On June 24, 2014, IREHR president Leonard Zeskind spoke to 200 people attending his session on white supremacists in Kansas and Missouri. The event was held at the Jewish Community Campus and was sponsored by the Kansas City Jewish Community Relations Bureau-American Jewish Committee. The forum was organized in the wake of three murders, allegedly committed in April by long-time national socialist Glenn Miller.
Zeskind gave a cursory history of white supremacist activity in Kansas and Missouri, dipping as far back as the Klan in the 1920’s and Rev. Gerald Winrod, known as the Jayhawk Nazi, in the 1930’s. The bulk of his speech was a detailed overview of the current status of white nationalist groups in Kansas and Missouri. He emphasized the Traditionalist American Klan in Park Hill, Missouri and the Council of Conservative Citizens, which is headquartered in the St. Louis area. Zeskind also provided a “trends analysis” that noted the need for forthright opposition by community groups to racism, anti-Semitism and bigotry of all kinds.
