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60 Minutes: White Supremacists Act as 'Disaster Tourists' to Aid in Recruiting and Help Their Image

Brett T.
Brett T.  |  8:00 PM on May 04, 2026

On Sunday night, 60 Minutes' Lesley Stahl hosted a segment about "disaster tourists" — white supremacist groups and other right-wing extremists who rush to the aid of disaster victims to soften their image and maybe even give recruitment a boost. She noted that one of their motives is to demonstrate how the federal government does practically nothing. She doesn't mention a FEMA official directing agents to ignore houses with Trump campaign signs or other materials.

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Matt Van Swol is our man on the ground in North Carolina, and he was there when far-right groups like the Amish jumped in to help build homes for victims of Hurricane Helene who were living in tents in the winter cold.

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… days later.

They NEVER mentioned Jake Jarvis, who has worked 550 days STRAIGHT FOR FREE for Hurricane Helene victims.

Instead, they dug up some fringe conspiracy angle to smear the people who actually showed up as White Nationalists.

I'm so angry.

Let me tell you what 60 Minutes will NEVER report on

I was there. I lived it. I am still here.

I shared every story I could find.

Me, my wife, hundreds of volunteers delivered RVs to mothers holding babies who were sleeping in TOOL SHEDS AND TENTS in the freezing cold, in the mountains.

Because their homes had been ripped off the side of a mountain and washed down the French Broad.

So tell me 60 Minutes... WHERE WAS THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT?

Tell me, WHY did all these volunteers NEED to show up?

Any thoughts on that?!!!!!

Any investigation AT ALL into the federal or state government's response to Hurricane Helene?

Please tell me... if the federal government was doing such a GREAT JOB, why did we need to put victims in RVs...

...A MONTH AFTER THE HURRICANE?!!!!!!!

Literally every single victim you talk to in Western North Carolina has a horror story about dealing with FEMA...

...and guess who they will all say actually cam through for them?

Neighbors.

Church groups.

The Amish.

The Cajun Navy.

Shawn Hendricks.

Samaritan's Purse.

MercuryOne.

The Mission Mules hauling insulin up washed-out roads, ONLY ACCESSIBLE by mules.

Greg Biffle burning his own fuel in helicopters.

Veterans like Adam Smith who organized helicopter rescues with other veterans BY HIMSELF and then was demonized by the media for it.

Volunteers like Jake Jarvis working TO THIS DAY, 550 days later without ANY PAY AT ALL.

THOSE ARE THE STORIES FROM HURRICANE HELENE WORTH TELLING.

But 60 Minutes won't tell ANY OF THEM.

Because the truth makes the federal government the villain and the "deplorables" are actually the heroes in this story and they can NEVER admit that.

So instead they smeared the rescuers as white nationalists.

This is unforgivable.

I was there. I saw it with my own eyes.

And I will BE DAMNED if I let CBS rewrite the history of what happened to my mountains.

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Brett T.
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Preach, brother.

Those Amish look pretty white.

Stahl wasn't done, though. In an "Overtime" segment, she talked to John Kelly of Graphika, a company that, much like Jessica Chastain's "The Savant," monitors how propaganda and conspiracy theories travel online.

The Patriot Front? The joke groups that apparently get their matching blue shirts and khaki pants from the SPLC?

Steve Guest says that Stahl should have used CBS News' own reporting in her piece:

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… donors, paid violent extremists millions, and “manufactured racism” for their own purposes

“The SPLC was not dismantling these groups. It was instead manufacturing the extremism it purports to oppose.” Per Todd Blanche

Stahl could have blurbed CBS News on 60 Minutes….

Then-New York City Mayor Bill DeBlasio said he was "very concerned" in 2020 when Samaritan's Purse built a 68-bed field hospital in Central Park to manage overflow from Mount Sinai during the COVID-19 pandemic, because they might refuse to treat LGBTQ patients (which was a lie). NYC Council Speaker Corey Johnson said at the time, "It is time for Samaritan's Purse to leave NYC. This group, led by the notoriously bigoted, hate-spewing Franklin Graham, came at a time when our city couldn't in good conscience turn away any offer of help. That time has passed." That's how they treated "far-right white supremacist group" Samaritan's Purse.

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Instead of doing a story on the Biden administration's botched response to Hurricane Helene, or the Amish who are still there on the ground rebuilding, 60 Minutes turns it into a story about white supremacist "disaster tourism." They must have gotten a call from the SPLC, which asked for some content to distract from their indictments.

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