Phoenix, AZ, July 20, 2010 ... The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today condemned the recent activities of neo-Nazi J.T. Ready and his "citizen patrols" of the border, and lamented the lack of community outrage over those patrols.

Ready has long held ties with neo-Nazi groups, most recently the National Socialist Movement (NSM), a group ADL calls one of the largest of its kind in America.  The NSM clings to an ideology that only non-Jewish, white heterosexuals should be American citizens and that everyone who isn't white should leave the country "peacefully or by force." 

Miriam Weisman, Regional Board Chair, and Bill Straus, ADL Arizona Regional Director, issued the following statement:

ADL is always concerned when insufficiently trained or untrained groups take it upon themselves to enforce our laws.  But when those groups are directed by J.T. Ready, or anyone who for that matter adheres to such a hateful ideology, that concern is heightened, and the potential for violence escalates, appreciably.

ADL is also profoundly disappointed at the lack of community outrage over this despicable situation.  Regardless of where one stands on the issue of illegal immigration, our hope would be that the community can at least come together in condemning law enforcement by neo-Nazis.

 

At the same time it condemned Ready and the patrols, the ADL commended Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu for his weekend comments discouraging Ready and "those who espouse hatred or bigotry such as his" from continuing the patrols.