It is the season for white supremacist groups, which are growing at a startling pace worldwide. Even more concerning is the rise of neo-Nazi Active Clubs, which combine a racist ethos with mixed martial arts training. “Since January 2021, Active Clubs have continued to spread and currently maintain a presence in 36 US states and have multiple chapters abroad, including Estonia, Scotland, Germany, France, Norway, Finland and more,” said Morgan Lynn Moon, an investigative researcher with the Anti-Defamation League. A video screenshot shows white nationalists doing mixed-martial arts training. (Photo: Counter Extremism Project) “These Active Club chapters continue to engage in on-the-ground activity, distributing propaganda, organizing a range of demonstrations and hosting large-scale fight nights across the United States,” she continued.   Their aim is to create a civilian fighting force that can prevail against minority groups on “Day X,” the racial reckoning to come, believes the Active Club. Moon said the network has succeeded by combining the surging popularity of MMA fighting with the unity created by group outings. “Active Club members see themselves as fighters training for an ongoing war against a system that they claim is deliberately plotting against the white race,” according to an ADL fact sheet. The extremist network is the brainchild of Robert Rundo, 34, whose worldview was partly shaped by the European MMA-ultranationalist scene, which emphasizes combat training and white nationalism. He has already pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to violate federal laws stemming from charges he incited a riot. Rundo spent a year on the run before being extradited from Romania to the U.S. in 2023. He received a two-year prison sentence, time he had already served in prison. Rundo, according to the ADL, “has stated that he wished the Active Club model to fill the gap within the American white supremacist scene by creating similar MMA-styled clubs that would force online ‘keyboard warriors’ to engage in real-world training and events.” His efforts have been aided by President-elect Donald Trump, who has helped to mainstream white nationalism, whether or not he understands the roots of the movement. Populist leaders have emerged around the globe, signaling a rightward tilt increasingly hostile to democracy. “I’m a nationalist, OK?” Trump said in 2018. “I’m a nationalist. Nationalist. Nothing wrong. Use that word. Use that word.” In the U.S., Active Clubs emerged from the Rise Above Movement (RAM), responsible for violence against counter-protesters at the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. Rundo began setting up independent cells disguised as fitness groups across the county that are purposely kept smaller than better-known white supremacist movements, Moon said. They are careful about their online profile, protecting Rundo from any of their illicit actions. They make no mention of their neo-Nazi sympathies and avoid public discussion about “politics, Jews or history,” the New York-based Counter Extremism Project reports. Members are encouraged to look and act like “regular guys” and maintain a focus on recruitment. “The large-scale fight nights, that sometimes attract upwards of 60 or more attendees from a range of white supremacist groups across the United States and even abroad, allow the groups to fraternize and recruit, while also fulfilling the Active Club’s goal of crafting a transnational white fraternal brotherhood,” Moon said. Law enforcement has struggled to get a handle on the network due to its decentralized structure, experts say. Here at home, the incoming Trump administration has signaled federal investigators will be diverting attention away from white supremacist organizations “One of the issues is that the apparatus thinks that the MAGA base is the problem,” said former Trump adviser Steve Bannon. “They think their collection of radicalized white nationalists, white separatists — I don’t know what they’ve concocted — but that’s the problem (former FBI Director Christopher) Wray’s been focused on.” ‘Deliberately Plotting’: ‘Radicalized’ White Nationalist Fight Clubs Are Holding ‘Large-Scale Fight Nights,’ Training for Race War As Law Enforcement Turns a Blind Eye