Louisiana Voice

What are Livingston Parish’s CAJUN GUARD’S ties to the III%ers, an organization to which a Louisiana congressman has claimed connections of his own on at least one occasion?

By inserting that “III%” into its logo, Cajun Guard is necessarily affiliating itself with an outfit called the Three Percenters, 3 Percenters, 3%ers, or III%ers (pick one). Whatever name they’re known by, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) categorizes them as an “anti-government,” white supremacist group and some Canadian authorities call them the “most dangerous extremist group” in that country.

The organization draws its name from the dubious assertion that only 3 percent of American colonists actually fought the British during the American Revolution. It was founded in 2008 following the election of Barack Obama as President, apparently in the belief there was something inherently unamerican about his election as leader of the nation.

If the Three Percenters actually represented 3 percent of America’s population today, which is highly improbable, their numbers would be approaching 10 million instead of fewer than 100,000 suspected members of all such groups scattered across the US.

The III%ers are loosely patterned after another militia-type outfit called the OATH KEEPERS, an organization that claims tens of thousands of current and former law enforcement officials as well as military veterans among its membership. The Oath Keepers is one of the largest radical antigovernment groups in the nation.

Yale Law School graduate Stewart Rhodes founded the Oath Keepers—not to be confused with the evangelical Promise Keepers—and among his many assertions and conspiracy theories is this 2015 speech in Tempe, Arizona:

“John [Mc]Cain is a traitor to the Constitution. He should be tried for treason before a jury of his peers – which he would deny you. … He would deny you the right for trial to jury, but we would give him a trial by jury. Then after we convict him, he should be hung by the neck until dead.”

Strong words, but consider this:

Oath Keeper Charles Dyer was sentenced to 30 years in prison for raping his own 7-year-old daughter. Although Dyer had spoken on behalf of the Oath Keepers and online videos identified himself as the group’s liaison to the Marines and once spoke on behalf of Oath Keepers at a Tea Party event in Oklahoma, Rhodes claimed after the charges were brought that Dyer wasn’t actually a part of his organization.

There have been others to run afoul of the law. The president of a local Ohio chapter was jailed for keeping a live napalm bomb in his home; An armed Tennessee man driving a pickup truck with an Oath Keepers logo on it was arrested when he attempted to place two dozen officials in a town under arrest, a-la Gomer Pyle.

But the III%ers have had their own problems, as well.

In March 2018, Michael B. Hari, a former sheriff’s deputy who once submitted a proposal to build Donald Trump’s wall on the southern US border, was one of three men arrested in connection with the bombing of a mosque in Minnesota. Hari at the time headed up a group called the White Rabbit Three Percent Illinois Patriot Freedom Fighters Militia. Their website called Illinois a “failed state” and encouraged readers to take up armed resistance against the government.

The SPLC says Oath Keepers encourages police officers and military personnel to DISOBEY ORDERS that might be “unconstitutional.”

The Anti-Defamation League issued an eight-page report that said there was “a lot of overlap” between Oath Keepers and the Three Percenters. The report said both organizations heavily recruit members from the ranks of the military and law enforcement. Read the full report HERE.

And while Cajun Guard has not issued any overt threats against the government, its self-proclaimed affiliation with the III%ers and indirectly, The Oath Keepers and any of the other 570-odd white supremacist HATE GROUPS (including 181 militias) now operating in the U.S. certainly gives rise to speculation as to its real objectives.

Nine of those so-called hate groups were said to be in Louisiana, according to the SPLC. The Cajun Guard was not one of those listed.

Louisiana hate groups that were listed include:

• III% United Patriots: statewide;
• American Patriots Three Percent: statewide;
• Constitution Party: Eunice;
• Empire Washitaw de Dugdahmounbdyah: Richwood;
• Gulf Coast Patriot Network: Shreveport;
• Oath Keepers: Central, Covington, and statewide;
• Three Percenters: Avoyelles Parish.

Nor did U.S. Rep. CLAY HIGGINS of Louisiana’s 3^rd Congressional District do anything to dampen that speculation when he intimated to representatives of the oil and gas industry in March 2018 that he was a member of The Three Percenters.

“Some of you know, some of you perhaps do not, that the Revolutionary soldiers that gave birth to this nation represented only three percent of the populace, the colonists,” he erroneously told attendees at the Expanding Global Gas Infrastructure seminar in March 2018. “Some of us refer to ourselves as ‘Three Percenters,” he added (emphasis mine).

Three Percenters have served as self-appointed, heavily-armed “border patrols, attempted to detonate a car bomb outside a bank in Oklahoma City in 2017, and served as self-appointed security during the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia that turned deadly in August 2017.

While it was not immediately clear whether Higgins really counted himself as an active member of any Three Percenter chapter, he has done little to dispel any such notion. He would again be linked to the organization two months later when he hawked T-shirts with what appeared to be a Three Percenter logo on the backs.

The shirts were distributed to participants in a “Redemption Ride,” a jeep and motorcycle ride with Higgins and Dog the Bounty Hunter. Online payments for the shirts were processed as individual contributions to Higgins’s congressional campaign.

And you, too, can emulate Higgins by visiting Cajun Guard’s online store to purchase your own military gear, clothing and accessories in preparation for the coming apocalypses by going HERE.

Tomorrow: Livingston Parish’s history of right-wing extremism

“[T]he president on June 7 said he would designate antifa as a terrorist organization. He made the same remarks last year after antifa followers rumbled with the far-right group, the Proud Boys. Antifa has never been accused of killing anyone, unlike the white supremacist hate group Ku Klux Klan, which is not declared a terrorist organization.

“Attorney General William Barr says antifa was responsible for the looting and violence that cities across the U.S. witnessed early on in protests against George Floyd’s murder and police brutality against Black Americans. However, federal court records show out of the 51 people facing federal charges, no one is alleged to have ties to the antifa movement.’

–WBUR Radio, Boston, June 11, 2020.

“[I]t is important to reject attempts to claim equivalence between the antifa and the white supremacist groups they oppose. Antifa reject racism but use unacceptable tactics. White supremacists use even more extreme violence to spread their ideologies of hate, to intimidate ethnic minorities, and undermine democratic norms. Right-wing extremists have been one of the largest and most consistent sources of domestic terror incidents in the United States for many years; they have murdered hundreds of people in this country over the last ten years alone.  To date, there have not been any known antifa-related murders.”

—Anti-Defamation League, undated. […So, bottom line, what makes antifa, founded nearly a century ago to warn of the threat of Hitler and Mussolini, any more traitorous (the word of one of our readers) than the skinheads, the KKK, the Nazis, the Proud Boys, the Boogaloo Boys, or any other white supremacist group? Yes, it has its bad element; so does law enforcement, the priesthood, education, the military, and any other organization you care to name.]

The Facebook post was chilling in its tenor and its ominous intent:

“For the sake of my kids and grand kids (sic), let’s just do this Civil War thing now before I get to (sic) old to fight. I just can’t believe what these antifa (sic) leftist little punks are doing and getting away with right now. I’m fed up with it.

Where do I sign up..”

The menacing message was posted on June 11 by Denham Springs realtor Brandon Browning, who was an unsuccessful candidate for Livingston Parish Assessor in last October’s election. His message apparently ignored the fact that Antifa is an anti-fascist political movement and that nearly 417,000 American military died in World War II, 276.600 of those fighting fascism and Nazism in Europe.

Be that as it may, no sooner had his message appeared than someone recommended something called the Cajun Guard to him.

Curious, I set out to find out what I could about the Cajun Guard—mainly because Browning’s message originated here in Livingston Parish where I live. I quickly found the Cajun Guard (not to be confused with the Cajun Navy, which did a heroic job rescuing families during the 2016 flood) has its own web page. You can see that web page HERE. (You should take note of the outfit’s logo which says Sivis Pacem Para Bellum—Latin for “If you want peace, prepare for war.”

Inside an outline of a map of Louisiana, there is what appears to be a skull and “III%,” which I’ll come back to later.

When I clicked on the “Contact Us” heading, I was taken to a page with the phone number 225-305-1911 and an email address info@cajunguard.org.

On the Cajun Guard Patriot Supply page, I found a PHYSICAL ADDRESS: 8241 Fairlane Drive, Denham Springs.

That just happens to be the residence of one Robert C. Witt, II, according to Livingston Parish property tax records.

No one has responded to my email inquiry now for five days and when I called their number, the call is eventually rolled over to another telephone number: 225-910-1094 where I was invited to leave a message. I did. Again, no response after five days.

So, what, exactly, is Cajun Guard to which Browning was directed to satisfy his thirst for adventure and possible insurrection?

Well, to get that answer, again we go to Cajun Guard’s own web page.

“We are a civilian volunteer organization that trains, educates, prepares, responds to disasters, and defends the constitution (sic).

“We strive to partner with our local law enforcement and elected officials to ensure that we are kept abreast of where our help can best be utilized.

“We work with local and regional disaster response teams to effectively assist established governmental agencies wherever possible.

“Many of our members are CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) credentialed and active within the community CERT program.”

Okay, so far so good. Sounds like a good civic-minded organization.

But then, the narrative continues:

“The militia is classified as a civilian volunteer organization and therefore will carry out operations in absence of orders as dictated by necessity during a crisis. All Cajun Guard personnel will conduct themselves with professionalism, integrity and the utmost respect for others at all times.”

Militia? Well, that got my attention.

“It is our assertion that Cajun Guard constitutes and fulfills the roll (sic) of the Unorganized Militia for the State of Louisiana as defined by Louisiana state law (LRS 29:3 which through Act 622 of 1974, defines organized and unorganized militia in their respective military roles).

After reading about the term militia—in 2019, the Southern Poverty Law Center identified 181 armed militia groups in the US—I moved on to the obligatory OUR MISSION page:

“Today’s militia has a wide spectrum of missions, from disaster relief to terrorism prevention (emphasis mine).

“…One role of the militia is defense of the state from terrorism or invasion…”

Membership, the web page said, is open to all ages, genders, and races so long as the applicant is “of good moral character” and who “is not any of the following:

• A fugitive from justice;
• An alien illegally in the United States;
• A convicted felon;
• A user of any unlawful drugs;
• Adjudicated mental (sic) defective.”

Turns out there could be a problem with the third requirement in those by-laws because in 2016, one Robert C. Witt, age 49, was arrested for possession of a firearm and carrying a concealed weapon by a convicted felon and for aggravated assault (emphasis mine).

That was in 2016. Today, four years later, Robert C. Witt of 8241 Fairlane Drive, Denham Springs, is listed as 53 years of age.

While it was not immediately clear what felonious charge Witt was convicted of, it would seem to make him ineligible for membership in his own organization.

And, what’s so important about Robert C. Witt anyway?

• Well, for openers, he’s listed as an officer of the Cajun Guard, according to records on file with the Louisiana Secretary of State’s office.
• Robert Witt is also listed as an officer for Gulf Coast Preppers, an outfit that trains paramilitary personnel. Here’s the web page for SOUTH ALABAMA PREPPERS.
• He’s also an officer for Minuteman Gear, LLC.
• Robert Witt and Robert Witt II are both listed as officers for CCD Ventures, LLC and for CCD Holdings, Inc.
• Robert Witt is listed as an officer for something called St. Paul Life Ministries
• He is also listed as an officer for Compuworks, LLC.

Each of those entities listed as their address 8241 Fairlane, Denham Springs.

One other entity no longer active for which Robert C. Witt and Robert C. Witt II were listed as officers is Southern Signworks of 8275 Vincent Road, Denham Springs.

When Robert Witt was arrested in 2016, his address was given as 7628 Vincent Road.

But of all the words of community service and benefits to humanity in times of crisis claimed by the Cajun Guard, nothing says quite as much about the organization as “III%,” the commonly-used symbol for the Three Percenters.

Tomorrow: A Louisiana congressman hypes III%

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“The fact that he got the crowd so riled up was just chilling. It’s a joke to him but not to us.”

–Chris Lu, a Chinese American who served in the Obama administration, on Donald Trump’s repeated use of the term “Kung Flu” in reference to the coronavirus.

“In some ways, the craziest part is that Barr does not feel the need to justify the firing of Berman, and the Republican senators don’t ask. A very low day for the Justice Department.”

–Career DOJ attorney, to Politico online news service on the abrupt firing last Friday of Geoffrey Berman, US Attorney for the Southern District of New York. [The key phrase being “and the Republican senators don’t ask.” What a colossal violation of their oath of office and shirking of heir constitutional duties.]

“…the greatest threat in my lifetime to our rule of law.”

–Former Deputy Attorney General Donald Ayer, on current Attorney General William Barr.

“President Trump’s erratic performance in office and his deteriorating standing in the polls is posing a grave threat to his party’s Senate majority, imperiling incumbents in crucial swing states…”

–New York Times analysis of the collateral damage of Donald Trump’s sagging poll numbers June 25. Well, as someone once said, you live by the sword, you die by the sword. That’s what happens when people like John Kennedy don’t hold him accountable, choosing instead to try and shamelessly ride his coattails when the economy flourished and his approval ratings were higher. Maybe next you can find a spine and a conscience.]