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D.C. man who praised Pittsburgh synagogue shooting arrested on weapons charges

Jeffrey Clark had deep ties to the far-right.

Police rapid response team members respond to the site of a mass shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood on October 27, 2018 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. (Photo Credit: Jeff Swensen/Getty Images)
Police rapid response team members respond to the site of a mass shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood on October 27, 2018 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. (Photo Credit: Jeff Swensen/Getty Images)

A 30-year-old man from D.C. who was arrested by federal agents on Friday on weapons charges has been revealed as an avowed neo-Nazi, with multiple links to far-right figureheads.

Jeffrey R. Clark Jr., 30, from Bloomingdale, has been charged with illegally possessing a firearm and a high-capacity magazine. According to court filings, the FBI received a tip-off from Clark’s family shortly after the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting. The family said that Jeffrey and his brother Edward — who committed suicide shortly after the Pittsburgh attack — were heavily involved in the so-called “alt-right” movement and knew the suspected Pittsburgh Synagogue shooter Robert Bowers through the far-right-friendly social media site Gab.

“According to W-1 and W-2, Jeffrey and Edward Clark openly discussed killing Jews and black people, and openly admired Timothy McVeigh,” the court filings read. “In regard to the shooting at the Tree-of-Life Synagogue, Jeffrey Clark stated that
the victims deserved it.”

Jeffrey Clark’s accounts on Gab give a true taste of the type of violent, neo-Nazi rhetoric he was spewing, as well as his potential capacity for violence. As HuffPost reported, on Gab Clark called himself “DC Bowl Gang,” a reference to the bowl-cut Dylann Roof, who murdered nine black worshipers at a church in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015. As the court affidavit noted, the FBI’s investigation of Bowers had revealed that he was “friends” on Gab with Jeffrey Clark.

“He was BASED! Get used to it libtards,” Clark posted after the shooting. “This was a dry run for things to come.”

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On November 9th, federal agents recovered handguns, shotguns, conversion kits for AR-15 rifles, and high-capacity magazines from a family member’s home in Falls Church, Virginia.

The Clarks had also repeatedly interacted with a host of far-right figureheads, including Jack Posobiec — who according to HuffPost hired them to help film a story for the far-right Rebel Media — as well as Unite the Right organizer Jason Kessler and former Traditionalist Workers Party leader Matthew Heimbach.

The court affidavit says that the Clark brothers previously posed with the flag of Vanguard America, a neo-Nazi group. They were also spotted at last year’s Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia right behind James Alex Fields, who allegedly killed Heather Heyer by ramming his car into a group of counter-protesters. In the photo, both Fields and the Clarks are wearing the uniform associated with Vanguard America, although the group has consistently denied Fields is a member.

Gab came under severe pressure in wake of the Pittsburgh shooting when it emerged that Bowers had regularly and consistently posted anti-Semitic content prior to the shooting — including a final post, minutes before the shooting, of “screw your optics I’m going in.” The site briefly went offline after domain registrar GoDaddy announced it was cutting ties with Gab, however it soon found a new home.