Chip Berlet Quotes

Even before the election I was saying that the rhetoric used by Trump was going to cause violence before and after the election. That was easy to predict.

People's perceptions of their status are just as important as their actual status.

Around the country, ideas that originated on the hard right or in the fevered imaginations of conspiracy theorists are finding their way into the mainstream. In a number of cases, these ideas have become commonplace in American minds.

That there are evil people destroying America and it's a conspiracy and time is running out and we should do something about it - that's what millions of people hear Trump saying.

Part of the coalition is intellectuals who have an idea of racial nationalism, which is very popular in right-wing populist movements in Europe. The alt-right believes in racially separate nation-states.

People will say to me, "Well, nobody really believes this stuff." But as a reporter I go out and talk to people who do believe it. And they can talk about it for hours.