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xxiv INTRODUCTION government’s intentions of seizing weapons was coming to pass. While the United States enjoyed a brief respite from domestic extremist groups during the admin- istration of George W. Bush—as the country focused its efforts on fighting the global war on terror—the election of the country’s first black president fostered a precipitous rise in extremist and hate group activity. Soon after Barack Obama was elected president in 2008, registered users on white supremacist Web sites tripled to more than 300,000 (Lee, Canon, and Patterson 2015). However, it was not only the election of the country’s first black president that heightened anxieties among extremists that explains the precipitous rise of extremist activity. In 2008, there was also an economic and financial crisis unlike any experienced in the United States since the Great Depression of the 1930s. Moreover, debates over immigra- tion, social changes, and a growing uneasiness among conservative white Ameri- cans that whites would soon be a minority in the country prompted the formation of new groups. Today, there are still vestiges of old extremist groups that have expressed their hatred or antigovernment sentiments for decades. Now, however, the rise of groups that completely disdain the current government are in the ascendancy. Sovereign citizens, for instance, do not really care about a reformation of government. Rather, they wish government to shrink to the size where all government is local. Though this ideal has never been a reality in the United States, sovereign citizens would be content to never interact with the government and would prefer to be largely self- sufficient with as little government interference in their lives as possible. The most recent alt-right movement is also antigovernment, disdaining traditional party pol- itics and agitating for a complete overhaul of the domestic and foreign policies that have characterized the United States since the end of World War II. Alt-right advocates, for instance, call the government corrupt, assail the Republican estab- lishment, flout almost every rule of political etiquette, and openly advocate for policies that will be advantageous to an increasingly dispossessed and disheartened white majority (Caldwell 2016). Alt-righters claim that unchecked immigration is contributing to “white genocide” as the values and principles that were once the hallmark of American society are now lost in a multicultural society where political correctness and government paralysis reign. The election of Donald Trump to the U.S. presidency has given hope to many extremists. Though Trump himself has disavowed many of the associations with extremists—and the endorsements that he has received before and after his election—his presence in the White House is nevertheless the most significant sign that extremism has found a new voice in American politics. For months, as Trump ran to secure the Republican nomination for president, his total disregard for the standards of American political campaigns and the undercurrents of hate he pro- fessed caused the establishment in Washington, D.C., liberal Americans, and many in the rest of the world to cringe about the possibility that he might actually be elected president. When the fears of many finally came to pass, Trump was hailed by right-wing extremists for his victory. Indeed, Richard Spencer, founder of the alt-right movement, shouted at a gathering of alt-righters soon after Trump’s elec- tion: “Hail, Trump! Hail, our people! Hail, victory!” As Spencer raised his hands,