advocacy Group succeed where previous white advocacy organizations failed? I believe there are three reasons for optimism.

First, the rise of social media and a growing Dissident Right sphere of influence means literally millions can be reached with pro-white messaging. Thirty years ago, white advocates were completely shut out of the media. Print newsletters and some talk radio shows were the only ways to spread the facts about anti-whiteness. This recent ability to bypass the media means that groups like the SPLC—who controlled discussions about race through their connections to journalists—can do far less damage. In fact, as I write this The House Judiciary Committee is holding hearings on how the SPLC “manufactured hate.”

Second, unlike the 1990s when there were zero elites who supported whites, today there are several. Elon Musk, President Trump, and numerous politicians and influencers now regularly criticize anti-whiteness on social media and elsewhere. Only a few years ago, Matt Walsh likely would have lost his job for producing documentaries that challenged prevailing narratives about slavery and the civil rights movement. Today, millions watch and share his work.

Third, rather than centering its efforts on protests, meetings, and rallies, the White Civil Advocacy Group appears focused on exercising power within institutions. By pursuing influence within politics, government, education, the legal system, corporations, and elsewhere, the group aims to ensure that white interests—as defined by whites—have organized representation.

It is surprising that a white advocacy group has not emerged over the past decade. Every single week now, I come across a new pro-white podcast, You Tube streamer or writer I had never heard of before. Many are quite young, which is an excellent sign for our movement. What is lacking is a unified advocacy group that can speak for whites and unite these efforts. If the White Civil Advocacy Group succeeds it will fill a major void. It will also signal that whites are now truly ready to fight back – and win.

https://counter-currents.com/2026/05/white-advocacy-past-and-present