Montana Resort Town Residents Band Together to Shun Broke Richard Spencer
EVERYBODY HATES RICHARD
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Break out the world’s smallest violin. White supremacist Richard Spencer is down and out in Whitefish, Montana, keeping a low profile and reportedly running away from residents. It’s a “really good feeling,” according to a local real estate agent who was targeted by an anti-Semitic hate campaign that began in 2016. Tanya Gersh told The New York Times she came across Spencer recently: “He runs.” Residents and officials of the largely affluent and liberal enclave said that the community has rallied to spurn and shun Spencer and his followers. The town mayor said that he’d last seen the neo-Nazi in 2019, when Spencer walked into a restaurant and was summarily booed back out again. Once upon a time, Spencer ran his National Policy Institute out of the $3 million Whitefish summer home owned by his mother. Now, that organization is kaput, as is his marriage. His wife, who took him to divorce court, accused him of physically, emotionally, and financially abusing her for years. Late in October, he will face trial for his role in the Charlottesville, Virginia neo-Nazi rally. Reportedly, Spencer is unable to afford a lawyer, and will be representing himself.