DISMANTLING THE FORTRESS, PT II: WOE, BE GONE

“Every newly invented religion needs a Hitler. Lutheranism’s is Corey J Mahler.” – Treblewoe, Vice President of a Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod congregation

 

Welcome to Dismantling The Fortress Pt. II, our second article in a series devoted to monitoring the rise of a white supremacist faction within the Lutheran faith. In this article we name an anonymous leader of this faction: Treblewoe. A special thank you to LateNightAFA and Sunlight AFA for their assistance. Grazie mille, amici.

 

In our last article, we traced the emergence of the “Lutefash,” an openly fascist Lutheran faction that has mostly coalesced in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS). As we discussed, this faction has found a pseudo-leader in Corey Mahler: resident of the Knoxville area of TN, white supremacist attorney, failed advocate for white nationalists Christopher Cantwell and Jason Kessler, and professional troll trying to spread fascism within the LCMS and other conservative churches. We examined Mahler’s relationships with a variety of Christian Nationalists in the lutefash network, including Ryan Turnipseed of First Lutheran in Ponca City, OK; Luthemplaer, propagandist and Catholic ally of lutefash; Blake Kilbourne aka “SuperLutheran,” neo-Nazi podcaster; and, of course, “Woe,” the co-host of Mahler’s own Stone Choir podcast.

Since then, some promising developments have arisen. Our story created a wave of debate that led LCMS president Matt Harrison to call for the discipline and excommunication of fascists within his denomination, condemning the Alt-Right along with:

“white supremacy, nazism, pro-slavery, anti-interracial marriage, women as property, fascism, death for homosexuals, even genocide.”

This, in turn, led to Corey Mahler being kicked out of his home church, First Lutheran Knoxville, and barred by police from re-entering. It was a public humiliation, recorded by acolyte Zak McGaha and uploaded by Mahler for all to see, one that possibly prompted McGaha himself to leave the church. After their departure, First Lutheran’s pastor made their severed relationship official, excommunicating Mahler in a live-streamed service. Meanwhile, an Oklahoma church elder who disparaged the LCMS, on a livestream featuring Stone Choir’s co-hosts and Turnipseed, was removed from his leadership position. For his part, Turnipseed reports being called on the carpet by his pastor and district overseers, obtusely relitigating the matter in a laborious thread that includes audio of his attempts to avoid sounding like a nazi while remaining loyal to Hitler respecters.

Nonetheless, it hasn’t been enough. Lutefash still haunt the LCMS. Dismissing all allegations out of hand, they consistently reframe any pushback as punishment for daring to criticize church leadership, rather than, you know, for advocating genocidal ideologies. Stone Choir now claims over a thousand downloads per week, and Woe has stated that the Stone Choir website surpassed 30,000 visitors in April, while record numbers of listeners heard at least 20,000 hours of content. In a few short months, that content has progressed from routine defenses of Christian patriarchy to apologias for scientific racism, as well as a concentrated attack on key leadership of LCMS as “servants of Antichrist.” This last point demonstrates how Mahler and Woe, while refraining from direct slurs and vulgarity, are escalating their rhetoric. They refer to Lutheran pastors who confront them as “Adversary Pastors,” which alludes to the Biblical description of Satan as the “Adversary.” Mahler continues to take donations at his website to fund Stone Choir. And as you’ll see, these forum comments illustrate the podcast’s growing success with Christians outside Lutheran circles.

The lutefash persist.

We must stress that the stakes of exposing this group far exceed the impact on one insular Lutheran denomination. On a global scale, Christian fascist movements are gaining ground, in large part because the consequences for their behavior are not nearly as grave as they ought to be. As such a movement, lutefash freely live and work next to those whom they secretly scheme to humiliate, deport, assault, or worse. As you’ll see throughout our series, their influence, while relatively small at present, is extending into many overlapping circles of christian nationalism, not to mention the white nationalist / supremacist movement at large. Their rising voice now has the ear of, and provides “polished” theological arguments for, angry white men in or at the cusp of joining an international crusade of blood and soil. Without an aggressive pushback, they offer a possible organizing template for all the eyes fixed on them right now, including those who might be watching from around the world. People outside the walls of the LCMS can’t afford to ignore the impunity of the lutefash, particularly those as entangled in antisemitic, misogynist, and pro-fascist organizing as Corey Mahler and his partner Woe. Regardless of whether antifascists identify with this denomination or religion, all must expose and confront the genocidal ideologies making inroads within it. Their Lutheran fascist ideology, like any other fascist ideology, poses a violent threat to society in the broadest sense.

Part of the reason that Lutheran fascism continues to expand is that the co-host of Stone Choir, “Woe,” continues to enjoy anonymity. As we’re sure the “adversary pastors” would agree, his online activity is truly woeful, a font of darkness, cruelty, and an almost fanatical need for control. (With the exception of some culinary takes; he makes a good case for deep dish, even though we still prefer Sicilian style. Beyond this, Woe is as appealing as week-old pizza crust, and about as insufferable to one’s constitution.) With the protection of anonymity, Woe arguably outdoes Mahler’s inflammatory polemic against the LCMS, as shown in how he has labeled the new annotated catechism the “pedochism,” a label Mahler himself does not use. The label invokes lutefash allegations, mentioned in the previous article, that the present LCMS leadership supports pedophilia. On his many social media accounts and his now-defunct blog, Woe combines these allegations with deadpan derision of Jews, Black people, Asian people, various ethnic minorities, women, gay people, trans people, mentally disabled people, and any one deemed beneath Anglo-Protestant cisgender Christian men. Combined with a hardline Christian Nationalist vision, the venom seen below has garnered Woe over 2,000 followers on the Twitter account he started in December 2022.

TW: below as throughout the article, strong expressions of homophobia, transphobia, misogyny, antisemitism, anti-Asian racism, anti-Black racism, anti-indigenous racism, Islamophobia.

 

Woe’s brazenness inspires an adoration that sometimes approaches a cult of personality. In the below lutefash Telegram messages and Twitter replies, one person laments that he would have to disavow Woe to remain in his LCMS church; another “jokes” about putting Woe’s face on their ultimate hero, Hitler.

Woe is vigilant about keeping his real face hidden. In this article, we take off his masks, one by one. As we do, we’ll see that behind the cold intellectualism of the Woe avatar hides a gun-obsessed, belligerent ideologue, whose temper, when triggered, unleashes racist outbursts that would make David Duke wince. Contrary to his insistence that nazis don’t exist, we will further demonstrate that this son of the LCMS has extensively networked with online white nationalists and racists, sometimes even nazis. (Yes, literal nazis, lest conservative readers charge us, as they always do, with slinging that term willy nilly.) In particular, we’ll discuss how this former Apple engineer has used his expertise to serve a troll community that researchers refer to as “The Shed,” whose pseudonymous accounts have issued death threats and hate speech without consequence. We’ll consider how his governmentally subsidized business in Vermont offers a respectable cover for white nationalist activities. And as we survey the podcast’s traction in the broader far-right mediasphere, we’ll discuss about what all this might mean for the future of lutefash efforts, within the LCMS and beyond it.

 

FASCHATOLOGUY: THE MANY MASKS OF WOE

First, let’s be clear: antifascists have tracked the various accounts run by the man behind the mask of Woe for some time—since well before he started his latest avatar, @treblewoe, to plug his new starring role as Stone Choir’s co-host. Indeed, researchers had already flagged Woe’s previous accounts, particularly @eschatologuy, a handle he used on Twitter as well as Gab. As @eschatologuy, Woe showed a fascination with the apocalypse that is reflected in his current handle.

“Eschatology” is the branch of Christian doctrine concerning the end of the world and the soul’s state after death. In his old account header, Woe refers to Revelation 8:13 (“Woe, woe, woe to those who dwell upon the earth”), as well as Revelation 6:12 and Matthew 24:6-8. These passages all include descriptions of the envisioned End Times. Not shy about drawing the connection to his current persona, Woe now goes by @treblewoe, which refers to the three “woe”s of Revelation 8:13.

Some Christians take predictions of the End Times literally, others metaphorically. As @eschatologuy, Woe preferred the former, showing an accelerationist bloodthirst for the “wars and rumors of wars” that are said to accompany the end times. His enthusiasm for such violence, not to mention the racist company with whom he shares it, sparked the attention of those seeking to stop fascism by outing its adherents. (TW: antisemitism) When an account refers to book burnings as a “good holocaust,” knowing full well the connotations of that word, those who hunt nazis will take notice.

TW: antisemitism, transphobia, homophobia

Woe as @eschatologuy proved fairly popular on both Twitter and Gab, the latter of which essentially functions as a Twitter for the far-right. (“Twitter for the far-right” may now be a redundancy, but we digress.) On Twitter, the @eschatologuy account picked up 2,000 followers between its start in late 2018/early 2019 and its closure in early 2020; Gab provided a sizeable following as well, amplifying him during the intervening period between Twitter accounts. As he couched his racism in the dry garb of statistics and scripture, Woe’s Eschatologuy regaled Gabbers with the kind of performative authority that appeals to fascists. There’s a lot of bile spilled on Gab, but the @eschatologuy formula engaged an assortment of far-right accounts who were especially eager to swallow the bile of Woe.

The popularity of the @eschatologuy persona meant that, when he shuttered his Gab account and “re-spawned” as Treblewoe on Twitter, he was able to gain back his followers in a relatively short amount of time. Woe’s pre-Stone Choir fandom now laughs at the idea of him playing second fiddle to Mahler. On Gab, his former followers remember him fondly, expressing excitement at discovering his latest digital manifestation.

Woe is skillful at cycling through accounts. What follows are the handles that we can directly tie to him, although we would not be surprised if there were others. The @eschatologuy handle was succeeded by @ChancelThreader (August-October 2020) and @MeldEndCastles (October. 2020-February 2021), and preceded by:

–@paperbackwrit3r from June to Dec. 2018

–@HermannBillung (WARNING: this archive link to @HermannBillung’s profile contains multiple uses of the N-word as part of the handle) from April to June 2018

– @est1608 from August 2017 to early 2019

These links have been established through a combination of comparing the numerical Twitter ID’s for various accounts, as well as through Woe’s self-disclosures.

Establishing continuity of @eschatologuy, @meldendcastles, and Woe:

 

Establishing identity of @MeldendCastles and @ChancelThreader:

 

Establishing identity of Woe and @HermannBillung: (Woe implicitly IDs himself with @HermannBillung in this thread)

Establishing identity of @HermannBillung and @est1608:

There are a few details in these last three screenshots worth highlighting. First, note that all three identify as “parody” and “current events” commentary. Second, note also that the profile pic of @HermannBillung is a slightly altered version of @est1608. Third, note the text “Hier stehe ich, ich kann nicht anders” in @paperbackwrit3r: “Here I stand, I can do no other,” Martin Luther’s motto from the 1521 Diet of Worms. Finally, observe the reflections in the sunglasses of all 3. They are identical to the painting that Woe has historically used in his profile art: Christ in Limbo, often mistaken for a Hieronymus Bosch painting, but actually painted by a follower of Bosch’s. As you can see, this painting was ultimately used as @MeldEndCastles’s banner.

 

This is just one of several visual and textual easter eggs that recur across Woe’s accounts. His @chancelthreader’s name was Rev813 (Revelation 8:13—the source of the three woes). For a time, he repeatedly returns to a quote from Admiral James Stockdale. And in almost all his incarnations, he proclaims that his lineage originates with the earliest American settlers, including one who arrived in (est)1608, or “over 400 years ago.” These motifs confirm each handle’s place in Woe’s extensive collection of facades.

SHEDDING ACCOUNTS, STALKING TOGETHER

It’s unsurprising that @eschatologuy’s openly genocidal antisemitism caught the eye of antifascists. But in fact, Woe landed on fascist networking maps several accounts before @eschatologuy, because of his fraternizing with some of the most unabashed online white supremacists this side of a private Telegram chat. As @eschatologuy, and through his several other accounts, Woe actively participated in a notorious online network known as ‘The Shed,’ a ring of pseudonymous nazi and hard right Twitter accounts that has been covered by social media researcher Erin Gallagher, among others. “The Shed,” as Gallagher has reported, tended to “cycle through iterations of similar usernames and profile photos [after being suspended for heinous behaviour] making it possible to identify them when they re-spawn on new accounts.” The network waged a slew of harassment campaigns; focusing their fire on journalists in particular, they terrorized their targets with death and rape threats.

As a participant in this network, Woe exhibited a chummy familiarity with John Rokes Jr, aka “SPICCI,” who was identified by the Anonymous Comrades Collective (ACC) last year. ACC calls SPICCI a “candidate for worst person of all time …. a racist, sexist, antisemitic, neo-Nazi troll, serial stalker and harasser.” You can read about a few of his harassment campaigns, particularly against the press, here and here. But Woe had a high opinion of SPICCI, at one point calling him “a national treasure.”

Woe can also be found endorsing Trey Garrison, aka Spectre, “a notorious white nationalist podcaster with a history of instigating harassment campaigns and threats of violence against reporters,” according to the SPLC’s unmasking report in 2019. Garrison coined “The Day of the Brick,” a play on “The Day of the Rope” from the neo-Nazi novel The Turner Diaries. In Garrison’s spinoff, people are encouraged to smash journalists’ faces in with bricks.

This is the part where fascist dissemblers wave us away with the old saw, “It’s just guilt by association!” But the content from Woe’s time in The Shed network makes his views plain. He consumed and regurgitated content from “The Right Stuff,” a white supremacist platform. He admitted to reading The Daily Stormer, an American neo-Nazi and white supremacist news and commentary website. He was a huge fan of white supremacist congressional candidate Paul Nehlen, at least until Nehlen was accused of doxxing Alt-Right disinfo king Douglass Mackey aka “Ricky Vaughn.” (Apparently Nehlen’s embrace of race war ideology was fine for Woe, but outing a fellow fascist was a bridge too far.) At one point, David Duke, former Grand Wizard of the Knights of the KKK, replied to Woe’s @HermannBillung account, and Woe proudly retweeted it. The list of vile characters inhabiting Woe’s online world goes on and on.

One of the ways Woe’s multiple accounts contributed to “The Shed” was through creating a huge blocklist on the Block Together tool, which, ironically, was built to help victims block harassers en masse. We even found a pastebin put out to the network, featuring tips on how to “respawn,” that promoted his list as a way to stay under the radar, noting that it was maintained by @est1608. Numerous times, as we combed through existing reactions to his handles, we found both right- and left-wing accounts expressing surprise to find themselves blocked by someone they’d never interacted with. Current LCMS twitter users are probably familiar with this; his block habit continues to this day.

Woe himself is quite proud of creating this list, which, by his estimate, has blocked over 1.4 million users.

Neither Woe nor the rest of “The Shed,” of course, deploy a blocking strategy because of any principled commitment to privacy. They deploy it to avoid drawing notice as they spout various grievances and stalk their chosen quarries. Woe’s skill at both developed on the 4chan message board /pol/, the site of his “redpilling (i.e., fascist indoctrination),” which he said was some time in the spring of 2016.

The earliest evidence we found of Woe using a redpilled sock account was under the @est1608 handle, whose first archived tweet was literally sent on the day of Charlottesville 2017. In this early period, we find Woe more invested in mingling with “The Shed” than in slamming the LCMS. Indeed, @est1608 and @HermannBillung do not reflect a rereading of the Gospels so much as a perusal of Mein Kampf, through anti-immigration sentiments, disgustingly anti-Black claims, and some of the clearest evidence of Woe’s soft spot for the Third Reich. Under @est1608, he commemorated Hitler’s birthday by calling him “uncle” (TW: strong anti-Semitism); below, you can see him “curious” about whether someone has read Hitler’s musings.

We also see the apocalyptic accelerationism of @eschatologuy beginning to take shape.

The below shot captures Woe in full meltdown mode, when his @HermannBillung avatar got caught up in a spat that ended in his suspension. As we’ll demonstrate at the end of this article, the slurs and rape threats found in this tantrum still come out when anything, or anyone, offends his hyper-inflated ego. (TW: anti-Black, anti-Asian, anti-Latinx, antisemitic, homophobic, misogynist, sexual violence)

Woe seems to have eventually become a fixture in the cavalcade of Shed personalities. This is illustrated in the artwork of white nationalist Gab user Arthur Angell, who included Woe avatars in several of his big group compositions of far-right avis. As you can see, one of them specifically alludes to The Shed.

As he solidified his status amongst online white nationalists, Woe also connected with SuperLutheran, aka Blake Kilbourne. (We discussed Corey Mahler’s advocacy of Kilbourne in our previous article.) Through such connections, it seems, he began to consider how to integrate his resentments with his religion. By late December 2018, on his @paperbackwrit3r account, ​​he claims to have arrived at the precepts of Christian Kinism over the course of the preceding year. A white supremacist ideology rooted in Confederate opposition to race-mixing, Kinism is now an urgent priority for Christians “in this thing.”

Woe appears to have inhabited a philosophical corner of The Shed network, where intellectual banter served as a radicalization pipeline. In this space, Woe perfected his process of reconciling racist apologetics with Christian faith, through a compilation of charts and arguments. In doing so, he polished a step by step course that slow walks Christians into ethnonationalism, a sequence that he and Mahler are now guiding listeners through, show by show, on Stone Choir.

With the start of @eschatologuy in 2019, Woe kept up with SPICCI and the gang. He lusted for the death of all Jews, lamenting that the nazis had only taken “half-measures” on the anniversary of Kristallnacht. He also promoted debunked canards about racial disparities in cranial size (and therefore intelligence), espoused anti-Asian and anti-immigrant racism, and promoted European supremacy.  At the same time, Woe became increasingly invested in pulling the LCMS rightward. As @eschatologuy, he indicated involvement in a “Confessional Lutheran” chat that was recruiting members. Interestingly, he also showed friendliness towards LCMS social media manager Peter Slayton, although this friendliness later curdled into Woe’s current preference for punning on “Slayton” and “Satan.”

Even as he reached out to mainstream LCMS, though, Woe also endorsed Kilbourne, aka @Super_Lutheran.

On @meldendcastles and @chancelthreader, Woe abandoned affable overtures to denominational representatives like Slayton, beginning to apply the Shed’s techniques of harassment and browbeating. After pastor Chris Paavola wrote an article lamenting the LCMS’s participation in 20th century white flight from urban centers, Woe harangued him for daring to have called his childhood congregation sinful. Paavola’s article, like the public statements of most LCMS pastors, appears to have deeply embittered Woe. In the second screenshot below, you can see signs of Woe starting to spread that bitterness to younger men, courtesy of a supportive cameo from Zak McGaha.

TW: anti-Black racism

Around this time, we also see Woe and Mahler’s relationship emerging in public.

Eventually, Woe’s hostility to conservative Lutheran figureheads led to conflict with Dr. Jordan Cooper of the AALC, a denomination tied to the LCMS. This, in turn, provoked the @meldendcastles account’s suspension from Twitter. On his blog Cognosce Veritatem, Woe further escalated, declaring of Matt Harrison, LCMS president: “Matt has prioritized the salvation of everyone but his own race, and the race of 96% of the LCMS. We have no choice but to say he has denied the Faith, and is worse than an unbeliever.” From there, of course, it was a short jump to his present collaboration with Mahler. Together, they’ve intensified their harassment of any LCMS pastor who does not profess hardcore white supremacist ideology.

Between his borderline libellous attacks and general pattern of bigotry, Woe has ample reason to keep shedding skins. At the end of his above denunciation of Harrison, he piously links his anonymity to “the stone that cries out,” referring to the verse from which the podcast Stone Choir takes its name. More recently, he’s accused the LCMS of a “coordinated doxing campaign” in the wake of our last article. Simultaneously, Woe is also proud of having evaded doxxing attempts. In this 2022 rant about attacks on his anonymity, he writes of “literal ravenous atheists, witches, child molesters, and terrorists who have spent years trying to dox me.”

But despite Woe’s skill at preserving his cover, several tells as to his identity began to emerge over the course of our research. What we learned proved both surprising and frightening. As you’ll see, Woe is a man of means and has embedded himself in positions of authority, even as he works to take his white power hobbies to the next level.

 

WOE UNMASKED: PRIDE OF AN LCMS PASTOR

First, Woe gave away his rough age by mentioning that he was present at CES (Consumer Electronics Show) 1993; alluding, at about 15:22 of the Jan. 25 Stone Choir episode, to being taught by LCMS pastor Paul McCain Sr’s mother in sixth grade; stating that he was in high school at the fall of the USSR; and indicating Generation X musical tastes.

Numerous tweets of his also betrayed expertise in computing, suggesting a professional career in the tech industry. Over his accounts, Woe has repeatedly mentioned Silicon Valley and Apple in such a way that implied familiarity with San Francisco. Furthermore, his tweets about Apple, combined with anti-Asian tweets specifically focused on their presence in the industry, implied a kind of wounded resentment, characteristic of someone who had less-than-positive experiences competing for jobs with non-citizens. Woe also alluded to familiarity with the ins and outs of the electrical grid in Northern California. All of this pointed to a person who had worked in Silicon Valley and/or lived in San Francisco. (TW: anti-Asian racism)

More significantly, Woe mentioned that his dad has been a pastor for “decades.” Given the family history provided in the Jan. 25 Stone Choir episode, we deduced that his father would necessarily have had to be an LCMS pastor. The wording of the tweet also suggested that his father was not retired, but still in ministry.

Our major breakthrough, however, came when he, as @treblewoe, posted a screenshot of a tweet he had made under his @HermannBillung account. Bragging that he had correctly predicted (eyeroll) a liberal conspiracy to force the population to eat bugs (double eyeroll), Woe declaimed, “Hear me now, believe me later.” Since this suggested that @HermannBillung was an older account of his, we tracked it down in the archives, which, in turn, led us to @est1608. As mentioned above, both of these bore the tell-tale signs of Woe’s pfps, banners, and bios. It was only then, cross-checking numerical Twitter ID’s, that we found his one pre-radicalization Twitter account: @vibescepter. This account’s tweets were almost all deleted, but Twitter still contains a record of its interactions with other users.

Amidst the traces of replies to @vibescepter, a story began to emerge. A UNIX-proficient engineer spends his idle moments trading quips with fellow techbros, more interested (at this point) in deconstructing the Blade Runner 2049 trailer than spreading antisemitic conspiracy theories. In 2014, he strikes up an intimate relationship with a likeminded professional in this circle, who has a habit of updating her Twitter followers about their road trips. On one such excursion, she tweets out a stray reference to a mishap involving a Lutheran pastor and his wife. Was it a coincidence, or were they @vibescepter’s parents, hosts on a cross-country itinerary?

Although it was unclear what happened with their relationship, we were able to not only deduce the ex’s ID, but also track her move from California to Vermont. There, we discovered she opened a whisky distillery in 2018 with two other co-owners. One readily divulges his biographical history in the article; the other, intriguingly, does not. Upon searching publicly available photos of the latter, we found a striking resemblance to someone pictured in one of the ex’s tweets: a fellow attendee at a 2015 professional whisky conference in Vegas, who, other tweets suggested, was her then-boyfriend Woe. (To be clear, we have found absolutely nothing to suggest that Woe’s ex, or current business partner, share his white supremacist ideology.)

 

From there, all the evidence fell into place. Digging a little further, we found that this reticent co-owner’s last name matched that of an LCMS pastor in Macpherson, KS. This shared surname also turned out to be German, matching another Woe clue courtesy of a customized family tree. This former denizen of Silicon Valley therefore shared both Mr. Woe’s tech interests and specific details about his family. Curiously, this person was also, as of 2009, an engineer working for Apple as an interviewer. Hadn’t the Apple-fixated Woe once said he’d been a “hiring manager for professionals” in the 2000’s?

Despite all this evidence, we continued searching for another smoking gun—audio linking Woe’s voice on Stone Choir to this co-owner’s public presence. And, lo and behold, we found it. In a video promoting his current business venture, we immediately heard the voice of Woe. Indeed, comparing this video‘s unaltered audio to that of Stone Choir revealed a direct match.

UNALTERED audio from Stone Choir podcast, ORT promotional video (https://vimeo.com/356266766) and a Youtube tourist’s visit to ORT distillery in 2019, publicly searchable.

All this was further corroborated by a recent reference to this person’s ID on the part of an anonymous Twitter account which regularly defends the “adversary pastors.” In an exchange with lutefash associate @Luthemplaer (currently @aelthemplaer), it coyly referred to “Dumpy” and includes a map of Vermont.

Based on the above, we can safely say that Woe, aka @treblewoe, @eschatologuy, @meldendcastles, @chancelthreader, @paperbackwrit3r, @hermannbillung, @est1608, and @vibescepter, is RYAN WOODIE DUMPERTH, one-time employee of Apple, co-owner of Old Route Two Spirits Distillery in Barre, VT, vice-president of Williamstown Lutheran Church, and raging white supremacist.

We would like to thank Woe/Dumperth for the clues he let slip in his many moments of boastfulness. As is written in the Book, “Pride cometh before a fall.”

Bringing Up Dumperth: From Luteschool To Lutefash 

Despite often sounding like a self-absorbed adolescent, Ryan Dumperth has 46 years under his belt. In a grim twist, this foe of LCMS leadership grew up as the son of LCMS pastor Dale Allen Dumperth. The senior Dumperth has, ironically, appeared on the podcast Table Talk with Bryan Wolfmeuller, an LCMS pastor who is a critic of Woe’s online. Despite this apparent difference, though, Dumperth Senior’s radio tastes seem to have profoundly influenced his son. Ryan developed the seeds of his worldview early on, at the dawn of right-wing talk radio in the late 80s, listening to Rush Limbaugh with his dad.

Sadly, Dumperth’s turn to fascism was possibly influenced by a tragic episode in his family history. In September 2001, his brother, Allen Dumperth, died in a shootout with Indianapolis police, after a deputy tried to stop Allen’s vehicle. Leading up to the altercation, Allen seems to have arrived at anti-government views, stockpiled assault rifles, and expressed interest in joining the military. The car in which he died had a cache of weapons and paramilitary gear, as well as 2 occupants who fled the scene; one was on leave from the Army. That said, the below article stresses that Allen’s motives were unclear.

Allen apparently scorned the strictures of being a pastor’s son, coupling increased interest in right-wing ideology with drug use, “666” tattoos, and petty theft. In contrast, Ryan played the studious authority-pleaser, entering the University of Chicago on a scholarship in 1995.

After graduating, Ryan seems to have enjoyed a successful and politically inactive career in tech. Notably, he also married and then divorced, in 2011. Based on this tweet, it seems that he has, by his own logic, disqualified himself from ever becoming a pastor.

In the mid-2010s, as his hard-right outlook evolved, Dumperth hatched a plan to open a distillery with an army veteran he claims he met on a video game forum. In a 2019 Barre Rotary Club article about the pair, they say that they chose Vermont for “the combination of a beneficial regulatory structure and a good agricultural fit.” Using a combination of private capital and government subsidies, they embarked on a lucrative business venture—one that provides yet another mask of respectability for Dumperth’s mighty fortress of hatred.

Presumably it was Woe’s money and mask of respectablility that landed him in the Vice President’s chair of Williamstown Lutheran Church. But beneath that mask remains the same vain and hateful man who has posted about how he longs for ethnic cleansing. Don’t take our word for it, take his.

 

Poast Cards from Hell

There’s a group in Woe’s orbit that we haven’t touched on yet: Nice Crew. They are a clique of Gab fash who style themselves as preachy “thought leaders,” and spend their time endlessly yammering about why Jews and Black people are bad. While there are accounts in Nice Crew that will openly post nazi content, many of them avoid overt nazism while still espousing open racism, reliably blaming the world’s ills on communists and antifa. Dumperth’s involvement with Nice Crew is critical, not only in understanding how he is trebling the reach of his hatred, but how deeply that hatred really goes.

The relationship between Woe and the Nice Crew harkens back to his former days on Gab as @eschatologuy. There, it seems, Woe was considered a top dog in their common circles, with Mahler playing the sidekick.

On Twitter, the recently returned Nice Crew (@speechmaximum) account RT’s Stone Choir content and signal boosts Woe/Dumperth. (TW: antisemitism)

We doubt “millions” of followers actually exist. The point is that Dumperth and Nice Crew here purport to shepherd their flock, however sizable it is, towards good Christian values (with a strong antisemitic twist, obviously). On hard right “fediverse” platform Poast, however, both the Nice Crew account and Dumperth disregard the kind of rectitude showed below, where a “parental warning” is attached to a recent Stone Choir episode.

Poast is a “fediverse” site, meaning that it includes an array of independently run servers and users that “federate,” i.e., interact via a hub to share content. Nice Crew runs an independent server, or “instance,” on Poast. The below screenshots show the “About” page for the Nice Crew server, including some of the server rules.

All of which is to say that Dumperth doesn’t just “interact” with a Nice Crew account on Poast, like on Twitter; he is a member of the server, has an account on it (@woe@nicecrew.digital), and is subject to its moderation “rules.” To understand Dumperth’s role on the Nice Crew team, let’s first establish that the Woe on Poast is, in fact, the same one on Stone Choir. (Note that the first shot’s joke about “heathens” implies that Nice Crew is not a Christian network, per se.)

In addition to re-confirming the Poast Woe’s identity with Stone Choir Woe/Dumperth, this shot suggests that Woe/Dumperth and Mahler want to expand to the right-wing video streaming platform Shing.

Woe/Dumperth tries to recruit Nice Crew to the LCMS (“pozzed” is right-wing derogatory slang for anything left-leaning):

Woe/Dumperth promotes to Nice Crew the Christian influencer Matt Whitman’s video “An Outsider Visits A Lutheran Church.” As Eschatologuy, he called Whitman’s work “accessible” for outsiders and specifically praised the same video as “great work.” As a bonus, you can see his now-evaporated amiability towards Slayton, too:

Woe/Dumperth betrays his expertise in whisky:

Woe/Dumperth shows off his technical know-how and UNIX fluency, in terms typical of this forum.

TW: misogyny:

Woe/Dumperth brags, in familiar terms, about his ancestry:

It’s important to note that Woe/Dumperth’s activity on Poast stopped in October 2022—right before he launched @treblewoe on Twitter and started promoting Stone Choir in earnest. In other words, the following content isn’t from a long time ago, before some moment of moral reform; it’s fairly current. The below screenshots expose Dumperth’s interactions with other members of Nice Crew on Poast in 2022, right before he branded himself (along with Mahler) as one of the holy prophets of the LCMS.

Admiring Hitler isn’t anything new for Woe. But what IS rare is to encounter him in a space where he is willing to take off the ultimate mask and express his bigotries in the crudest and most sickening terms possible, while abandoning the Christian sexual morality he claims to champion in his Treblewoe persona. Ryan Dumperth on Poast reveals the inferno of malice that burns inside him.

Remember, these are posts that the moderators decided do not constitute a violation of their server rules. Additionally, bear in mind that this is the vice president of an LCMS church, who vaunts himself as the humble “stone that cries out” in service of Jesus Christ, and who demonstrates such concern for his podcast listeners’ delicate ears. Watch how he loses his temper, and the words he uses when losing it. Be warned that extreme misogyny, anti-Black racism, anti-semitism, ableism, transphobia, and homophobia follow.

TW: misogyny

TW: homophobia, misogyny

TW: misogyny

TW: misogyny

TW: uses of the n-word (blurred out)

TW: uses of the n-word (blurred out), ableism, misogyny, fatphobia, homophobia

TW: anti-Black racism, suicide. misogyny.

TW: ableism (blurred out)

TW: ableism, homophobia (r-word and f-word blurred out)

TW: homophobia, suicide (Woe here suggests unaliving)

TW: transphobia

TW: anti-Asian racism, antisemitism

TW: antisemitism

Perhaps most chillingly, the fully unmasked Dumperth revels in fantasizing about violence and sexual assault against those he hates, to a degree not shown in his other accounts.

TW: violent antisemitism, anti-Black racism, racism, misogyny

These gleeful calls for violence would be disquieting enough on their own. However, they are even more so in light of the fact that Dumperth is a gun lover who apparently owns multiple firearms, has expressed a desire for “acceleration, gentlemen,” and—as shown above—has fantasized about a world without Jews, while also calling for “TOTAL N—-R DEATH.”

Don’t be fooled by Nice Crew and Dumperth’s Twitter personas, which avoid the kinds of edgelord expressions of hate above. Under all the disguises, this is who they are. This is who has the ear of countless impressionable listeners in the LCMS and beyond. And this is the man who has made a local name for himself selling spirits, and who sits in a seat of authority in his LCMS church.

 

Old Route Two Spirits: A Woeful Investment

Now operating under John Fitch Distillery Company, Old Route Two Spirits was valued at an impressive 4.4 million as of 2022. It arrived at this milestone, in part, because of support from the Vermont Community Loan Fund, “Vermont’s largest Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI).” As a CDFI, a program under the Department of the Treasury, the VCLF would be the beneficiary of federal funding. (See page 82 of this document for confirmation of VCLF’s involvement in the CDFI.) At the distillery’s inception in 2016, this federally supported program granted a loan for “equipment purchases and leasehold improvements to their new production facility,” with the expectation of creating “three new jobs in 2017 and additional jobs going forward.” ​​​​​​​Dumperth’s repulsive online activities should concern the VCLF board of directors, since they indirectly furnished him with money from a branch of the federal government.

Enjoying this support, Dumperth and Overbay have embedded themselves in Barre, VT, as well as in the broader state business community. The 2017 VCLF article points out Dumperth’s and Overbay’s intent to “source its products from Vermont, including grains and hardwoods,” a sign of the distillery’s localist strategy. Indeed, Dumperth not only received a favorable hearing from Barre’s City Council when his distillery first opened, but also apparently became part of Barre’s Area Development Board (a non-profit that works with the Council) at some point; his email, including the board’s acronym, is included in a development funding request dated 2020. In May 2019, well into Dumperth’s radicalization, Old Route Two Spirits was even selected to represent Vermont, alongside government officials, at the National Restaurant Association Show in Chicago. This enabled Dumperth to reach out to international buyers and, presumably, helped the distillery arrive at its current stature. He must be quite proud of his inclusion in the 2020 book Distilled In Vermont, which highlights standouts in Vermont’s booming distilled spirits industry.

The distillery also benefited from a collaboration between a federal agency, a state non-profit, and, maybe most disturbingly, a student internship program. In 2019, Norwich University and Lyndon State College joined the Central Vermont Economic Development Corporation in providing 4 student internships to Old Route Two Spirits. The students worked with Dumperth and Overbay to improve the distillery’s social media presence, boosting its Instagram engagement by 85%. It’s even possible that these students created the promotional video from which we confirmed Woe/Dumperth’s identity. What’s worse, the Central Vermont Economic Development Corporation itself relied on funds from the USDA Rural Development department: in other words, a state non-profit used federal funds to help universities send college students to work with a man who calls Hitler “uncle.” The offices of Senator Bernie Sanders will be alarmed to know that their Outreach Representative at the time, Jessica Early, was present at the press conference celebrating a secret fascist’s business.

To be clear, it seems that all of this was done unwittingly. Nonetheless, we shudder to think what kind of sick beliefs Dumperth could have expressed to these students, whether to indoctrinate them or to subjugate them. In fact, two of the interns were women, and one was of Polish descent; Woe is obviously misogynist, and has also said that Poland does not deserve to exist. Students and administrators at Vermont’s Norwich University and Lyndon State College should be aware that, without knowing it, their institutions have become publicly linked to a white supremacist.

It’s evident that Dumperth has wormed into the good graces of multiple important institutions in the state. This might be because the distillery seems to have become a bit of a tourist destination. As indicated by this video (starting at around 4:30), he has maintained a deceptively friendly presence around the distillery, giving tours and answering questions. We can imagine how unsettling it might be for these patrons to discover that their tour guide believes that Jews should be genocided, that white people are inherently more intelligent than Black people, that Chinese citizens born elsewhere are not and can never be “real Americans,” that those providing gender affirming care are “trans butchers,” and that being homophobic, in addition to other kinds of bigotry, means “being right.” (Warning: misogynist language at link.) For his part, we presume Dumperth has to put on his ‘normie’ mask whenever a tour group includes minorities he detests. Even he knows that expressing open bigotry, however pleasurable in the moment, is bad for business.

 

Dumping Adversaries at Williamstown Lutheran Church

Making money and talking trash online, however, aren’t the only tools at Dumperth’s disposal. On the Open Corporates page for Williamstown Lutheran Church, an LCMS congregation in Graniteville, VT, Ryan Dumperth was listed as Vice President as of May 31, 2023.  Williamstown Lutheran is no stranger to controversy: the LCMS disciplined its former pastor for sexual misconduct allegations, dating back to his former career as an Army Chaplain. Fortunately, the church has an ally in law enforcement, since Matthew Chin, its president, is a state trooper. Judging from the “thin blue flag” in a photo on his Facebook profile, where he goes by “Matt Mantle,” this key contact of Dumperth’s is a fairly militant kind of cop, too.

 

 

The Open Corporates page for Williamstown Lutheran also shows that 3 officers from church were removed as of 4.12.2022: director Ken Bailey, director Lee Walther, and officer Michael Schumacher, listed as “other officer with decision-making authority.” There’s no public evidence about why these removals took place, but as vice president of the church, Dumperth holds a lot of power when making these calls. In fact, Dumperth alluded to participating in a call committee, a group that screens pastoral candidates for the church, in September 2020. Strangely, the person currently listed as pastor for Williamstown in the LCMS Find A Pastor locator, Patrick D. Runk, is not mentioned on the website, which is sparse in information. What’s more, on the LCMS website, Runk is listed as having a Florida permanent address.

 

The public persona of Williamstown Lutheran gives little, if any, indication that its board members might even dispute LCMS leadership, let alone loathe it. The church’s Facebook page reposts LCMS content designed to affirm support for racial diversity, exactly the kind of messaging that Woe and his collaborators find so contemptible.

 

 

It’s not clear who at the church, if any, shares Dumperth’s views. However, as Woe, Dumperth has suggested that he attends a “solid congregation” led by a “faithful pastor.” This would seem to indicate that, in his opinion, he is surrounded by LCMS members who are sufficiently right-wing for his tastes.

 

That said, it sounds like Dumperth disapproves of a more openminded faction in his church, who should beware the depth of hatred carried by the person opposing them.

It is deeply distressing to know that a church with ties to law enforcement might be a safe haven for nazis and fascists. And it’s even more distressing in light of where Dumperth and Mahler’s online profile is apparently headed: becoming an influence beyond the LCMS, or even conservative Lutheranism, itself.

 

Trebled Bigotry: Dumperth Beyond the Lutefash

As the racist Stone Choir gospel has spread, so has the emoji that signals its supporters. And there are troubling signs that that audience is spreading beyond lutefash circles. As you can see in the below screenshots, Mahler and Woe are more than just an internal problem for the LCMS. The podcast has managed to amass an array of devotees in a few short months. Partly through the work of the young Christian Nationalist pundit Ryan Turnipseed, seen here laundering their reputation on a podcast with Baptist (and neo-confederate) Jon Harris, Dumperth and Mahler are building a cross-denominational alliance, stone by stone.

 

 

Stone Choir’s new fans aren’t limited to disgruntled Baptists and Anglicans, either. It has become one of the “favorite podcasts” of a man the SPLC calls a “gatekeeper” of the Alt Right: Bradley Dean Griffin, League Of The South aficionado, Charlottesville attendee, and owner of the website Occidental Dissent, where he writes under the name Hunter Wallace. Gaining Griffin’s approval is a big win for two podcasters hoping to become bigger players in the far-right movement.

Dumperth’s expertise in online tactics, in fact, make him a shining example of the kind of keyboard warrior Griffith extols on his site (TW: antisemitic use of word “goy”): “We need to have a group of Proud Goys, a social media team, who do nothing but build social networks. Let them sit there and build relationships all day on Facebook and Twitter” (quoted in the above SPLC article).

Unfortunately, the LCMS hasn’t been able to contain the choir these fash are preaching to. The conservative online “adversary pastors” have struggled to wrap their heads around how to confront well-practiced trolls. They’re still trying to deal with the problem by arguing that the nazis were really socialists, or that Canaan was cursed and not Ham. Meanwhile, Dumperth as Treblewoe has been spinning strawmen in every direction and issuing threats to LCMS leadership like edicts from an Old Testament Prophet. The stage where we debate fascists like him is long gone. It’s well past time we knew his name.

 

WOE UNTO YOU, RYAN DUMPERTH

Ryan Dumperth —white supremacist, Hitler admirer, misogynist, homophobe, transphobe, antisemite, anti-Black racist, anti-Asian racist, all-around racist, unstable gun owner, vice president of Williamstown Lutheran Church, co-owner of Old Routes Two Spirits Distillery, beneficiary of state and federal funding, son of LCMS pastor Dale Allen Dumperth—is as pathetic as he is dangerous. From his perch in the darkness, he hurls the most abhorrent slurs at those he sees as beneath him, while also working to spread his views. A divorcee himself, he sanctimoniously maintains that divorced men are disqualified from pastoral ministry. He lobs criticisms of moral degeneracy, while objectifying women in terms that would make a sailor blush. And, in an especially absurd moment, he has the nerve to mewl about an opponent’s “hateful diatribe about incels,” while using the N-word in his Twitter handle. (TW: anti-Black racism)

At the same time, Dumperth is not just another sad online Hitler devotee. He is a wealthy and well-connected entrepreneur, whose tech savvy and funds offer valuable assets to a Christofascist movement hungry for both. Meanwhile, as the co-host of Stone Choir, he is working diligently to reach young white men as misguided, angry, and untethered as he is, selling them a hateful fantasy built on an arbitrary definition of Lutheranism. Yet mainstream LCMS, however horrified they might be at this state of affairs, cannot simply dismiss Dumperth as a fringe member. Dumperth has built his platform while operating in the very heart of denominational organization, under the nose of a respectable LCMS pastor who has worked in the ministry for decades. Given how successfully he’s pulled off this operation, it’s no wonder that he shows such brazen confidence in the future of the lutefash, starting with calls to flex their muscles at the 2023 LCMS Convention, and the events leading up to it, in June and July of this year. Ominously referring to the forum in which the Convention conducts business, Dumperth recently said of President Harrison, “Matt is going to have a really rough time from the floor.”

Even if the lutefash fail to elect their favored candidates for LCMS leadership, they will undoubtedly soldier on in their efforts, partly because of Dumperth’s incessant polemic. And, as we have stressed throughout, there is no reason to believe that their actions will remain restricted to creating headaches within the LCMS. Never lacking in ambition, Mahler has recently stated that he, Dumperth, and Kilbourne/Superlutheran may want nothing less than a new splinter Lutheran denomination, complete with its own Book of Concord, that “corrects the mistakes of the Enlightenment.”

 

We are calling on all outraged by this report to take the following actions to stop them from proceeding any further.

1. Place pressure on LCMS leadership generally, and anti-lutefash LCMS like @ArpadZahra and Chris Rosebrough (@piratechristian) particularly, to divulge as much as they already know about Dumperth, and to disclose how long they have had this information. Frankly, we are appalled by @ArpadZahra’s above suggestion that they have known Dumperth’s identity for some time, only to withhold that information so that they can keep it as a “card to play.” Whatever reasons they had for doing so, this amounts to prioritizing LCMS affairs over the unsuspecting neighbors and acquaintances of a dangerous, well-armed bigot—in particular, members of minority groups on whom Dumperth has wished death.

2. Demand answers from Williamstown Lutheran Church ((802) 479-1164; wlcvermont@gmail.com). Is their church as welcoming a place for Dumperth’s views as Dumperth seems to think it is? Who among their leadership sympathizes with his prejudices? And what steps will they take to remove Dumperth immediately, not just from the board of directors, but from membership and attendance?

3. Exhort John Fitch Distillery, which acquired Old Route Two Spirits in 2020, to immediately sever ties and issue a condemnation. Dumperth should not be able to continue profiting from sales under the John Fitch label. (info@johnfitchdistilling.com; 860.968.2427)

4. Call local liquor stores in the Barre, VT area to ask whether they are selling Old Route Two Spirits products. If so, inform them of the brand’s ties to white supremacy and demand that they stop selling this product. Here is a list of some possible liquor stores in the area: https://www.yelp.com/search?find_desc=Liquor+Store&find_loc=Barre%2C+VT+05641

5. Demand answers from the Barre City Council members about the extent of their ties to and association with Ryan Dumperth. What degree of influence has he had over their decisions? Apply pressure to the council to put out a statement condemning Dumperth’s ideology. The mayor, Jake Hemmerick, can be reached at j.hemmerick@barrecity.org / (802) 363-7831.

6. Demand a response from the Vermont Community Loan Fund. Inform them that their organization has unwittingly provided financial support to a white supremacist. Point out that their status as a CDFI effectively implicates the federal government in this situation. Call on them to denounce Dumperth and sever any material ties.

7. Demand answers from Pastor Dale Allen Dumperth of Grace Evangelical Church (prdumperth@att.net; 620-241-1627) and call on him to put out a statement condemning his son’s extensive record of hatred and bigotry. Whatever his personal affections for his son, the broader public deserves to know whether an LCMS pastor in good standing affirms such a reprehensible worldview.

Dumperth and his circle of lutefash feel emboldened to proselytize their so-called “perfect hatred” of anyone they consider their inferiors. In part, they do so because they are are careful to cloak that hatred in  language of theology and anti-heretical crusades. This lends plausible deniability to their movement, as they can claim that they are merely “defending Scriptural truth.” But as the above evidence hopefully makes clear, this is all an act. For them, Christianity is a means to obtaining wealth, adulation, submissive sexual partners, sadistic treatment of LGBTQ people, persecution of racial minorities, and white power, at any cost. Only through sustained and unflinching opposition, only by tearing off their masks of righteousness, will we truly halt their campaign of woe. 

 

Dismantling the Fortress: Corey J. Mahler and the Lutefash.

Content Warning: Intense anti-semitism, white supremacy, and discussions of Nazism, violence, and anti-LGBQTIA+ views. The post is intended as a resource to identify the specific harms of Corey J. Mahler, the context he is in and the religious organization around him. Machaira Action explicitly denounces white supremacy and fascism in all forms and makes every attempt to cite specific instances WHILE not amplifying hate. Some links are specifically not provided to avoid providing oxygen to these abusive ideologies.

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Welcome to Dismantling The Fortress: Corey Mahler and the Lutefash, a series devoted to monitoring the rise of a white supremacist faction within the Lutheran faith. We will be examining the dangerous spread of this ideology and exposing the individuals within it who pose a threat to the community.

“Lutefash” is not a word they use to describe themselves, rather it is our way of giving a name to this network of Lutheran fascists that doesn’t have any self-identifying terms (other than casual references like “based LCMS”).

This first article in our series will explore the supremacist ideology of the Lutefash movement and its broader role within the fascist “faith” community. We will also identify one of its principal thought leaders, Corey J. Mahler.

Mahler stands out as a figurehead among far-right American Lutherans. We’ll learn about his role in neo-Nazi fundraising, his carefully crafted online platform, his church home in Knoxville, TN and his growing network of alliances in the Lutefash world. As we work our way through the characters in his orbit you’ll meet everyone from infamous names like Jason Kessler and Vanguard America’s Blake Kilbourne, to the young and impressionable former horror novelist Zak McGaha, who hangs on Mahler’s every word. You’ll meet the notorious “crying nazi” Christopher Cantwell and Lutheran shock jock Ryan Turnipseed, as well as a variety of other characters who have either partnered with Mahler or have enabled his rise to prominence in Lutheran circles.

Mahler began to grow his brand among the Lutefash when he stepped into the disarray that followed the Unite The Right rally. He’s been trying to build a theological fortress for Lutheran fascists ever since.

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In 2017, a horde of neo-nazis and white supremacists marched from the Internet’s dark corners and, armed with torches, took to the streets of Charlottesville. We all remember what followed: the brazen and bloody violence, the murder of Heather Heyer, the shock. Despite all the warnings that had been coming from antifascists, Black folks and communities of color, for many people Unite the Right lifted a veil off the face of white supremacist terror in America, and the depth of its support, including the tacit sympathy of a sitting President.

After the event, many of the organizers scurried back into the dark. As they tried to cover their tracks, antifascist research groups gathered receipts and began a long campaign of accountability that continues to this day. Court cases, ID drops, and the continued research of groups like Ignite The Right have since identified many of the Unite The Right (UTR) participants. Some of the UTR supremacists, like Jason Kessler and Andrew Anglin, are well known and have suffered public consequences. Other key members and second-tier enablers have been forced to lay low.

As the far-right regrouped following UTR, representatives of the mid-2010’s ‘alt right’ began to commingle more regularly with the Christian nationalist movement, which had been emboldened by the rise of Trump and his cadre of Christian sycophants. Where the former privileged dreams of a white ethnostate encompassing paganism and even atheism, the ascendant Maga-dominionists lay emphasis on theocracy. The convergence of these far-right movements isn’t exactly new, but, particularly now with Elon Musk’s twitter, its capacity for harm is much greater than it has been in recent memory.

The most visible demagogues on Twitter and elsewhere don’t work alone, though. Nazis who stand in the spotlight rely on a secondary level of enablers. But behind every Kessler stands an army of sycophants and supporters who amplify, applaud, and encourage white supremacist bullshit. Here, we focus on one of these second-tier enablers.

Today, many confessional Lutherans funnel into neo-nazi ideology through the insidious efforts of one Christofascist in particular: Corey J. Mahler. His ascent illustrates how fascism is built on enablers all the way down. In his case, his set of enablers come from within conservative Lutheranism—some willfully, and others through ignorance. But in trying to share a space with a fascist, they’re allowing Mahler’s crew to take it over.

The Lutheran Church (Missouri Synod) And Christofascism in the United States

The Lutheran Church Missouri Synod (LCMS) is the second-largest Lutheran denomination in the United States, boasting an estimated 1.8 million members as of 2021. Founded in 1847 as the “German Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States,” the LCMS now has congregations in all 50 states, Canada and a growing presence globally. Despite Lutheranism’s perceived association with mainline progressivism (mostly through the work of the ELCA and more liberal voices like Nadia Bolz-Weber), the LCMS holds a staunch  conservative theology; forbidding women in leadership, maintaining virulent opposition to LGBTQIA+ folks, and adhering to a loud anti-choice stance on abortion.

Within its already conservative ranks a far-right faction is growing, agitating for more stridently reactionary positions. The significance of this faction is evident from Unicorn Riot’s Discord leaks, which exposed the private chats of thousands of white supremacists between 2018 and 2020. A noticeable number of chat participants self-identified as being part of the LCMS, including a member of the “Traditionalist Worker Party,” a neo-Nazi organization that was present at Unite the Right in 2017. Elsewhere, chat members admired the LCMS’s far-right reputation, alongside their explicit racism, homophobia, misogyny, antisemitism, ableism, and calls to replace America with an openly fascist state. For example, one member in a Nick Fuentes group referred to another as “based LCMS bro.”

Today, this faction of the LCMS strongly identifies with the label “Christian nationalist.” Some even proudly identify as fascists, espousing deeply anti-semitic and neo-nazi beliefs. Most recently, this faction has come into conflict with LCMS president Matthew Harrison and his supporters over its new edition of Luther’s Large Catechism, a foundational document to Lutheran denominations. In the opinion of this faction, the essays published in the new edition implicitly support Marxism, critical race theory, trangender identity, homosexuality, and even pedophilia. A cursory overview of the offending passages reveals nothing more than politely phrased opposition to all the above. Nonetheless, the Lutefash successfully pushed to pause distribution of the volume, although distribution has resumed as of February 2.

Using podcasts, blogs, Twitter accounts, and right-wing social media forums, these LCMS-fascists rally around an ideology that joins Evangelical conservatism’s anti-trans and anti-CRT sentiments with open white ethnocentrism. Perhaps because of Martin Luther’s own vehement antisemitism, Lutefash in these forums cast their faith among the thorns, where admiration for Hitler, denunciation of the Jews, and opposition to interracial marriage choke and twist the conversation.

While Lutefash often express their white supremacist sentiments explicitly, they also sometimes do so in code. For example, in a Telegram Channel run by Corey Mahler, one user stated, “1483 men. Jesus Christ is wonderful.”

NOTE: 1483 is a ChristoFascist spin on the nazi code of 1488: 14 stands for the 14 words of David Lane about protecting whiteness, while 88 duplicates of the eighth letter of the alphabet, HH, for “H*il H*tler.” In this instance, 1483 represents the 14 words plus “Heil Christ”—a call for white Christian nazism. 

Mahler’s Telegram channel attracts similar minded zealots. One user praises him by writing, “There really need to be more Protestant fascists. Your takes on these issues are a breath of fresh air.”

Lutefash Telegram channels and blogs are replete with this dark and antisemitic trash theology. What’s more, they show how large Corey Mahler’s presence looms in these networks. Whether through his Twitter account, his podcasts—Stone Choir, Tischreden, and Confident Faith—or his several websites, Corey has become a particularly successful apostle of Christian fascist ideology. To quote one of the Telegram posts in the above screenshot, his message is: “Either Christo-Fascist or Judeo-Marxist. There are no other options.” For him, fascism is a useful means to an end, a “bridge back to proper governance.” Or, as he put it in blunter terms, “​​I am a Fascist, because it leads to Monarchy.”

Obviously, we can append “theocratic” to his use of “monarchy.” Now, let’s look at how Corey is building his part of the “bridge” back to theocracy.

Corey Mahler’s background

Mahler’s current Twitter account is the second in his career as a public fascist. Equally as toxic as his first account, Mahler’s present profile states that he lived in California most of his life, “more than thirty years.” Based on address records and his former law offices, we can confirm that Mahler spent his formative years in Ranchos Palos Verdes, CA. There, he wrote in a May 2022 “letter to President Harrison of the LCMS,” he attended an LCMS school (likely Christ Lutheran Church and School). While from the LCMS background, Mahler states that he did not become baptized into the LCMS until later in life.

It is unclear when Mahler became an official Lutheran. However, his comments in a January 25, 2023 episode of his podcast Stone Choir suggest that he converted during his college years at the University of Michigan (he graduated in 2008, with a B.A. in Political Science). After graduation, Mahler completed a law degree at Chapman University’s Fowler School of Law, an institution not far from his home in California. Around the time Mahler attended Chapman, its law faculty included John Eastman, the attorney who represented Donald Trump in his attempt to overturn the 2020 election. (Eastman’s involvement led to his forced resignation from Chapman in early 2021.) Chapman’s long reputation as a conservative-leaning university may account for Mahler’s choice to attend its law school. At some point in this period, Mahler further immersed himself in the Christian right by attending Pepperdine University, a Christian college that has also garnered a conservative reputation. At around 02:23:06 of Episode 3 of Tischreden, he mentions driving to Los Angeles from San Diego when he was “going to Pepperdine.”

After earning his law degree in 2012, Mahler pursued several business ventures, including starting up an IT services company called Zyniker Computer Services. (“Zyniker,” German for “cynic,” is the same name as Mahler’s law firm, which would gain notoriety for representing Charlottesville “luminaries,” as discussed below.  “Zyniker13” also served as Corey’s Github alias around this time). In 2018, Mahler renamed the company Bristlecone IT, probably because the bad press associated with his law firm had begun to give it a bad name. But despite this attempt to salvage its reputation, Zyniker/Bristlecone remains a cornerstone of his descent into fascist organizing.

Mahler’s Radicalization and Collaboration with Jason Kessler

Initially, Mahler’s blog posts combined his IT knowhow (“Encryption Explained”) with a fairly standard range of conservative beliefs, such as climate change denialism and denunciations of the Left’s “governmental power.” However, Mahler’s interests appeared to change when he briefly moved to Berlin to earn an LL.M (a Master’s in Business and Law) in 2016-2017, returning just before Unite The Right in Charlottesville. A few months later, in October 2017, Mahler began to focus on ethnonationalism. By the following spring he was expressing an open and unabashed European (read as white) supremacism, as seen in a May 17, 2018 blog post entitled, “The European Peoples and Christianity.” Here, in embryonic form, we can see the pro-white theology that Mahler now propagates incessantly. Europeans, as “God’s chosen people,” are uniquely equipped to maintain Christianity, while “heathens” have and continue to threaten the faith’s foundations. In a move that most traditional Christians would find shocking, Mahler even calls the Bible a “lesser revelation” compared to that of “Nature,” so that he can praise pre-Christian Europeans for venerating this revelation through pagan mythology. In this post, Mahler also forges a link between Lutheranism and the veneration of “Volk,” or the “folk” that lies at the core of neo-nazi ideology. This myth of a pure “folk” culture lurks under his boast that Europeans (read as German Lutherans particularly) “built a Church that respected tradition, defended our Volk, and gave glory to God.”

Around this time, Corey Mahler started to put his “volkish” obsessions into action by becoming an attorney for one of the UTR Charlottesville organizers, white supremacist Jason Kessler. While Kessler listed “Kolenich Law Office” as his attorney in a January 12, 2018 post to his website, by February 2018, he began listing “Zyniker Law” as a proxy for donations. Due to public pressure on Big Tech, UTR defendants needed ways to get around increasingly difficult obstacles to fundraising. Corey’s solution to the problem was documented in this ThinkProgress piece: using Zyniker Law’s website as an intermediary, Kessler and fellow neo-Nazi Christopher Cantwell were able to raise money via PayPal, accepting donations of up to $10,000 dollars. As Luke Barnes and Casey Michel noted in their ThinkProgress piece, Mahler’s now deleted posts on Gab alluded to an “Alt Right Legal Fund” and efforts to “build a legal infrastructure for the Right.” By mid-2018, it was clear that Mahler wasn’t interested in remaining a bit player in the American fascist revival. He had, and continues to have, grandiose designs.

It seems that Corey Mahler didn’t just help Kessler and Cantwell raise funds, either. He and his firm have also been accused of abetting their twisted fundraising tactics, which involved hyping up threats against victims of UTR—in effect, witness intimidation as a marketing scheme. This is evident from the testimony of data scientist and activist Emily Gorcenski, a counterprotestor at Charlottesville, who afterwards created the “First Vigil” website, a node for keeping track of white nationalists.

In retaliation for her testimony about Charlottesville’s events, Kessler and Cantwell began to routinely disparage and harass Gorcenski, using their terror campaign to drive interest to their platform, where they inundated the traffic with donation links. In an amended version of Gorcenski and Christopher Goad’s 2018 counterclaim against Christopher Cantwell, Gorcenski and Mr. Goad both allege that Mahler and Zyniker Law supported Kessler and Cantwell by encouraging donations as a reward for their harassment, calling it a conspiracy to interfere with their civil rights, obstruction of justice, and witness intimidation.

Although it was officially slated for legal defense funds, Zyniker’s Paypal account also served to cover Kessler’s expenses for a planned anniversary of UTR. The outcry stemming from this effort led to Paypal shutting down the Zyniker account around July 2018. Undeterred by this setback, Mahler forged on with Kessler, nabbing a speaking slot at UTR 2.0 in DC’s Lafayette Square. Had he actually been able to speak, he would have joined the likes of Klan leader David Duke and Kessler himself. Fortunately, UTR 2.0 was a massive dud. Ending before it began, the “rally” saw 30 or 40 fascists vastly outnumbered by thousands of counterprotestors. Kessler offered a few whining remarks before abruptly ending the proceedings.

Rather than give up on his fascist ambitions, though, Mahler turned from helping the Alt-Right old guard to advancing his presence within the LCMS. Mahler’s comments on Tischreden suggest that, throughout this period, he was attending a church in the Los Angeles area. At around 28:50 of Episode 3 of Tischreden, he boasted that his California church “had a full German service on Christmas Eve” when he was living there (likely through early-to-mid 2021). Around 2:05:25 of Episode 1 of Tischreden, Mahler referred to having a CA pastor who moved to the state from Wisconsin. Finally, an early 2020 tweet mentions a “philosophy professor” who taught Bible Study at his church every Sunday. All this information suggests that Mahler was probably attending St. John’s Lutheran of Orange, which annually hosts a German language Christmas service, has a pastor who moved to CA from Wisconsin, and holds a Bible study each Sunday taught by Dr. David Ciocchi, professor of philosophy at Biola University. Finally, St. John’s used to hold an apologetics series called “Confident Faith,” the name of Mahler’s devotional website.

Mahler, however, wasn’t satisfied with attending German language services and holding forth on philosophy at his local Bible study. As we’ll see, the next part of his career saw him increase his standing in the denomination at large.

Mahler’s activities post-2018: The Book Of Concord Website

Besides the Bible itself, the Book of Concord is the foundational authority of Lutheran doctrine. It is a credal collection of documents that guide Lutherans in “Concordia,” “an agreeing together,” to which, traditionally, pastors would pledge themselves. The Large Catechism, the recent edition of which sparked the controversy mentioned earlier, is just one of the documents that comprise the Book of Concord. Today, one of the only online versions of this document is controlled by Corey Mahler.

After UTR 2.0 failed, Mahler seems to have spent about a year laying low and restricting his activities to fulminating on his blog. By late 2019, though, he started executing plans to broaden his profile in the LCMS, using the existing Book of Concord website to do so. As he tells it, in late 2019, Mahler made contact with Rev. Paul McCain, chief editor of LCMS publishing house Concordia Publishing, to inquire about updating their online site for the Book of Concord. McCain agreed, so Mahler designed and built a new site. As a result, a white supremacist ended up controlling one of the only web versions of the Book of Concord available in an English translation—by far, the premier online version.

In a February 2022 blog post detailing the above events, Mahler claimed that he was still the legal owner and maintainer of the Book of Concord website, but that LCMS members displeased with his influence unsuccessfully tried to have ownership of the site transferred out of his hands. (LCMS seems to have restored the pre-Mahler version of the website at bookofconcord dot org—no “the” at the front of the address.) Corroborating Mahler, Scam Advisor’s listing for thebookofconcord dot org suggests that Mahler continues to administer the site—in particular, through his company Bristlecone IT.

Mahler’s activities post-2018: Continued funding for his activities via Bristlecone IT Services

Scam Advisor lists Bristlecone IT Services as the administrative organization responsible for the Book of Concord website. Scam Advisor also notes that Mahler has attempted to hide his identity as the owner of this site, as well as a related one: thebookofconcord dot com (as opposed to dot org) also administered by Bristlecone, which now directs to Mahler’s devotional website “confident dot faith.” In essence, Mahler is using the name of Lutheran’s foundational book as a phishing scheme for his products and fascist ideology.

As mentioned above, Mahler originally called his IT company “Zyniker Computer Services,” but renamed it “Bristlecone” around the time that “Zyniker Law”’s association with Kessler became public. Bristlecone’s site currently claims to offer “Network Management” to “upgrade the performance and the security of your wired and wireless networks.” Although Mahler boasts that his list of clients includes “multinational corporations,” the website provides no confirmation of this claim; the only endorsement on the site is attributed to a “Tom S” enthusing about his home Internet connection. It’s doubtful that an IT company working for important corporations would only feature such an endorsement. Still, any corporations employing Mahler should be made aware of his hateful rhetoric.

The site’s “shop page” features a “Network Management and Privacy Package” that can cost anywhere from $649 to $6,499, as well as gateway routers that can cost up to $2,999.  In addition, it includes an option to make a donation of up to $1,000. These prices, the donation option, and his deceitful efforts to fund raise for Christopher Cantwell and Jason Kessler, suggest that he may use this business as a front to receive funds for his activities.

2020-present day: relocation to Knoxville, Tennessee, and present church membership

While working on the Book of Concord site in 2020, Mahler seems to have hatched a plan to relocate across the country. In August of that year, he complained on Twitter that transferring his license to a “different jurisdiction” required him to specify the date on which he passed the bar. In later tweets, Mahler hinted at the rationale behind this move, noting that his present location offers him “good neighbors and better odds if things go sideways.”

According to his lawyer.com profile, he changed his mailing address to a P.O. box in Townsend, TN in April 2022. This move coincided with an uptick in his Twitter activity under his username @coreyjmahler. In a now deleted 2022 tweet, Corey said, “I live in TN.”

Furthermore, tweets from this year indicate that he now lives in the “back hills of Tennessee.” On lawyer.com, he is listed as an active and licensed attorney “in good standing” in TN. Based on our research, we can confirm that Mahler now lives in Maryville, TN, approximately 20 minutes from his PO Box in Townsend, TN. Given that Maryville saw disruptive appearances from Nazis at a drag show in November, the presence of a person who raised funds for Jason Kessler and Christopher Cantwell should alarm antifascists in the area.

We can also confirm that Mahler attends First Lutheran Knoxville, an LCMS church in North Knoxville. First Lutheran livestreams their weekly service, and the videos of those services show him attending from at least June 6, 2021 to the present. A creature of habit, Mahler posts on Telegram for his followers to, “go to church tomorrow,” and then he does. He sits in the same spot on the same pew, week after week.

 

Mahler has successfully embedded himself in the life of the church. At around 00:20:23 of Episode 2 of Tischreden, Mahler alludes to purchasing a “Moravian Star” (a large traditional Advent ornament) for First Lutheran Knoxville, as well as voting in a congregational meeting. The fact that the LCMS denominational leadership permits a neo-nazi to participate in organizational decisions should be of enormous concern.

First Lutheran Knoxville is pastored by Edward Maanum. On Twitter, the co-host of Corey’s Stone Choir podcast, who goes by Woe (@treblewoe, formerly known as @eschatologuy and @meldendcastles before that), indicated that a group of pastors had written Maanum to complain about Mahler’s explicitly white nationalist and antisemitic tweets. At around 01:55:21 of Episode 3 of the Tischreden podcast, Mahler expresses admiration for Maanum and indicates that Maanum has stood by him despite criticism. He jokes that he owes Maanum a beer for his solidarity. We can assume that Maanum is either indifferent to Mahler’s views or espouses them himself. At around 1:51:00 of Episode 2 of Tischreden, Mahler also alludes to meeting with Pastor Emeritus Rev. John Schulz and his wife. At around 00:11:02 of Episode 3 of Tischreden, Mahler speaks highly of Schulz, saying that he hopes to feature Schulz on the podcast. This indicates that Schulz may also be sympathetic to Mahler’s views as well.

Mahler doesn’t just attend church in Knoxville; he is expanding his online efforts and recruiting on a local level. As mentioned above, he increased his Twitter presence in mid-to-late 2022, and also started two podcasts, Stone Choir (with sidekick Woe) and Tischreden (with Knoxville native Zak McGaha). These podcasts serve to supplement his preexisting Confident Faith podcast, a more explicitly devotional series for which he also created a website. At the same time, Mahler continues to write on the eponymous blog he’s maintained for over a decade.

2021-present day: Mahler’s support for “Super Lutheran,” aka Lutheran Pastor Blake Kilbourne

As Mahler was planning his move to Knoxville in 2021, he continued to stump for Charlottesville’s architects, supporting a UTR-linked figure within conservative Lutheranism. Blake Kilbourne (aka “SuperLutheran”) is a pastor and neo-Nazi podcaster who had a significant position in Vanguard America, the precursor to Patriot Front. In the Anonymous Comrades Collective’s Jan. 2022 doxx of Kilbourne, they note that Vanguard America wasn’t just present at UTR 2017; they also “instigated a large part of the violence” that transpired there. SuperLutheran / Kilbourne is believed to have significantly shaped the religious dimension of Vanguard America’s propaganda. At the time of the doxx, Kilbourne was pastoring Our Savior Lutheran Church in Dickinson, ND, part of the Association of Free Lutheran Congregations (AFLC). Before this doxx, however, evidence suggests that Mahler not only collaborated with Kilbourne, but also that key figures in conservative Lutheran circles knew, and concealed, Kilbourne’s identity. Unpacking this pre-doxx situation requires explaining the complex interrelationships amongst conservative Lutheran denominations.

During the fallout from Kilbourne’s doxx, a local North Dakota paper reported that Kilbourne had previously pastored at a Washington-based church belonging to the American Association of Lutheran Churches, a Lutheran organization closely linked to (“in fellowship with”) LCMS. (The AALC is not to be mistaken for the AFLC—Lutherans have a particularly convoluted history of denominational splintering.) According to the paper, AALC church Emmanuel Lutheran had employed Kilbourne as an intern, and considered making him head pastor in the spring of 2021. However, Kilbourne was denied the position after appearing before a May 2021 AALC “determination hearing” in Iowa.

The AALC maintains that this hearing merely involved a discussion of whether Kilbourne was a “viable candidate,” remaining tight-lipped about whether Kilbourne’s extremism was factored into the decision. The former pastor of Emmanuel, Tim Cartwright, denies that Kilbourne’s fascist activities had anything to do with his dismissal. In a July 12, 2021 reply on the right wing media site Poast, though, Kilbourne said that he was, in fact, “fired [from the AALC church] for being Super Lutheran”—i.e., for being a Nazi.

This background is relevant because, in episode 3 of the Tischreden podcast, Mahler indicated that he attended the 2021 AALC “determination hearing.” Supporting Super Lutheran’s version of events, Mahler’s comments differ markedly from Cartwright’s and AALC representatives’ official statements. His account comes in the middle of a zealous defense of Kilbourne, beginning around 00:04:00 of the episode. He accuses pastor Jordan B. Cooper, an AALC figure, occasional LCMS ally, and frequent critic of Mahler’s, of “lies.” Mahler starts by claiming that Cooper “brought charges” against Kilbourne and even aided in his doxxing. Mahler seems to mean 1) that Cooper called for disciplining Kilbourne, and 2) that the hearing involved discussion of his “charges.”

Mahler didn’t specify whether he thinks Cooper “brought charges against” Kilbourne in the AALC (pre-doxx) or the AFLC (post doxx). However, it seems reasonable to assume that Cooper acted with respect to the AALC: not only does Cooper sit on the AALC’s executive committee, but AALC is “in fellowship” with LCMS while AFLC isn’t. (Confused yet?) If Mahler’s account is accurate, this would mean that Kilbourne’s identity was known to Cooper, and perhaps other AALC/LCMS senior leadership, before the 2022 doxx—but that no one chose to publicize this information. It would also mean that, contrary to Cartwright’s account, the determination hearing actually did involve discussion of Kilbourne’s far-right profile. Corroborating this theory, Mahler then described advocating for Kilbourne at an “AALC” hearing, complaining that those presiding over the hearing tried to ban him from its proceedings. In response, Mahler says he refused to accept this because “I spent time traveling to get here.” Depending on where he was living at the time, Mahler traveled from either California or from Tennessee to attend the Iowa hearing.

Mahler boasted that he was able to convince “all but one” panelist at the hearing of his perspective, saying that even the holdout was “50/50.” However, Kilbourne was ultimately denied a pastorate because, as Mahler lamented, “the hearing panel and the body making the decision are not the same.” In short, Mahler seems to have tried to help Kilbourne secure a pastorate in the AALC. His account of the hearing, if true, is revealing. It means that Mahler already knew that Kilbourne was “Super Lutheran” before the doxx, perhaps because they moved in the same circles; it means that Mahler was close enough to Kilbourne to take time to travel to Iowa on his behalf; it means that Cartwright and AALC representatives were not forthcoming about the nature of the 2021 hearing; and, based on the (apparent) openness of hearing panel members to his arguments, it means that Mahler was able to tap into a latent sympathy for Christofascism within the AALC.

Mahler’s admiration for Kilbourne stems from his intimate familiarity with Kilbourne’s success. After describing the hearing on Tischreden Episode 3, Mahler said, “I’ve seen all of the emails, the messages. I know roughly how many people have been brought to the faith because of him.” It is unclear if this refers to Kilbourne’s evangelism for Christianity or for the white supremacist movement. However, given Mahler’s racist theology, it seems likely that he is conflating both. For many in these circles, evangelism is also a recruiting tactic for white nationalist organizing. Kilbourne’s success at the former would suggest success at the latter.

Kilbourne seems to have reciprocated Mahler’s admiration. On Poast, a user named SuperLutheran recently boasted that Corey Mahler was his “homie.” According to the Anonymous Comrade Collective’s report on Kilbourne, this would be the same “Super Lutheran” as Blake Kilbourne. We can assume that the two maintain a friendship, if not a collaborative relationship. A user named Super Lutheran is also an active member of Corey’s Telegram channel.

Thankfully, in May 2022, Kilbourne was removed from fellowship with the AFLC, and replaced with pastor Scott Erickson at Our Savior’s Lutheran. Our Savior’s site and Facebook page have wiped all evidence of Kilbourne’s time pastoring the church. Declining to comment on the circumstances of Kilbourne’s removal, the AFLC newsletter merely states, “the ministry [Kilbourne] is involved in would be better operated from a context other than congregational ministry.” To say the least, Kilbourne’s “ministry” of indoctrinating Nazis should be kept far, far away from Lutheran congregations—or any other organization, for that matter.

Tischreden podcast and association with Zak McGaha, aka Protestant Folk Peasant

Corey’s determination to indoctrinate younger Lutherans can be seen in the mentorship of his Tischreden podcast co-host, 24-year-old Zak McGaha, who goes by the pseudonym “Protestant Folk Peasant” online. In calling himself a “folk peasant,” of course, Zak echoes the “Volkish” ideology that Mahler has and continues to push.

A former horror writer, McGaha has declared that his conversion to Lutheranism required abandoning that genre for what he calls “cozy Christian fiction.” McGaha amplified Mahler’s views with his Protestant Folk Peasant (now-deleted) Facebook and Twitter pages, echoing the antisemitic, racist, and transphobic theology Cory discusses on Tischreden. In a tactic to lure conservative Lutherans further right, McGaha also regularly posts to Telegram channels with less overt white supremacist views, creating a pipeline by which Lutherans move from snarky memes to horrendous Lutefash ideology. Elsewhere, he uses his place in the writerly community to create space for far-right extremism. In a January 23, 2023 episode of a podcast titled “Facebook Has AIDS,” McGaha joined horror writer Tom Monteleone in making transphobic and racist comments. This episode led to Monteleone being ousted from the Horror Writers Association.

It’s unclear if McGaha was specifically invited by Mahler, but the young fascist-in-training is a fellow congregant at First Lutheran Knoxville. He seems to have become especially interested in the LCMS in mid to late 2022, “liking” almost every livestream post on the church’s page from then onward. Presently, McGaha regularly appears seated next to Corey Mahler on the livestreams of First Lutheran Knoxville. It’s reasonable to infer that Zak is the first of many local sycophants that Mahler hopes to gather around himself.

Mahler’s influence on Zak is evident even in the phrases that the latter has adopted. On Twitter, Mahler likes to respond to detractors and ideological opponents with some variation of the phrase, “Look, a demon.”

On Facebook, Zak can’t help but express himself in similar terms during a testy exchange with someone calling out his transphobia and misogyny.

Similarly, Mahler enjoins his followers to “go to church,” using a particular meme.

Zak has borrowed both the meme and the exhortation.

On Tischreden, Mahler seems to play up an aura of being an experienced man-about-town, possibly a tactic for impressing younger men like Zak. As a result, he takes a rather different tone from that of his other podcasts. For example, on Stone Choir’s Jan. 25 episode, Mahler talks soberly about becoming Lutheran in college. Speaking of his college years on Tischreden, however, Mahler talks of being immersed in “dens of iniquity,” alludes to promiscuity with cheerleaders, and warns against “sending daughters to college.” He teases, “Some of us know what they’re doing while they’re there” (approx. 01:40:00 onward of Episode 1). In various episodes Zak and Corey comment with relish about women’s physical appearance.

Zak and Corey record their podcast episodes at a local brewery after church. Based on their descriptions of the brewery as Germanic in emphasis, as well as cross-checking Zak’s photos with images from local breweries, we can confirm that they record their podcasts at Schulz Brau Brewing Company located, in their own words, “just down the street” from their church. They have even joked about bringing a whole crew from their church to take over the balcony (around 01:54:43 of Episode 3). While they don’t sound entirely serious, the comment is a disturbing reminder of how neo-Nazis try to expand their presence by claiming local bars as their own—starting with innocuous visits from a handful of people.

Schulz Brau is owned by Nico Schulz. Along with Fanatic Brewing Company, another local vendor, it participates in Germanfest, a local festival dedicated to German food and culture hosted by First Lutheran Knoxville each year. The annual August festival raises money for First Lutheran’s school.

At the brewery, Zak’s and Corey’s podcast recordings involve antisemitic, transphobic, homophobic, and racist content. They allude to recording for hours on end, with mics and laptops set up at their table. They talk not infrequently about approaching women at the bar. Their presence obviously creates an unsafe space for other patrons of Schulz Brau Brewery.

Mahler’s growing network and purposes

It is apparent that the LCMS is a safe haven for Lutefash like Mahler. With Discord archives featuring many LCMS members tied to far-right organizing, and Mahler’s crew singing the denomination’s praises, facts on the ground clearly contradict official denominational statements about inclusion, racism, and justice. The LCMS denominational website states, for example: “The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod condemns racism and asks its members to combat it.” A 2019 Synodal resolution affirmed the “Common Humanity of All People and Ethnicities,” stating, “Christian response to racism is centered in the Gospel of Jesus Christ and is shaped by clear Biblical principles.”

In contrast, Mahler and his growing ilk tell a very different story. For them, the LCMS’s “based” reputation in the Discord leaks represents an ideal that they hope to foster within the denomination. Conversely, to Lutefash, a statement like the official LCMS response to George Floyd’s murder amounts to “high-handed, unrepentant, knowing sin.” In the below screenshot, Mahler goes even further, insisting that LCMS theology categorically affirms the anti-Black “curse of Ham” doctrine.

In short, Mahler and his supporters see their purpose as pulling LCMS back from the brink of “wokeness” and returning it to what they see as its historic essence, a denial of “common humanity” and open support for white supremacy. For them, even mild (and non-binding) statements of anti-racism amount to a betrayal of Lutheran tradition. As the recent controversy around the Large Catechism shows, Mahler and his supporters are determined to make far-right policies the official and explicit agenda of the LCMS.

Mahler’s success in advancing this goal, in collaboration with right-wingers in churches around the country, is exemplified by his work with Oklahoma-based Ryan Turnipseed. Turnipseed, which appears to be his real name, is also a Lutefash influencer with a significant following. Running a Youtube channel with 3.9k subscribers as well as a few Telegram Channels, he traffics in similar traditionalist and anti-semitic content. Turnipseed’s channels regularly share Mahler’s content, and Woe is a member of Turnipseed’s Telegram. Turnipseed also hosted Mahler and Woe on his YouTube channel in January of 2023.

(Image fully obscured due to intense anti-semitic depiction)

Turnipseed uses his real name and his avatar looks like him. This allowed us to identify him as attending First Lutheran in Ponca City, OK. He appears in the stream of their service on May 7, 2022 and is featured in their bulletin.

The pastor of First Lutheran, Ponca City is Joseph Highley. It is unclear if he is aware of Turnipseed’s fascist beliefs. First Lutheran Ponca City’s associated school does include a non-discrimination policy on their website, but given Turnipseed’s relatively high visibility, it seems unlikely that his association with neo-nazis would have escaped Highley’s notice. At the very least, Highley’s possible ignorance of Turnipseed’s activities demonstrates the ease with which Mahler and his ilk have slipped into positions of influence in LCMS churches, under the oblivious or approving watch of pastoral leaders. It’s clear that Turnipseed isn’t a casual presence at First Lutheran Ponca City, either. In a recent tweet, he alluded to “everything he’s been doing” on behalf of his parish, as well as his relationship with his pastor.

As their reach increases, we can expect to see fascists continue to flock to this denomination. When asked in Telegram, “What is the best Luther synod?” Mahler’s response is “LCMS.”

In the same way that Mahler and the Lutefash want to attract fascists to the LCMS, they also seek to pull the LCMS towards fascism. In the wake of the Catechism controversy, Mahler’s disciple McGaha summed up the Lutefash “victory” as a broader refusal to just “play defense” over traditional values. His generation, he warned, is ready to go on the offensive.

One member of Turnipseed’s community, Luthemplaer (himself a sort of Catholic/Lutheran hybrid found in Lutefash online spaces. In an interview from January 2023, he states he is a Lutheran but in other places claims to be Catholic. While his specific denominational allegiances may be fluid, his membership in the larger Christofascist community is not. Luthemplaer participates with LCMS figures and other Lutefash. Our larger concern is with his fascism and white supremacy, not only possible LCMS membership), even laid out the ultimate aim of the fascist faction: “Given the small size of the LCMS to start, it may be worth using it as a testbed as to how a traditionalist coalition might retake an institution.” While it seems the LCMS is being infiltrated to expand its support for fascist traditionalism and white supremacist Christianity.

Luthemplaer’s prolific output illustrates the ambitiousness of Lutefash’s “testbed” ecosystem. He runs his own channel called The Restoration Bureau (with over 5k subscribers) and claims to be the creator of the infamous nazi YE image. Through such efforts, he and fellow fash seek not just more power within the denomination, but a platform in fascist politics more broadly.

Mahler, McGaha, Woe, Turnipseed, and Luthemplaer are only the most prominent figureheads of this faction. Future posts will spotlight the details of LCMS fascist strategy, including further information on key LCMS-identified members of the Discord chat leaks. However, even as we expose these open Lutefash, we must also expose the complicity and silence of the denomination and its associated organizations. As we’ve seen, conservative Lutherans have repeatedly refused to acknowledge fascist activity, as in the case of the AFLC’s dismissal of “Super Lutheran” Blake Kilbourne, not to mention the AALC’s denial of knowledge about Kilbourne’s nazi views. Even worse, they show weakness for pro-fascist arguments (e.g., the panelists Mahler apparently swayed to Kilbourne’s side) or just outright stand with those fascists in the face of criticism (e.g., Mahler’s current pastor, Edward Maanum). Even someone like Jordan B. Cooper, a frequent critic of Mahler’s, seems to have preferred a behind-the-scenes discussion of Kilbourne, instead of publicizing his threat to vulnerable minorities.

Sadly, these examples of complicity and silence are all too predictable in a denomination where even public opponents of Mahler think that progressives are worse than the far-right, as in the first screenshot below. And as the second screenshot makes clear, this downplaying of fascism’s severity stems from the fact that, at the end of the day, many of these pastors agree with racist ideology—they’re just more polite about it.

How To Take Action

To borrow a phrase from Martin Luther himself, the Lutefash want to raise a “mighty fortress” of neo-nazi hatred within the LCMS. Whether they succeed depends on how willing the rest of us are to dismantle it.

Folks looking for action items can contact the LCMS—and First Lutheran Knoxville in particular—and demand they denounce Mahler, as well as excommunicate him from their community. They can also contact Schulz Brau Brewing House and Fanatic Brewing and ask them to refuse any further participation in First Lutheran Knoxville’s Germanfest. In particular, Schulz Brau must also bar Mahler and McGaha from the premises and make the venue a safe space once more. Moreover, folks can also contact Chapman’s Fowler School of Law to demand a statement disavowing one of its most openly fascist alumni.

Finally, those concerned can also demand disciplinary action, up to and including a revocation of Mahler’s license, from the State Bar Associations of California and Tennessee. In particular, they can point out that Mahler’s actions violate the moral turpitude clause of the CA bar ethics code (Bus. & Prof. Code, § 6106), as well as the “unprofessional, dishonorable, or unethical conduct” clause of the TN bar ethics code (TN Code § 63-6-214 (2021)).

Without these actions, Mahler’s influence will grow in tandem with his faction’s plans. If churches truly believe the statement that “hate has no place here,” they must take specific action and remove it from the pews. At least in one church, we know where it sits—in the same pew, every week.

Update: We clarified Jordan Cooper and Luthemplaer’s denominational affiliation. Cooper is a member of AALC and while Luthemplaer participates with LCMS figures, has not been confirmed to be an official member of the LCMS denomination.