Local 'think tank' leader arrested in Budapest

Prominent white nationalist and Whitefish resident Richard Spencer was arrested and detained in Budapest, Hungry last month after attempting to host a conference that was condemned by the Hungarian government.

Spencer is director of the National Policy Institute, an “independent think-tank and publishing firm dedicated to the heritage, identity, and future of European people in the United States and around the world.”

Spencer has directed NPI from his home in Whitefish since 2011. He openly advocates for the creation of a white ethno-state in North America.

The Southern Poverty Law Center refers to NPI as a “hate group.”

Last month, Spencer was arrested and detained in Budapest after attempting to hold an NPI-organized conference.

According to reports, Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban said the government would use “all legal means” to prevent the NPI gathering that he described as “an attempt to breathe new life into Nazi and… fascist ideology.”

Reservations for the conference venue were canceled and some of the guest speakers, including Russian nationalist Alexander Dugin, were denied entry into the country.

In a press statement from the Hungarian government condemning the NPI conference, Dugin is described as being known for his “radical, racist, Russian nationalist and anti-Ukrainian views.”

“The Hungarian Government strongly condemns all xenophobic and exclusionary organizations that discriminate based on religion or ethnicity.”

Yet, Spencer and other conference attendees still gathered at a Budapest pub on the night of Oct. 3. Hungarian police raided the gathering and subsequently detained Spencer.

The arrest was captured on video and posted to YouTube.

“I find this quite depressing,” Spencer said in the video as police swarmed the pub. “We were obeying the law and meeting privately. This is not a conference.”

He was deported three days later and has been banned for three years from entering the visa-free Schengen area of Europe.

In an Oct. 8 blog post about the incident, Spencer wrote, “I was apprehended by police in a Budapest pub, where dozens of attendees and I had gathered to build fellowship before the next day’s conference. The room was filled with our European family: Britons, Canadians, Scandinavians, Flemish, Croatians, and more.

“There are certainly more pleasant ways of spending a weekend than in a Hungarian jail; however, if I were to do it over again, I wouldn’t change a thing. We must never lose our nerve as our adversaries react... and overreact... and try to shut down our projects.”

Spencer made national headlines again just a few days later when a story broke about his controversial inclusion in the private Big Mountain Club at Whitefish Mountain Resort.

According to an Oct. 18 article in “The Daily Beast” online magazine, during a shared chair lift ride in the winter of 2013, Spencer reportedly “berated” fellow club member Randy Scheunemann for his political beliefs. Scheunemann, who owns a home in Whitefish, is a former advisor to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and was Sen. John McCain’s foreign policy aide.

According to the story, Scheunemann reported Spencer’s antics to ski club organizers. After learning more of Spencer’s background, he eventually gave the club an ultimatum — either Spencer is kicked out or Scheunemann cancels his membership.

The club, reportedly, decided to keep Spencer as a member and Scheunemann has since left the club.

Asked if he missed being in the club, Scheunemann told The Daily Beast, “I don’t want to be in a club that has this overt racist in it.”

According to a report from the Institute for Research and Education on Human Rights, Spencer previously worked as an assistant editor at Pat Buchanan’s “The American Conservative” magazine, then as executive editor of the Libertarian magazine “Taki’s Magazine.”

He went on to start the white nationalist website AlternativeRight.com before taking control of NPI.