Richard Butler, founder of the Aryan Nations white supremacist group, died Wednesday at age 86. In the 1970s, Butler opened a compound in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, that became a center for his racist, anti-Semitic group. Butler believed that Jews were descended from Satan and controlled the media and that African Americans were inferior “mud people.” In recent years Butler’s influence had waned, and he was forced to sell his compound after a court judgment against his group. His movement also spawned a tolerance movement in Coeur d’Alene, as local residents established groups opposed to racism and anti-Semitism.
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