Manassas Journal Messenger | Distribution of KKK fliers condemned

People who live on Weems Road between Fort Drive and Stonewall Road in Manassas reported finding Ku Klux Klan tabloid newspapers and handbills on their doorsteps Sunday.

Travis Pierce of the Ku Klux Klan LLC of Compton, Ark., said the group distributed the literature after it received requests from someone in the area.

‘We’ve had a lot of requests from the people in Manassas for information,” Pierce said in a telephone interview Monday.

“They’re interested in what we’re doing, why we’re doing it, how we accomplish things and we wanted to let them know that we’re in the neighborhood,” said Pierce who is the KKK national membership director.

Manassas City Council member Mark Aveni said an organization from Arkansas shouldn’t be getting involved in Manassas.

“Obviously these people are from out of town and I hope they stay from out of town,” he said. “We don’t want this here.”

Pierce said the group was exercising its right to “peaceably and legally” distribute its message.

“The free exchange of information has never been illegal or immoral,” Pierce said.

Aveni said it’s not legal to leave fliers and tabloids around neighborhoods.

“Technically it’s a zoning violation, but you’ve got to find them, you’ve got to prosecute them,” he said.

Steve Thomas of help Save Manassas, an anti-illegal immigrant group, said recent demonstrations over the proposed resolution to restrict county services to illegal immigrants may have spurred the group to disseminate the information.

The latest demonstration, sponsored by Mexicans Without Borders, was Sunday at the Sean T. Connaughton Community Plaza on County Complex Court behind the McCoart Administration Center.

“You’ve got to wonder if a rally like yesterday’s draws the fringe from both sides,” Thomas said Monday.

Pierce said the tabloid entitled, A Brief Historic Perspective of the Ku Klux Klan, was addressed to white Americans to show that KKK tenants weren’t “so far away or so radical from basic Christian values.”

“Our government has forgotten our Christian roots,” Pierce said.

Aveni said distributing such information served no good purpose.

“I don’t see this as productive at all,” he said.

Thomas said he despised the idea of the KKK in Manassas.

“I 100 percent condemn this sort of thing,” he said.