How Tea Party Candidates Like Joe Miller and Rand Paul Benefit From Armed, Right-Wing Militia Groups

Throughout the election, members of Alaska's Citizen Militia have rallied behind Tea Party-backed GOP nominee Joe Miller. They've shown up at his town hall meetings, and posted "Vote for Miller" signs around town. Norm Olson, a prominent Michigan militia leader in the '90s who now commands Alaska's militia, explains they have to walk a tightrope. "If we put on uniforms and do a parade, it might look like 1936 Germany," Olson told AlterNet. They avoid “stomping around in uniform” under their militia banner.

Others don’t hold back. In a recent parade, Miller supporters marched behind the candidates' Hummer with assault rifles on their shoulders and handguns strapped to their legs.

Joe Miller isn't the only Tea Party-backed national candidate attracting militia support with his staunch Constitutionalist support of the Second Amendment, which in its entirety includes the right of citizens to form militias. U.S. Senate candidate Rand Paul, who like his father is a favorite among militia members, spoke at a Second Amendment event last March outside Kentucky’s state capitol to a crowd of armed, uniformed members of the Ohio Valley Freedom Fighters. Rand joked that while he wasn’t armed that day, he felt “like I have a private security out there.” Militia forums lit up when he won the senate nomination. Even militia members outside Kentucky rallied in support of Paul.

Meanwhile, Ray Southwell, who is running for Alaska's House Speaker, is actively promoting his position as one of the foremost militia leaders of the '90s, and a current member of Alaska Citizens militia. Southwell confidently says his militia experience “has definitely helped me privately, even if the demonization by the press has caused people not to publicly support me. Just watch and see the numbers that vote for me on Tuesday.”

As militias grow in number in the Obama era, conservative candidates have to walk a fine line between getting the political support of militias to generate local votes, while avoiding national headlines accusing them of extremism. Advocating for militia rights would have been considered political suicide in prior elections—and it's still risky—but for staunch constitutionalists it’s a given part of a pro-Second Amendment platform. What results are politicians like Miller and Paul using lots of double-talk and symbolism.

When Joe Miller announced his decision to run for the Republican nomination on April 19, militia members like Southwell and Norm Olson, who together founded the Michigan militia in the 1990s before moving to Alaska, took it as a symbolic gesture. “It was a signal across the state,” says Olson. “That was a subtle nonverbal to us anyway that something good was coming out of his campaign.” April 19, of course, is the battle on the Lexington Green, the chosen day for nationwide Second Amendment marches, as well as the anniversary of the Oklahoma Bombing. “He has the credentials, background and ideology to stand up and oppose the federal regime in Washington,” says Olson of Miller, whose anti-federal stance is so strong he’s advocating that Alaska should have complete power—including the power to mine Denali National Park.

Even many militia members recognize the need for political savvy, so as not to alienate voters. Ray Southwell, who met Miller at a small community meeting in April, says, “we asked him tough questions and he came out a strong advocate of the Second Amendment. He doesn’t run from it. But as a politician, he won’t come out and join one."

Miller’s militia ties hit mainstream news when his security guard Bill Fulton detained a journalist at one of Miller’s events. Fulton was discovered to be a regular poster on the Alaskan Citizen’s Militia forum and main supplier of their gear.