Political Parties in Charlottesville: An Expert's Perspective

Charlottesville County, Virginia is a politically vibrant area, with the majority of voters casting their ballots for Democrats in the last presidential election and 12.8% voting for the Republican Party. In addition to these two major parties, there is also the National Justice Party (NJP), a white supremacist organization that claims to be “an organization that will advocate for the civil rights of whites, the working and middle class, and the traditional family against our corrupt and illegitimate institutions.”The NJP's mission is to “utilize our constitutional rights to challenge the consensus view among affluent elites, politicians, and intellectuals that white people are not a legitimate group and do not deserve to be defended.” The group has also published on Telegram its political objective of limiting “Jewish employment” in essential institutions, as well as highlighting members of the cabinet with Jewish heritage. This is part of a long-standing white supremacist conspiracy theory that Jews run the government. The NJP has organized rallies and demonstrations in Fargo (North Dakota), Akron (Ohio) and Waukesha (Wisconsin), where they highlighted cases in which white people are killed by blacks and alleged crimes of racial hatred or “terrorism against whites.” At its opening ceremony, NJP president Mike Peinovich did not present an official party platform, but did list some of the group's issues, such as workers' rights; a just and peaceful foreign policy; a clean environment; defense of the family; prenatal policies; freedom of expression; freedom of religion; immigration reform; and legal designation of the United States as a country with a European majority. Peinovich chose to run independently to avoid any kind of political affiliation because his platform is about political work, not politics. He is joined by Tony Hovater as chief of staff and Warren Balogh as secretary. In Charlottesville County, Virginia, there are three major political parties: Democrats, Republicans, and the National Justice Party.

Each party has its own set of beliefs and goals that it seeks to achieve. While the Democrats and Republicans are more mainstream parties, the NJP is a virulently anti-Semitic white supremacist organization that seeks to challenge the consensus view among affluent elites, politicians, and intellectuals that white people are not a legitimate group and do not deserve to be defended.