How Antifascists in Pennsylvania Mobilized Their Community Against an Active Neo-Nazi

In early September, around 50 people in Millvale, PA organized a march on the home of Brandon Cahall, a local landlord and active neo-Nazi. Cahall had recently been exposed for his involvement in white supremacist groups such as Patriot Front, the Goyim Defense League, and White Lives Matter, groups which have long and violent history of attacks across the US.

Following the march, antifascists began a broad campaign of outreach and education within the community, distributing flyers, stickers, and information on Brandon and the threat that neo-Nazi groups pose to our communities. White supremacist groups also responded, putting up banners where were then quickly taken down.

Wanting to know more about this campaign, we sat down with PGH Fash Watch about mobilizing in their area.

IGD: Tell us about who Brandon Cahall is and why people decided to form a campaign outing him to the wide community? 

As it relates to his neo-Nazi activism, Brandon is a key player in the PA chapter of White Lives Matter (WLM) and the regional WLM movement. He’s been printing / shipping thousands of pieces of propaganda to other racists around the country. On a personal level, he’s a single, sad, childless 50 something year old white man who lives with his elderly mother. He supports himself by renting out inherited properties that he seems to have trouble keeping up to code.

He is networked with and seemingly played a role in vetting the Michigan WLM chapter. There’s seemingly a close relationship or dual-membership between PA WLM members and the local Patriot Front network, Network 16.

He’s a fucking loser who hid in his house while 40-50 queers, Jews, antifascists, and neighbors chanted his name and plastered his face / link to his doxx all over his neighborhood and nearby business district.

IGD: Tell us about some of the actions which have happened so far. There was a march by antifascists to the home of Brandon and also a flyer campaign.

Research and information gathering aside, the first IRL action against Brandon Cahall was the march through his neighborhood, which you can read more about here. Shoutout to the people who contributed to getting that info out.

The following weekend, there was a pretty robust effort to spread the doxx as far and wide as possible. Pgh Fash Watch issued the “Fuck Brando Challenge,” which was essentially a call to action to paper the region with Brandon’s face and doxx.

Autonomous crews worked to print stickers, make flyers, and make some digital tools pointing people to Brandon’s doxx. At least 2,000 physical pieces went up or were distributed around the Pittsburgh area within a 3-4 day stretch. That’s what we know about. There were people printing and making their own shit, taking it upon themselves to hand out flyers at events, shows, festivals, you name it. People submitted their flyers, stickers, and tags that were posted on social media, or they posted on their own.

After consistent flyering and stickering, there was an uptick in Patriot Front (PF) and WLM activity, as well as some other white supremacist groups. PF began by dropping a banner in downtown Pittsburgh, which was removed by antifascist activists within 30-40 minutes and burned shortly after. They were busy that week and the following. To their credit, they put up a fair amount of tags and stickers, and sometimes their stuff stays up for longer than it should. There’s been at least three fascist banner drops since our march through Brandon’s neighborhood, which is more than normal.

But it has only caused more and more people to take notice and take autonomous action. Every time PF and WLM drop a banner or place a sticker, someone gets more interested in anti-fascist activism.

A good bit of the actions taken since the march revolve around word of mouth education and building out some tools and practices that will make it easier for people to take action on their own.

IGD: What has been the response from the wider community? How have people reacted to Brandon being outed?

The response has been overwhelmingly positive. Even people who don’t live in Millvale were eager to learn more and post up fliers and stickers. There is a real appetite here for making Nazis known. People were talking about it at bars and coffee shops. People outside the typical “activist” scene were sharing and discussing Brandon Cahall’s dossier. That’s a win.

IGD: What lessons have antifascists learned from this campaign?

Next time, we’ll be better prepared to distribute information to people without reliable internet connections or data access, probably via fully printed out pamphlets.

We also became seriously aware of the need to pace ourselves and to find ways to support each other mentally and emotionally through long-running efforts like this.

Another lesson we learned is that we need to get tools and info out to people in a way that doesn’t rely as much on already being connected to some kind of organizing network. We need to make tools available so that people feel empowered to take action on their own, like hosting printable materials for downloading, digital info-images that can be shared, etc.

IGD:In a recent essay, Power Punch, the author laments how antifascists often doxx nazis and there is no follow up. This seems like one template to build a public, interactive campaign against active neo-Nazis in our community.

We’ve gone a bit beyond just dropping a doxx. There are plans to continue following up, pivoting towards a positive program about antifascism, and broadening the scope beyond just this one fucko.

An important aspect of the march and subsequent flyering actions was raising consciousness of white supremacist activities in the area among locals, which we hope will encourage more folks to engage in anti-fascism autonomously, especially after seeing a demonstration of everyday anti-fascist solidarity in their town.

Making sure that the dox was being spread *offline* and out in the real world is what made this effort successful, in our opinion. Taking up physical space and putting up physical pictures of Brandon shows people that anti-fascists are among them, and they can do it too.

IGD: What advice would you give others in other places who are looking to launch a similar campaign?

More people are on your side than you think. It doesn’t mean you have to trust everyone with all the information you have, but people are legit willing to listen if you do your due diligence and come up with a solid doxx package. Be prepared to answer questions about the provenance of your info and to balance those answers with necessary security practices.

Aside from that, people should know that this is doable. Some of us have some skills and experience, but most of what we’ve done doesn’t require much know-how. Everyone can take action and everyone should.

IGD: How can people follow this campaign?

Stay tuned at pghfashwatch.noblogs.org or over on our Twitter @pghfashwatch. For more info and materials, go here.