A town manager in Maine, the whitest state in America, was finally fired after his white separatist, xenophobic views became public knowledge. According to the Lewiston Sun Journal, selectmen in the small northern town of Jackman voted 4-0 to remove Tom Kawczynski from his position.
The Arizona-bred 37-year-old was brought in to start working for the town last June, reportedly after a total lack of local interest in the job, and in November created a white separatist group online called New Albion. The group called for a voluntary separation of races in New England, but on alt-right platforms his comments went even further, pushing into the realm of racism, xenophobia, islamophobia, and attacks on feminists. He called Islam 'barbarism" and the “the scourge of Western civilization." As more of these comments surfaced, Kawczynski and the town came under fire.
“The divisive and extreme beliefs and opinions publicly expressed this week by the Jackman Town Manager Thomas Kawczynski are fundamentally incompatible with the role and responsibilities of a municipal manager,” president of the Maine Town, City and County Management Association Larry S. Mead said. “We reject and condemn the principles of division, uniformity and white separatism espoused by Mr. Kawczynski.”
However, Kawczynski continues to claim he is neither racist nor a white supremacist. “We are open to all ethnicities, all races,” he said Tuesday morning at the Jackman town office. “And I reject categorically the suggestion that I am a racist, a bigot, a Nazi, or any of the other foul names which have been attributed to me or my wife. What I will say, and I will say this quite publicly, is I do believe that we have the rights as citizens, as American citizens, to assert that some ideas are better than others and to have discussions about those ideas.”
Even as he defended himself, he brought up the fact that he has “serious questions” about Islam. He shared most of his xenophobic and separatist ideologies on Gab, an alt-right social media site. In one post he shared a meme that read “Leaves are like civilizations. They change color as they die.”
Kawczynski will be receiving a $30,000 pension in exchange for agreeing to not sue the town after being let go.
