(Updated below with new comment from John Munger)
As I was writing Sunday's piece on the decline in the number of border-watch groups, another skirmish occurred in the ongoing conflict between the Southern Poverty Law Center and those it classifies as extremists.
On March 13, Tucson attorney John Munger, a prominent Arizona Republican, wrote a letter to the executive director of the state Democratic Party, Luis Heredia, demanding that he retract his description of Southern Arizona border activist Glenn Spencer. In the Feb. 22 statement, Heredia described Spencer as " an avowed anti-Semite and purported racist."
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In his statement, Heredia linked, apparently as background material, to the Southern Poverty Law Center's online bio of Spencer.Â
In the letter, Munger says "Mr. Spencer is not an anti-Semite and statements to the contrary are false and defamatory." He goes into detail trying to explain this 2008 piece by Spencer, headlined "Speaking the Unspeakable: Is Jew-Controlled Hollywood Brainwashing Americans?"
"Any fair reading of that piece however, makes it clear that Mr. Spencer's comments were not anti-Semite but were anti-liberal," Munger wrote.
He goes on to criticize Heredia's claim that Spencer is a "notorious militia leader." The Star has reported on Spencer's activities through the years, and indeed they have focused largely on using technology to show apparent insecurity along the Mexican border, not armed patrolling of the border.
In any case, Heredia told the Phoenix New Times he is declining the invitation to retract his statements.
"I stand by my statement as it was released," Heredia told me today. "The number one thing is, why is the Tea Party Senate inviting a person like Glenn Spencer. He does not deserve the attention he was receiving."
Update: This afternoon, Munger called me back and said Spencer is being unfairly maligned as racist in a way that is too common these days.
"It’s got to the point where anybody who disagrees with anybody else is called a racist," Munger said. "It just needs to stop."
"You can have a view that you want to control the border. That doesn’t make you racist."
Of course, the accusations of racism against Spencer aren't as simple as that. Refer to the SPLC bio or New Times story above, along with the American Patrol website, for more details and to make up your own mind.
