Family Denounces Fargo Man At Charlottesville Rally As 'Crazy Nazi'
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- Peter Tefft calls himself a pro-white activist who went to Charlottesville to demonstrate against the removal of a Robert E. Lee statue.
He calls it upholding free speech, but his own family doesn't see it that way.
"I don't really want to speak too much about my family and their harassment," said Tefft.
Since a Twitter page titled, "Yes, You're Racist," outed Tefft for taking part in the white nationalist rally, his family has received numerous threats. Tefft's father Pearce even publicly disowned him, and wrote to the Fargo Inforum, saying, "His hateful opinions are bringing hateful rhetoric to his siblings, cousins, nieces and nephews as well as his parents. Why must we be guilty by association?"
"I would ask how anybody sees advocating for civil rights as hate speech," said Tefft.
Tefft even posted a picture of himself standing next to the Robert E. Lee statue last weekend.
"As far as the term white supremacist goes, in my view anybody that thinks white people don't need advocacy, they are the white supremacists," said Tefft.
Tefft said that the pro-white groups that came together in Charlottesville were not allowed to peacefully protest.
"Not everyone there agreed on everything. But they did agree that white people deserve civil rights. You had Constitutionalists. You have basic Republicans. You had National Socialists. You had white and Southern Identitarians. We are all being thrown in the same boat by the media. That's why we all need to stand together," said Tefft.
But as far as his family goes, Tefft will stand alone. His father added: "My son is not welcome at our family gatherings any longer. I pray my prodigal son will renounce his hateful beliefs and return home. We do not, never have, and never will, accept his twisted worldview."
Tefft's father also wrote that his beliefs were not learned at home.
And that his entire family never has and never will accept Peter Tefft's twisted worldview.
In a statement to WDAY, another of Tefft's relatives denounced him as a "crazy Nazi." Jacob Scott told the TV station that Tefft that gone down an "insane internet rabbit hole" and is a source of fear to his family.
"He scares us all," Scott wrote, "we don't feel safe around him, and we don't know how he came to be this way." "He scares us all," Scott wrote, "we don't feel safe around him, and we don't know how he came to be this way."