The 'Crying Nazi' from Charlottesville admits he is working with the feds

Cantwell made the announcement — an admission, really — in a conversation with Andrew Auernheimer, a notorious neo-Nazi hacker who uses the alias “Weev,” and in a subsequent blog post on his personal website last weekend.

“We are being instructed to behave like criminals by a Jew in a foreign country, as we were assaulted by terrorist in our own!” Cantwell wrote. “The feds are our only hope for a lawful remedy, and I intend to cooperate fully with any effort to bring these criminals to justice.”

At issue is the federal investigation following the deadly Unite the Right rally last August in Charlottesville, Virginia. One protester was killed during the rally when a racist plowed his car into a group of counter protesters. Following Cantwell’s convoluted logic, his cooperation with federal investigators is a way to him to turn the focus of the investigation toward antifascist protesters instead of violent racists.

“My attorney has already spoken with the FBI on my behalf, and we are soon to meet,” Cantwell wrote. “The FBI seems more interested in stopping the violence, which necessarily means leftists going to prison.”

Cantwell became something of a household name following the Charlottesville rally. First, there was video of Cantwell screaming for milk after being sprayed with pepper spray during the rally. Then, he posted a tearful mea culpa on his website after he learned that Charlottesville authorities were seeking his arrest.

But not everyone is buying the argument that he is working for the feds for the greater good, especially when cooperating with federal authorities has historically amounted to an invitation to exile.

“Cantwell is a self admitted [sic] police informant and a known rat,” a user named “Goy Rogers” wrote on the white nationalist social media platform Gab. “Anyone who trusts him deserves to get burned.”

As much as the news of Cantwell’s cooperation with federal investigators shows just how fractured the alt-right has become in the aftermath of the Unite the Right rally, Cantwell isn’t the first racist on the radio to turn on his Aryan brethren.

One of Cantwell’s most notable predecessors spreading hate on the airwaves was Hal Turner. Like Cantwell, his rhetoric was vile.

Turner regularly ranted about “bull-dyke lesbians,” “savage N---- beasts,” “f------,” and a contraption he called a “portable n----- lyncher.” But at the same time –– from 2003 to 2007 –– he served as an FBI informant, providing information on white supremacist groups for the same government he frequently railed against.

Nonetheless, Cantwell insists he is taking the high road when compared to his comrades in the movement, especially Weev.

“As for speaking to the FBI, I have hinted at this publicly, but I discussed those details to Weev in confidence,” Cantwell wrote. “His plastering our private conversation on a forum should speak to his reputation.”