White supremacists and other right-wing groups have joined in protests against social distancing measures in an effort to reach new followers.
Mostly white protesters, many of them bearing firearms, have demonstrated outside statehouses and sometimes the homes of public officials to demand an end to coronavirus restrictions, and some of them have displayed Confederate flags and Nazi symbols, reported Business Insider.
"While we respect everyone's constitutional rights to bear arms and we know Michigan is an open carry state, we do ask those who wish to carry to do so in a respectful and lawful manner," said a representative from Michigan United for Liberty, who distanced the group from extremists at the protest. "We cannot control what people bring, do, or say, but we have made several statements in regards to keeping our events peaceful."
Sociologist Peter Simi, of Chapman University, told Business Insider that extremist groups are hoping to exploit the coronavirus crisis to mainstream their ideas.
"They're looking for ways to latch on to any kind of mainstream elements that can help further their narratives about racism, xenophobia, and immigration," Simi said.
"COVID-19 and the crisis surrounding it is custom-built for far-right extremist ideology and white supremacist ideology in particular," he added. "The anti-lockdown protests are a magnet because they represent so many different things that dovetail so nicely with the pre-existing trends of right-wing and white supremacist extremism."
Far-right groups and white supremacists have tried to piggyback on other protests in hopes of peeling off demonstrators with legitimate frustrations and folding them into their extremist agenda.
"When there are uprisings of political frustration on the right it's something that extremists are always paying attention to and trying to harness their own ends," said Cassie Miller, a senior research analyst at the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Miller pointed to the Tea Party movement after the 2008 recession and the 2015 church shooting in Charleston, South Carolina, as events the far right has tried to exploit.
"Riots broke out all over the country where people were arguing that the Confederate flag should stay up at statehouses and other public places," Miller said. "There were hundreds of these rallies, and the extremists were there on the ground with them because they felt these were people who were kind of primed to accept their perspective."
Miller and Simi agreed the COVID-19 deaths and economic hardship were a perfect storm for right-wing extremists to jump into, but they're not offering solutions -- just an outlet for violent anger.
"I'm sure there are some [protesters] who sincerely fear for their livelihood and are essentially mobilizing to open up the economy," Simi told Business Insider. "As far as the extremists — that element is really the side issue. Their concern is really much more about mobilization, getting their message out, expanding their narrative, and using crisis situations to spread fear and to spread anxiety."
