Jack Buckby

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Jack Buckby (1993–) is an English Islamophobe, anti-vaxxer, conspiracy theorist,^{[note 1]} white nationalist and former British National Party member. In 2012 he tried to rebrand white nationalism as culturalism, but failed; he formerly worked for The Rebel Media,^[1] widely considered alt-right. He holds extreme anti-Islam views, such as wanting to close down all mosques in the UK and stop Muslim immigration.^[2]

In 2017, Buckby became associated with For Britain, a far-right anti-Islam political party.^[3]

Post-2019 Buckby claims to have "left the far-right" and be no longer political-party aligned, but identifies as a small-c conservative.^[4] He has recently tried to re-invent himself as a "counter-extremism researcher", writing a book "recounting his experiences amongst far-right terrorists and extremists".^[5] The problem is there's no evidence he gave up his extremist views; he still regularly tweets extreme Islamophobia, wants to ban Muslims from entering Europe and claims to support a "strong immigration policy" that is based on race and is "pro-European identity".^[6]

Buckby was denied a visa to travel to the US. He appealed the decision legally by suing the US Department of Homeland Security in November 2018.^[7] US Federal Court records show that in March 2019, Buckby voluntarily dismissed the lawsuit, with prejudice, thus forbidding him from refiling the case. ^[8]

In 2020, Buckby became a staunch critic of Black Lives Matter on social media,^[9][10][11] describing BLM as "fighting largely imaginary racism".^[12]

Buckby is currently an article writer for the Frontier Centre for Public Policy, a right-wing Canadian think tank that promotes global warming denial and residential school apologia. He published an article for the Frontier Centre in January 2020 criticising carbon neutrality (net-zero carbon emissions).^[13]

In 2023, Buckby reinvented himself as an anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist and supporter of the anti-vaccination movement. He has endorsed Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for president and published a book titled The Truth Teller: RFK Jr. and the Case for a Post-Partisan Presidency. In 2024, he published articles supporting Kennedy' presidential campaign.^[14][15]

Background[edit]

A far-right racist, Buckby grew up supporting the BNP as young as 16 and supported the party after he saw Nick Griffin appear on Question Time in October 2009; he later joined the party as a member. He has praised Nick Griffin in the past, and was once thought to be a possible successor to the British National Party, described by Vice magazine in February 2013 as "Britain's Next Nick Griffin" and the "Boy Wonder of the British Far-Right":^[16]

I initially got involved with the BNP in high school. I wasn’t very political, but I had my opinions, as everyone does. I saw Nick Griffin and the real bias that he was facing on the television and I thought, 'That can’t be right.' I did my own research and thought, 'Shit, I agree with him. He actually seems like a good bloke.' I started supporting it and went through college being the notorious BNP guy. It was later that I met Nick and started talking about these culturist ideas.

While a member of the BNP, Buckby stated he agreed with the racial aspect of the BNP's ideology, i.e. white nationalism, and that he believes UK should always remain majority white British and he doesn't consider immigrants born in UK as natives; Buckby, however, has argued the party should focus more on culture, than biological race, to appeal to more voters and sound less-racist and therefore was a moderniser within the party:

Currently there's this idea that the BNP is racist, as I’m sure you know. I don’t believe that. I just believe that every country should be populated predominantly by its own people. I do believe in the racial aspect of that. And, in my opinion, that’s not race hate, it’s just realism. What I would bring to the party is I’d take away this constant race issue, because I don’t think that’s the biggest issue in Britain. I mean, it is an issue, but there are other problems as well and I think the best thing for the party to do is to focus on culture.

Buckby has been a target of Liverpool anti-fascists who have criticized his racism, opposition to gay marriage and immigration, and Islamophobia:

Mr. Buckby administers two blogs and also has his own Youtube channel, the latter containing pronouncements such as ‘Gay marriage is wrong’ or ‘White people are never seen as a race that has its own homeland’. The blogs are equally suffused with such ideas, including the entirety of Enoch Powell's notorious ‘rivers of blood’ speech from 1968 which stoked racial hatred and envisaged racial violence as the outcome of immigration to Britain. Mr. Buckby’s assessment: ‘Enoch Powell was right’. He consistently attacks multiculturalism from the standpoint that so-called ‘race mixing’ will lead to a ‘monoculture’ and a ‘monorace’. Hardly the words of someone who claims not to be racist. Other forays into social media such as Mr. Buckby’s Twitter account (New Nationalist) contain posts such as ‘Liverpools in a right multicultural mess’ (22 May 2012) and ‘Travelling in outskirts of London. Terrible multicultural, third world slum’ (23 Jun 2012).^[17]

In 2011, Buckby was asked on Twitter about his views on immigration to UK; he responded he has no problem with immigrants who are white settling because they are of the same "ancestral stock" as white British, but said he opposes mass immigration from non-white races because "It destroys races, and hence destroys diversity."^[18] This reveals his opposition to certain types of immigrants is entirely based on race and white nationalism ideology; later however Buckby (influenced by the PVV) would focus on opposing Muslim immigration.

National Culturists[edit]

In June 2012 Buckby founded the National Culturists (NC) describing it as an "anti-egalitarian and socially conservative" group for young people who oppose multiculturalism, particularly university students.^[19] At the time, Buckby was a student at the University of Liverpool and attended in September 2012 a Freshers' Fair at the university to promote the NC group, but was met with anti-fascist opposition; Buckby enlisted a far-right skinhead as a bodyguard.^[20][21] Despite Buckby claiming the NC was not racist, he was a member of the British National Party and the NC had strong links to the BNP.^[22] Buckby in October 2012 said he considered "him [Nick Griffin] a friend."^[23] Furthermore, the NC’s Facebook page contained a racist cartoon, with the phrase “White people have the right to exist as white people. Be White" and other white nationalist imagery, or slogans.^[24] Buckby was exposed on Instagram posting crude racism about Obama, calling him a "nigger", as well as using homophobic slurs, criticizing interracial relationships and posting a white pride Stormfront-style cross.^[25] Commentating on his personal blog, Buckby also made more racist statements such as criticizing the idea of a "coffee coloured global civilisation" through "race mixing".^[26]

BNP links[edit]

The NC was endorsed by Nick Griffin, chairman of the BNP, and most its members were BNP party activists:

Buckby has met with the BNP’s Nick Griffin on a number of occasions and has called him his “favourite British politician of all time”. He is described as the organisation’s chairman and appears to work alongside a small number of like-minded students. Matthew Penny, announced as the organisation’s treasurer on 10th August 2012, also wrote a piece for the NC website about ‘biased teaching’ in which he openly declares that he supports the BNP. It also appears that the group has a presence outside of Liverpool, with a student and BNP activist called Emmerson Collier at the University of Birmingham being announced as the group’s Director of Communications on 10th August 2012.^[27]

In July 2012, Buckby addressed a meeting in Chester with Nick Griffin, and other members of the far-right Alliance of European National Movements, including Bruno Gollnisch of the Front National and Jobbik politicians; both Gollnisch and Griffin are Holocaust deniers, while Jobbik are virulently anti-Semitic. Buckby is quoted as saying in his speech:

In other words, Buckby's so-called culturalism was a strategy to rebrand white nationalism and make it more palatable to voters and youths by sounding more moderate in public discourse (by talking of culture and not race), while in private retaining the hardcore racist ideology of the British National Party; this same technique was used to a lesser extent by Nick Griffin when he modernised the BNP in the 2000s, which led the party to winning council seats across England; Buckby wanted to modernise the BNP even further, like the FN.

Closing down mosques[edit]

Buckby's National Culturists in 2012 had an anti-Islam policy even more extreme than the BNP's to close down all mosques in UK.^[29] BNP policy (based on their 2010 GE Manifesto) in contrast was to prevent any further mosques being built, but not close existing mosques. Buckby and the NC also supported the "de-Islamisation of UK" and to ban the burqa.

Terrorism[edit]

Jack Buckby with neo-Nazi terrorist Jack Renshaw.

The NC did not distinguish between ordinary law-abiding Muslims in UK and Islamism or Muslim extremists; Buckby caused outrage when he said the Lee Rigby killing in Woolwich was "a perfect example of what Islam is all about" and argued virtually all Muslims are terrorists.^[30] While accusing Muslims of terrorism, some members of the National Culturists themselves went on to be convicted for terrorism and other serious offences; Craig Cooke, the NC's North West Regional Organiser was jailed for going to a man’s home armed with a knife and two Molotov cocktails; police found Nazi paraphernalia and far-right literature in his bedroom.^[31] Another NC activist who appears in a 2012 photo shaking Jack Buckby's hand, Jack Renshaw was a member of the BNP as well as a neo-Nazi terrorist organisation, National Action; the NA was proscribed under the Terrorism Act 2000. Renshaw was arrested by counter-terrorism police for extreme anti-Semitism such as threatening to kill Jews.^[32][33]

Liberty GB[edit]

In May 2013 the BNP fully collapsed in terms of votes in the local elections that year, losing nearly all its remaining councillors, with most former BNP voters turning to UKIP; Buckby left the party around the same time and looked for a new party to attach the National Culturists to. Since UKIP banned former BNP members from joining them, he chose Liberty GB - a "counter-jihad" crank party founded by Paul Weston that splintered from UKIP.^[34] He was quickly made their press-officer and wrote an article on their website in June 2013:

On present demographic trends, we can see that within a matter of decades Muslims could easily become an overall majority in Britain. At the very least they will dominate many of our biggest towns and cities, centres of power from which they will be able to impose sharia law, a system which allows no rights for women, no rights for gays and no rights for animals; indeed no respect for any culture but the oppressive culture that comes with the political ideology — not religion — of Islam.^[35]

Ironically, Buckby who openly opposes gay marriage and has criticized homosexuality and bisexuality on Twitter such a retweeting a homophobic "DON'T CATCH AIDS!!! Don't have sex with…" poster^[36]), now claims Muslims are homophobic and a threat to LGBT; this was an electoral tactic first used by Marine Le Pen to try to attract gay or transgender voters to the Islamophobic Front National as part of her dédiabolisation strategy. While the FN has had success achieving this, Liberty GB, none whatsoever, with Buckby embarrassingly receiving only 0.13% of votes when he stood in the European elections in 2014 to represent South East England. Buckby was beaten by the BNP candidate, who received 0.72%.

View on Jewish people[edit]

Jack Buckby with Holocaust denier Bruno Gollnisch and another National Culturist member at the July 2012 AENM conference; Buckby used to associate himself with anti-Semites before he reinvented himself as a philo-semite, influenced by Geert Wilders.

Similar to Peter Sweden, Buckby has shifted his public statements and opinion on Jews, from anti-Semitic to philo-Semitic after realising Islamophobic right-wing populist parties like Party for Freedom (that are anti-Islam, but pro-Israel) perform a lot better in elections than traditional far-right parties.^[37] Buckby's National Culturists were anti-Semitic, with members posting conspiracy theories about Jews being behind cultural Marxism and having links to anti-Semitic groups.^[38] While in the BNP, Buckby also associated himself with Holocaust deniers like Nick Griffin and Bruno Gollnisch and never criticized their anti-Semitism, but after distancing the NC from the BNP, Buckby reinvented himself as a philo-Semite who opposes the far-right and is pro-Israel, and made up a story that the far-right despise him:

The above comment was made in April 2013, yet less than a month earlier Buckby was praising Nick Griffin and was still a BNP member.^[39] What really changed Buckby's mind about the BNP was the fact they were wiped out in the local elections and he needed a new political home. Although Buckby posted in April he had "nothing to do" anymore with the far-right he made contacts with the Traditional Britain Group, that attracted the most extreme-right individuals in UK, and was invited to their conferences.^[40] In August 2013, Buckby had Gregory Lauder-Frost added as a friend on his Facebook account.^[41] Frost is a white nationalist and Metapedia admin who has made plenty of racist and anti-Semitic comments, such as describing the broadcaster Vanessa Feltz, as a "fat Jewish s**g".^[42]

Culturist Hub[edit]

Realising the National Culturists had baggage by being associated with the BNP, Buckby while a member of Liberty GB changed the name to Culturist Hub and labelled himself as a (short-c) conservative to appear as a non-extremist.^[43][44] Buckby wrote an essay about his experiences in the BNP titled "The BNP Danger",^[45] making up a story that while he joined the British National Party and moved up the ranks within the party, and was a close ally of Nick Griffin, he never believed in their racism or anti-Semitism.^{Do You Believe That?} Buckby now tries to sell himself as a "moderate conservative" and right-wing populist who is despised by both the far-right and far-left, despite his political views are blatantly far-right himself:

Despite trying to present himself as a moderate, Buckby was expelled from the University of Liverpool for his Islamophobic and racist views then made a video in May 2014 ranting about the university calling the decision to expel him as somehow communist.^[46] In October 2015, Buckby made an appearance on the TV-documentary "Is Britain Racist?" on BBC Three.^[47] The documentary exposed Buckby as a white nationalist who rejects non-white people as British, even those born in the UK, thus destroying his fake image as a moderate:

At one point in the documentary Mona meets Jack Buckby, a press officer for Liberty GB - a far right party that claims to ‘endeavour to put a stop to our rapidly accelerating descent into economic, educational, moral, cultural and social ruin.’ Jack refuses to accept that Britain is Mona’s ‘native homeland’ despite her being born here.^[48]

Batley and Spen by-election 2016[edit]

Jack Buckby baked a cake for the Labour Party candidate Tracey Brabin with the iced words "Muslim rape gangs" on it as an election stunt.^[49]

Buckby stood as a candidate for Liberty GB in the Batley and Spen by-election, after the murder of Labour MP Jo Cox in June 2016.^[50][51][52] The by-election was very unusual since the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats, Green Party and UKIP (who had all previously contested the seat) chose to not stand candidates, out of respect to Cox. Since these other parties decided to not contest the by-election, Buckby originally thought it would be only a contest between him versus Labour and that he could obtain a high vote share; he wrote on his website: "I am the only candidate willing to talk about the evils of Islam" and would mostly focus on the issue of Muslim grooming-gangs.^[53] However, eight more candidates contested the election, including the English Democrats, National Front and BNP, all focusing on similar anti-Islam campaigns. Buckby polled only 1.1% of votes, and was beaten by the ED's (4.8%) and BNP (2.7%); Labour easily retained the seat with 85.8%. Jo Cox's husband was pleased that the far-right candidates, including Buckby, lost their deposits.^[54] Buckby's dismal vote was not only the result of his extreme and cranky anti-Islam views, but the fact he had controversially tweeted homophobic statements about the Orlando mass shooting such as "Sick of all these crocodile tears from leftist and LGBT groups. YOU are responsible for the murder of over 50 gays in Orlando."^[55] for which he was criticized by Pink News.^[56] While writing such statements and openly opposing gay marriage, Buckby (adopting the FN's strategy) tried to appeal to gay voters by putting out leaflets describing Islam as anti-LGBT.

UKIP leadership election, 2017[edit]

Buckby is banned from joining UKIP for his ex-BNP membership, but he was the campaign manager for the anti-Islam political activist Anne Marie Waters who stood in the UK Independence Party leadership election, 2017.^[57][58] Waters was not successful in becoming leader (coming second place) and then set up her own anti-Islam party named For Britain; in December 2017 Liberty GB deregistered with the electoral commission and its members, including Buckby, joined For Britain:

We believe Anne Marie Waters' recently launched party, For Britain, can best provide that focal point. For Britain occupies much the same political ground as Liberty GB and presently has the momentum, following Anne Marie's recent UKIP leadership bid. Certainly, it makes little sense to have two similar parties competing.^[59]

Moderate UKIP members, who are Eurosceptic, but not Islamophobic dislike Buckby and Waters, arguing the party was "saved" from being taken over by racists, Nazis and fascists, when Waters failed to win the leadership election, losing to Henry Bolton.^[60][61][62] However under the leadership of Gerrard Batten (who replaced Bolton), UKIP has shifted to the hard-right and is almost now a far-right party, having recently supported Tommy Robinson, increasingly become more Islamophobic and have allowed people like Paul Joseph Watson to join the party.^[63][64] Farage has been critical of this, while at least one moderate UKIP MEP resigned in opposition to Batten's support for Robinson and the FLA.^[65]

Post-2019, reinventing himself as a "counter-extremist"[edit]

Post-2019, Buckby claims to have distanced himself from the far-right and now says he is against extremism and opposes neo-Nazis, having written a book on his past-experiences in the BNP. He claims to have become a more moderate right-winger and a conservative. This probably stems from someone in 2018, compiling a detailed history of his racism and praise for Holocaust denier Nick Griffin,^[67] former views he says he's embarrassed about. There is no evidence Buckby has genuinely abandoned his old beliefs and he still associates with far-right Islamophobic activists, while still tweeting he opposes Islamic immigration and supports a "strong immigration policy" that is "pro-European identity":

The centerpiece of Buckby's rebranding campaign is a book, Monster of Their Own Making: How the Far Left, the Media, and Politicians are Creating Far-Right Extremists. This was published in 2020 by Bombardier Books^[69], an imprint of the conservative publisher Post Hill Press. Other writers on its roster include prominent Islamophobes such as Milo Yiannopoulos^[70], Robert Spencer^[71], Melanie Phillips^[72], offering skeptics valid reasons to question the legitimacy of Buckby's supposed departure from the anti-Muslim bigotry that attracted him to the far-right in the first place.

Buckby appeared on Channel 4 News about far-right extremism on 10 June 2020 describing himself as a "counter-extremist".^[73]

Buckby thinks that a person's sexual orientation can make them a far-left extremist. ^[74]

Buckby has also made it clear in 2020 that his views on Islam haven't changed. When he was challenged on about his past racist rants on the Gavin McInnes' show, Buckby's reply was:

On July 21 2020, Buckby appeared on Jeff Schoep's YouTube channel to discuss his deradicalization^[76]. Schoep was the chairman of the National Socialist Movement from 1994 to 2019, and is currently trying to reinvent himself as a 'peace advocate', 'extremism consultant', and 'classic liberal'. In the interview, Schoep and Buckby bond over their shared desire to sanitize their reputations after years of deep involvement with the far-right. They both decry credible counter-extremism researchers as 'far-left', blame the emergence of the alt-right on 'far-left' activists, complain at length about Black Lives Matter, and whine that their Islamophobic views are unfairly excluding them from mainstream counter-extremist institutions.

Whitewashing his involvement in the BNP[edit]

Buckby was interviewed by Four Freedoms^[77] in September 2020 about the British National Party. In the video, Buckby whitewashes his involvement with the BNP and makes a number of dubious claims and inaccurate statements. Although Buckby admits to being a former BNP member, he questionably claims in the video that he had no idea the BNP was racist when joining^{Do You Believe That?} and alleges the majority of BNP members he met in the party were not racists but normal people (doubtful considering several former BNP councillors and activists had left the party after noting racist language was commonplace at meetings,^[78] there exists "a vein of Holocaust denying within the BNP"^[79] and the party is "institutionally racist").^[80] Another dubious claim Buckby makes is he rejected the hardcore racism and anti-Semitism in the party and only joined because he held working-class concerns about immigration after watching Nick Griffin on Question Time in 2009. Buckby also claims he supported civil-partnerships when a member of the BNP and has described himself as a "moderniser" on issues such as LGBT rights. However, Buckby has a long history of opposing LGBT, including tweeting that the Orlando nightclub shooting was the fault of LGBT people.^[81] According to Pink News, "Buckby appears to have removed previous YouTube videos he recorded opposing same-sex marriage and LGBT rights."^[82]

Twitter deletion spree[edit]

In March 2021, Buckby locked his Twitter (X) account and began deleting his old offensive tweets. His account was later unlocked; as of 2023, he now describes himself politically as a "moderate".^[83]

Alleged recantation of far-right extremism[edit]

In 2022, Political Research Associates published an article which doubts Buckby has truly renounced his racist beliefs and extremism:

Although some P/CVE organizations warn against making “being a former a career path or new identity in itself,” many have capitalized on their status by selling books, creating pay-to-view YouTube channels, and even launching merchandise shops. For example, despite his continued promotion of Islamophobic and xenophobic views, former member of the far-right British Nationalist Party Jack Buckby published a book with Simon and Schuster in 2020, drawing on his experiences as a “former” extremist and rebranding himself as a “counter extremism researcher.” Alarmingly, as a recent study from German researchers Antje Gansewig and Maria Walsh indicates, some “formers” who have engaged in P/CVE programming (like informative talks in schools) “might not have completed the deradicalization process” before engaging in programming targeting children and teens. The attention and prominence formers can achieve through these rebrands may also encourage some formers to upsell or fabricate their involvement in these movements as a way to gain more publicity.^[84]

Notes[edit]

References[edit]