The first year of Donald Trump’s second term in office was marked by the rapid implementation of his far-right program. From ICE to DOGE, from anti-DEI to anti-antifa, and from bombing boats to $400 million bribes, Trump’s regime has turned out even more extreme than feared after he was elected to a second term in November 2024. His words and actions as president have been covered extensively over the past year, as have those of a number of internal advisers and outside confidants, like Stephen Miller and Steve Bannon. However, the grassroots far right, and its influence over the administration, has received far less attention.
One of Trump’s first acts of his second term was to pardon the hundreds of people who were arrested, and in many cases convicted, for their role in the January 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol. Once pardoned, many of these individuals wasted no time in calling for retribution against the FBI and prosecutors and trying to sue the government. Several have been subsequently arrested for crimes including kidnapping and child molestation.
But the most important event for the far right in 2025 was the assassination of Charlie Kirk. Head of the right-wing Turning Point USA, or TPUSA, a political action group focused on young people, Kirk was an anti-trans and racist propagandist known for debating liberals on college campuses. After his death, he was made into a Christian martyr and Trump awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Many people who made critical comments about him were fired or suspended, the most prominent of whom was late-night host Jimmy Kimmel—although public outcry forced his return.
Trump has also created an environment where far-right terrorists are well positioned to commit attacks, as federal monitoring of far-right groups is being dismantled. Law enforcement training, tracking studies, and prevention programs have all been cut over the past year, along with reviews of the military’s anti-extremism initiatives.
The influence of conspiracy theories on federal officials has also increased dramatically. The most visible are the anti-vax views of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., but the most outlandish was Trump’s Truth Social post promoting “MedBeds”—which Kelly Weil describes as “a fabled medical instrument that does everything from reversing aging to regrowing missing limbs.”
These conspiracy theories have only been amplified as far-right influencers have been given special access to the administration. In October, the Pentagon banned reporters from its press pool unless they pledged to only publish official statements, which no major outlet agreed to, including right-leaning ones like Fox News. They were replaced by friendly influencers and conspiracy theorists such as Laura Loomer, who also wields unprecedented influence over the president and has directly prompted Trump’s firing of national security officials.
Starting a decade ago, the alt-right created a distinct aesthetic, and these images and slogans have filtered up into the social media of the Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and Border Patrol. Their accounts now post memes like the neo-Nazi favorite “Moon Man,” antisemitic song lyrics, and slogans referencing white supremacist books.
As longtime digital innovators, white supremacists are taking advantage of new platforms and technologies. Some use AI to help produce propaganda—and even plan terrorist attacks. Elon Musk celebrated Trump’s inauguration with a Nazi salute, his AI Grok has called itself “MechaHitler,” and his online Grokipedia encyclopedia cited white supremacist websites over a hundred times. And neo-Nazis and the 764 child abuse cult are now recruiting on Roblox, an online gaming platform used by millions of children.
The administration has also made efforts to help the European far right, which it is increasingly allied with. Trump is close to Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Britain’s head of the nativist Reform Party, Nigel Farage, while JD Vance met with the leader of the extremist Alternative for Germany party and called on European parties to remove their “firewalls” against cooperating with the far right. Trump’s new National Security Strategy even celebrates these parties while railing against “civilizational erasure” in the form of immigration from Africa and Muslim-majority countries.
Far-Right Groups
Although remaining strong under Biden, grassroots far-right groups have not exploded in popularity over the past year—likely because the administration is enacting much of their agenda. But this did not stop several groups from having banner years.
Kirk’s murder led to a dramatic rise in the popularity of TPUSA, which proselytizes in schools, trains young right-wing activists, and has 2,000 chapters. The Christian group’s prominence has become so strong that the Texas state government is promoting TPUSA clubs in high schools and TikTok was a sponsor of its December conference.
Ironically, Kirk’s loudest critic on the right, the white supremacist Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes, also received a huge attention boost after Kirk’s death. Fuentes’s Groyper movement works to influence GOP circles from inside, especially by pushing antisemitism, and his fans have been climbing up the career ladder in recent months. Longtime ally Wade Searle is part of the Pentagon press pool, while Fuentes defender Paul Ingrassia is acting general counsel of the General Services Administration.
Fuentes’s appearance on Tucker Carson’s show caused outcry from the right, especially after the Heritage Foundation’s leader, Kevin Roberts, said Fuentes’s antisemitic views were acceptable right-wing positions to express. This led to an intra-movement fight breaking out among conservatives and others on the right over the increasing role of MAGA antisemitism. As it went on, the New York Young Republicans Club hosted antisemites at its annual gala.
The Proud Boys had a quiet year, despite leader Enrique Tarrio’s pardon for his role in J6. While Tarrio was in prison, the organization split between his supporters and opponents, but neither have been very active as there have been no large-scale clashes with antifascists, which were the group’s bread and butter. Tarrio himself was unable to provoke an incident when he showed up at an anti-ICE protest in Portland, Oregon in November.
The fascist Active Clubs, which do martial arts trainings, have continued to expand globally, and there are now 187 chapters in 27 countries. Their potential for violence has drawn the attention of the intelligence services. For example, a Buckingham Palace guard was found to have played a “key role” in an Active Club in England.
But The Base, which promotes terrorism, presents a more immediate danger. They have also been expanding into Europe, leading to numerous arrests there. Leader Rinaldo Nazzaro, now living in Russia, is offering cash bounties to followers who carry out attacks in Ukraine.
Last, the fascist Blood Tribe eschews these other groups’ more sophisticated approach. Its frequent rallies and intimidating visual look—masks, uniforms, and flags—draw significant media attention. But although they have become the most prominent neo-Nazi group in the country, their membership does not match their profile.
Legal Actions
Lawsuits are a frequent tool against the far right. Dominion Voting Systems, falsely accused of rigging the 2020 election, settled for $67 million with Newsmax. The fascist group Patriot Front was ordered to pay $2.75 million for an assault on a Black man during a 2022 march, and there are two lawsuits against the antisemitic Goyim Defense League for a harassment campaign in Nashville.
However, the far right also uses the courts. In addition to the J6 lawsuits, Trump is suing the BBC for $10 billion over an edit of a speech he gave at a rally that preceded the assault on the Capitol, which was broadcast earlier this year. Oath Keepers leader Stewart Rhodes, whose J6 sentence was commuted, said he is preparing to relaunch his militia organization—and meanwhile filed a $25 million defamation suit against USA Today, journalist Will Carless, and his own ex-wife Tasha Adams. Not to be outdone, Jacob Angeli-Chansley, a.k.a. the QAnon Shaman, is suing Trump and others for $40 trillion.
Far-right activists are also arrested constantly. Trump supporter Brian J. Cole Jr. was arrested for planting bombs in D.C. the night before January 6. But many other arrests are related to “nihilist violent extremism,” or NVE, a new FBI category. It refers to an online milieu that mixes Nazi-Satanism, neo-Nazi terrorism, school-shooter fetishists, and the extremist child abuser group 764. Together, they form an amorphous mix-and-match of toxic extremes.
The FBI has opened 350 investigations into 764. Incorporating other NVE currents, its members sextort and threaten minors into producing pornography, engaging in self-harm, and even committing suicide. It has spread globally, and numerous members were arrested in 2025, including leaders “War” and “Trippy”—as well as “White Tiger,” who was arrested for coercing a 13-year-old to kill himself online.
Neo-Nazis involved in terrorist propaganda and actions have been hit hard. Patrick Crusius, who murdered 23 people in the 2019 El Paso Walmart massacre, received 90 life sentences. Maniac Murder Cult’s Michail Chkhikvishvili pleaded guilty to soliciting terrorism. Former Atomwaffen Division leader Brandon Russell was sentenced to 20 years for plotting to attack Baltimore’s power grid. The international Terrorgram Collective was declared a Foreign Terrorist Organization, and one U.S. leader, Dallas Humber, was sentenced to 30 years for soliciting murder. And Terrorgram influenced Nikita Casap, who was arrested for murdering his parents.
Violence
While there were no explicitly white supremacist massacres in 2025, several fit the NVE concept, which mixes politics with school shootings. During the Antioch High School shooting, one person was killed. Although the perpetrator was Black, his manifesto referenced Terrorgram. The perpetrator of the Annunciation Catholic School shooting, where two were killed, painted their guns with the names of both racist murderers and apolitical school shooters. As white supremacist massacres blend seamlessly into apolitical ones and then into school shootings, perhaps the most telling slogan painted on one of the guns was simply: “There is no message.” What starts as politics ends in nihilism.
It’s the same nihilism that underlies Trump’s gratuitous cruelty toward the most marginal members of society, even as his followers proclaim their own victimhood. In 2025, the far-right grassroots was largely eclipsed by the administration’s blitzkrieg—but as its inertia breaks, new possibilities will open. We should be concerned that what runs through them will flank him on the right—especially in the wake of the dismantling of those government apparatuses that kept an eye on far-right terrorism.
