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ADL and Council on American-Islamic Relations condemn display in Howell

HOWELL – “We are disgusted.”

That's the response from several organizations to a white supremacist gathering outside Howell's American Legion Post 141 on Saturday, November 9, during a performance of “The Diary of Anne Frank.”

Specifically, the quote comes from the American Defamation League (Michigan), which wrote a statement on X, formerly Twitter, on Monday.

More: 'We hid outside with Nazis': White supremacists protest play in Howell

“We are disgusted by the right-wing extremists who praised Hitler and waved Nazi flags in front of an American Legion showing the play 'The Diary of Anne Frank,' and we stand with American Legion 141 and @HowellTownship in knowing “That hate does not belong to their community.”

According to a video posted by the American Legion on social media, a group of five protesters carrying Nazi and American flags with white supremacist symbols gathered outside the organization where the show was produced by Fowlerville Community Theater.

An American Legion member told WLNS the piece was intended to be educational amid reports of rising anti-Semitism. The organization went online on Facebook on Saturday and filmed the protesters' confrontation with officers from the Livingston County Sheriff's Office.

A protester can be heard telling MPs that they are protecting their right to freedom of expression.

When the group saw they were being recorded, they left the area.

Another four protesters were seen waving Nazi flags in Fowlerville at the intersection of Grand River Avenue and Grand Street. It is unclear whether members took part in the protests as their faces were obscured.

More: Timeline: Livingston County's Complicated Racial History

More: That's not who we are – right? Ten years later, I'm still writing about racism in Howell

In a text message to the newspaper, Livingston County Sheriff Mike Murphy confirmed that the protesters told officers they were from Fowlerville. However, since the protest was “peaceful,” the officers had no reason to ask for ID.

The Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the country's largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy group, also spoke out against the demonstration.

“We condemn this expression of neo-Nazi hatred and join everyone who speaks out against the increasing bigotry and social division we are witnessing across the country,” said CAIR-MI Executive Director Dawud Walid. “All such attempts to promote racism, anti-Semitism or any other form of bigotry must be rejected by local, state and national religious and political leaders.”

CAIR's mission is to protect civil rights, increase understanding of Islam, promote justice and empower American Muslims.

WLNS also quoted Jason Woolford, recently elected to represent the area in the Michigan House of Representatives, and Howell Mayor Robert Ellis – both of whom are frustrated with Howell's ongoing reputation as a safe place for white supremacists.

“I say to those who are using our community, and in most cases don’t even live here, to spread a message of hate, stop coming here,” Woolford said.

“It was national news,” Ellis said. “And it’s very difficult to respond because we don’t have a national voice.”

The Fowlerville Community Theater released a statement Monday describing the scene at the theater.

“As a theater, we are storytellers,” FCT’s press release states. “We tell stories that take the audience to other times and places – some real, some fantastic. At the heart of this production are real people who lost their lives in the Holocaust, and we have strived to tell their story as realistically as possible.”

“On Saturday…things became more real than we expected; we hid outside with Nazis. As a theater we want to encourage people to feel and think. We hope that by presenting Anne's story we can help prevent the atrocities of the past from happening again.”

An American Legion member told outlets that theatergoers were escorted to their vehicles for fear of exiting alone at the end of the play.

“The Diary of Anne Frank” is based on the writings of the real Anne Frank, who kept a diary while her family hid from the Nazis during the occupation of the Netherlands. The family was arrested in 1944 and Frank later died of typhus in a concentration camp. Her diaries were retrieved and given to the family's only survivor, her father Otto Frank, after the war ended. It has since been published in more than 70 languages.

This is far from the first white supremacist demonstration in Livingston County in 2024. In late July, a group gathered in front of the historic Livingston County Courthouse and then in front of the Howell Carnegie District Library. They could be heard shouting “Heil Hitler”.

Later in the day, a second demonstration took place on the overpass at I-96 and Latson Road. In a video, the demonstrators could be heard chanting: “We love Hitler. We love Trump.”

A similar demonstration took place in Brighton in August. Several local businesses publicly condemned the news. In response, a local boutique, Forest and Follies, closed.

In fact, Livingston County was never able to fully shake the reputation of racism it acquired on a farm in the 1970s, when Robert Miles, once a Grand Dragon of the Michigan Ku Klux Klan, settled in Cohoctah Township.

According to the Lansing State Journal, Miles was attention-seeking and had a reputation for violence. He was among five people convicted in 1971 of planning the bombing of school buses intended for judicial desegregation in Pontiac. A few years later he was convicted of conspiracy in connection with the tarring and feathering of Dr. R. Wiley Brownlee, an Ypsilanti school principal who advocated for desegregation.

Miles died in 1992 at the age of 67 – but after years of rallies and demonstrations on his farm, the damage was done. Over the years, various KKK rallies, demonstrations and a cross burning in the 1980s brought the county's reputation back to the surface.

It was further marred by national reports of racist tweets by high school students in 2014, racist fliers and anti-Semitic graffiti, vandalism and unchecked allegations of racist behavior at Hartland Community Schools and Pinckney Community Schools.

In response to these incidents, local residents have organized events to “wash away” white supremacy and hatred in the places where protesters demonstrated, transformed graffiti from hate to love, and founded non-profit nonprofits to combat future discrimination.

– Contact reporter Tess Ware at [email protected].

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