There are two group names you have likely been hearing throughout the presidential campaign—White Nationalist and Alternative-Right, or "Alt-right."
Now that President Elect Donald Trump has named Steve Bannon as his Chief Strategist, they are names being more commonly used.
But how did they come about and what do they really mean?
University of San Diego (USD) Professor Tom Reifer, Ph.D, says these ideologies and beliefs are far from new, adding that they date back to centuries ago.
“The Democrats used to be the party of white supremacy in the South. And once the Democrats started to accept civil rights, you got a shift and the whites started moving to the Republican Party. So there's always been this kind of White Nationalist aspect of Republican politics in the late 20th century,” Reifer said.
He says that "Alt-right" is the more extremist side of White Nationalism and is a continuation of those same beliefs.
“Politics of White Nationalism can be seen as a continuum. To those people who are concerned about immigration, who want to build a strong wall, to those people that are more explicitly more racist, and more explicitly stand up for white people, and have hostile attitudes towards persons of color," Reifer said. “That latter group is what they've been calling the Alternate-Right."
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“A lot of voters on all sides of the political spectrum are rightfully upset with American politics. They're upset with the economic system," he added.
He told NBC 7 that there is a lot of public discussion about the "forgotten man." In recent years. due to affirmative action, some say whites in America feel like they are the ones being suppressed.
Reifer says that could be increasing this notion of White Nationalism and "Alt-Right" in America. Those individuals will be welcome to expressing their views by Bannon who wants to create a haven for the discussion.
According to White Nationalist and "Alt-Right" websites, they don’t agree with the KKK and extreme white supremacy groups. They feel there are many things that separate them and the "Alt-Right" is a much more intelligent group of people standing up to stop the demographic shift in America.
