Richard Spencer's divisive speech sparks protests, outrage at Texas A&M

Law enforcement officers come face to face with protesters outside the Texas A&M Memorial Student Center on Tuesday. Law enforcement officers come face to face with protesters outside the Texas A&M Memorial Student Center on Tuesday. Photo: Brett Coomer, Houston Chronicle Photo: Brett Coomer, Houston Chronicle Image 1 of / 108 Caption Close Richard Spencer's divisive speech sparks protests, outrage at Texas A&M 1 / 108 Back to Gallery

COLLEGE STATION – Newly minted alternative-right hero and self-styled spokesman Richard Spencer brought a ballroom crowd of 400 nothing they had not heard – or heard of - since he began to make headlines with the rise of Donald Trump, whose appeal to working-class rights raised the spectre of a new day for identity politics.

But his adamant defense of race-based identity and his calls for a white United States drew more than 1,000 protesters to the Texas A&M University campus Tuesday, chanting and shouting long before the white nationalist arrived and kept at it until security personnel shooed them away after he had left the building.

A special entertainment-focused "Aggies United" event hosted by A&M President Michael Young at nearby Kyle Field drew an even bigger crowd.

All the attention, most of it based in hostility, was exactly Spencer's objective.

"We won," Spencer said, of the crowded meeting hall that buzzed with tension and occasional flare-ups, though no moments of violence.

"Dr. Young and his event lost."

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A&M police referred to the evening activities as a "peaceful event" in a Tweet announcing the protests had ended at 9:41 p.m. Two people, described as "non-students" by university police, were arrested.

Earlier in the day, Spencer called president-elect Trump "a kind of alt-right hero," and said his focus on white identity gives him a deep connection with the alt-right movement.

Spencer, who was invited to the College Station campus by a former A&M student, has openly espoused Nazi-era views and used anti-Semitic language in previous speeches and writings.

On Tuesday night on campus, Spencer's message was clear: race matters. And he didn't soften his belief that white men conquered the land that became the United States and should revel in their historic and racial identity.

"You're part of a bigger extended family, and that race has a story to tell," Spencer said. "It's a people and a blood and a place on the map."

Thought most in the audience clearly didn't agree with him, Spencer was at home on stage, batting away hecklers, returning insults, and defiantly arguing for the achievements of European culture and the white race that he claims made them possible.

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"A race is genetically coherent," he said. "It's something you can study, DNA. But it's more than that. It's a people and a spirit."

Spencer, whose remarks were steadily interrupted, stopped short of directly disparaging other races. The point, he said, is that white Europeans ultimately built great civilizations, including the United States, that become imperiled when their fundamental racial identity is lost.

"Whether it was nice or not, and I'm not going to deny there was a lot of brutality that went along with it, we won. This country belongs to white people," he said.

Spencer praised Trump for directly addressing what he sees as a restoration of that historic supremacy.

"Trump was the first step toward white identity politics in the United States," he said. "He is not going to be the last. The alt-right is a new beginning."

In a testy question-and-answer session, Spencer, often smiling and encouraging the audience to converse and engage, not to fight, was quick to insult those greeting him with insults, including reference to their physical appearance. Yet he clearly took pleasure in presenting ideals that aren't in the mainstream of civil discourse.

He likely won few converts, yet there was more than a smattering of applause when he assailed contemporary culture and its emphasis on consumption. He said a restoration of national and racial identities and not greater mixing of races was the first step to battling a soulless power structure.

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"They want an undifferentiated global population, consuming sugar and drugs and watching porn on virtual reality goggles while maxing out their credit cards," he said. "They want a gray-on-gray world, a market they can rule."

He insisted racist is a "fake word" designed to put a stop to meaningful conversations about race.

"Race is real," he said. "Race matters. Race is the foundation of identity."

If no race is objectively better, one questioner asked, then why sing the praises only of the white race?

"Because the white race is mine," he said. "It is unique."

Inside Kyle Field at the Aggies United event, a cluster of students gathered on the field to listen to live music and watch dance performances. Others sat in the bleachers, participating in call-and-responses from performers and waving blinking colorful lights.

Sarah Trevino, a 21-year-old junior studying biology, said she believed the university handled Spencer's visit well.

"You can't trample someone's freedom just because you don't agree," said Trevino, from San Antonio, as a quartet began to play "Lift Every Voice and Sing" inside the stadium.

Loud protests outside the stadium rang out for several hours before Spencer's speech.

Confrontations between a small group of Spencer supporters and protesters brought groups together in intense debate near the Memorial Student Center.

"The Nazis murdered six million people like me," said Adam Davies, 25, who attended Texas A&M before transferring in 2011.

"No, they did not," said a man who identified himself as Azzmador and a writer for the Daily Stormer, a white supremacist website. A tight cluster erupted in disbelief.

Later, Davies, who wore a yarmulke, said Spencer "shouldn't be given a platform" like A&M for his views, which support a white "ethnostate."

"Advocating for ethnic cleansing," Davies said, "it crosses a line."

Chants rung out throughout the early evening as hundreds of people waved signs that read "hate is not an Aggie value" and "denounce racism." Nearby, dozens of protestors stood silently near a campus fountain, holding signs that denounced Spencer and promoted inclusivity.

Law enforcement - some armed with riot gear and others on horseback - began pushing back the crowd from the student center as Spencer's speech wound to a close.

They eventually shut the entire center down for the night.