January 13, 2017
Allegations of illegal party funding for the Dutch Party of Freedoms (PVV) shed light on political, financial, and ideological links that lead from the European far-right to the White House.
Geert Wilders has got behind him a fervent supporter of Donald Trump, David Horowitz.
The Euro-Atlantic “progressive racism” movement
Horowitz is the President of the David Horowitz think-tank and author of books like “Progressive Racism” that describes the civil rights movement in the US as a “lynch mob,” which condemn white Americans “before the fact” and proclaims African Americans innocent “even when the facts prove them guilty.”
Funding links and illegal PVV funding allegations
Horowitz also donated $150,000 to the PVV over the last three years. It could be more than that because the PVV records and the Horowitz think-tank records do not agree.
According to the PVV, David Horowitz donated $25,000 in 2016 and €108,244 in 2015. But, in 2014 PVV records report a €18,000 donation while the Horowitz Foundation reports $75,000. PVV has refused to comment on the discrepancies. Since 2013, Dutch law stipulates that donations over €1,000 must be recorded and over €4,500 publicized. The PVV does not qualify for state funding because it has no membership structure, DutchNews reports.
Institutionalizing links
Geert Wilders is now spearheading an international organization called the “International Freedom Alliance” with the explicit objective to counter the threat of Islam in the West. That initiative comes days after he was convicted by a Dutch court for inciting racial hatred.
Horowitz and Wielders find themselves fighting for a common cause. Horowitz is considered for over a decade as being one of the most sophisticated voices of the American Alt-right. Horowitz is accused by human rights groups in the US of spearheading a campaign to “make bigoted and discredited ideas respectable.”
The Breitbart common denominator
Horowitz has also been a campaigner for Donald Trump, whom he admired for his openly anti-Islamic stance. In an article published by Breitbart in June 2016, the conservative pundit praised Trump for being “especially courageous (and politically incorrect) in pointing out that the Muslim communities in which the terrorists operate, know what is going on but don’t say anything.”
Horowitz is for some time suggesting that the American left is not only tolerant of extremist Islam but also its ally.
Breitbart is, of course, a voice of authority for the American far-right, which is why there was widespread condemnation when the founder of this outlet, Steve Bannon, was appointed chief strategist and aide to the President-elect. That was a signal to the US far-right that the Trump movement remained “anti-establishment.”
Breitbart also hosted Geert Wilders in January 2016, when he challenged what he called the “delusional Britons” who wanted to ban Donald Trump from entering the U.K. That was perhaps the moment when Donald Trump became emblematic for the European far-right, envisioning a new Euro-Atlantic ideological consensus.
