DARREN BEATTIE
Commission Member
2020 -
SPEECHWRITER WHO ATTENDED CONFERENCE WITH WHITE NATIONALISTS IN 2016 LEAVES WHITE HOUSE
“In 2016 I attended the Mencken conference in question and delivered a stand-alone, academic talk titled ‘The Intelligentsia and the Right.’ I said nothing objectionable and stand by my remarks completely,” he told CNN’s KFile in an email on Saturday. “It was the honor of my life to serve in the Trump Administration. I love President Trump, who is a fearless American hero, and continue to support him one hundred percent. I have no further comment.”
August 22, 2018
MATT GAETZ HIRES EX-WHITE HOUSE SPEECHWRITER WITH WHITE NATIONALIST TIES
April 19, 2019
Darren Beattie, a former visiting instructor at Duke University, was fired from the White House in August 2018 after CNN reported that he spoke at the 2016 H.L. Mencken Club Conference, an annual gathering that has featured prominent white nationalists such as Richard Spencer.
The conference was described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as "a band of white nationalists, pseudoacademic and academic racists.”
The Mencken Club describes itself as "a society for the independent right" and an organization of independent intellectuals of the political right.
JEWISH GROUP DENOUNCES WHITE HOUSE PICK FOR PRESERVATION COMMISSION
November 18, 2020
“It is absolutely outrageous that someone who has consorted with racists would even be considered for a position on a commission devoted to preserving Holocaust memorials in Europe,” said the group’s chief executive, Jonathan Greenblatt. “We urge the administration to rescind his appointment immediately.”
Asked for comment, Mr. Beattie said of the group: “The ADL pretends to be an organization that protects Jews, but it really exists to protect Democrats. As a Jewish Trump supporter, I consider it an honor to be attacked by the far-left ADL and its disgraced leader, Jonathan Greenblatt.”
WHITE NATIONALIST APPOINTED BY TRUMP TO HOLOCAUST COMMISSION PRAISED JEFFREY EPSTEIN FOR NOT BEING “A PUSSY”
November 20, 2020
This week, the Trump administration pulled Beattie back into the news by appointing him to the Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad, whose duties include commemorating the Holocaust. That’s great stuff all on its own, but then HuffPost checked his recent social media history and found this gem:
"At least Epstein wasn't a pussy."
From the rest of Beattie’s Twitter posts on the day he sent this, it appears that he was upset that Barr—Trump’s loyal and partisan attorney general—is not doing enough to prosecute “antifa”-style left-wing groups. (This despite Barr’s connection to the killing of a self-described antifa activist and murder suspect in Oregon by U.S. Marshals, an incident Trump has boasted about as if it were an extrajudicial execution.) The implication, I guess, is that Barr … should have the courage to kill himself in shame? I don’t know! There are like 17 angles to this story and they’re all bad!
TRUMP MAY BE GONE, BUT HE LEFT PLENTY OF LACKEYS BEHIND. HERE ARE SOME OF THE WORST.
In 2018, Beattie was fired as a White House speechwriter when it came out that he had attended a white nationalist gathering two years earlier, appearing on a panel with the founder of an anti-immigration site labeled as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. Naturally, Trump appointed him to the commission that, among other things, helps to preserve sites related to the Holocaust.
February 1, 2021