Adam Kinzinger continues support for Ukrainian ‘meme army,’ despite neo-Nazi ties

Over the past couple of months, the corporate press has inundated itself with endless articles celebrating a pro-Ukraine “meme army” called NAFO (short for the North Atlantic Fellas Organization), which has helped to raise money for a shadowy, unaccountable foreign organization to support Ukraine’s fight against Russia. The NAFO keyboard warriors, which label themselves the “fellas,” operate as internet attack dogs (who sport Shiba Inu logos) in the information war against Russia.

Over the weekend, however, NAFO ran into major controversy. Internet sleuths and researchers discovered that the founder of NAFO, a man named Kamil Dyszewski, identifies politically with neo-Nazi ideology, as an avowed antisemite, Hitler admirer, and Holocaust denier.

Moss Robeson, a New York-based researcher on Ukrainian fascist movements and the publisher of the Bandera Lobby Blog on Substack, highlighted a series of disturbing antisemitic sentiments advanced by the NAFO founder.

The NAFO founder has since locked his Twitter account and mass deleted many of these posts.

Over the past couple weeks, the NAFO “meme army” has received rhetorical support from several Baltic state leaders, and even the Ukrainian ministry of defense. Its chief advocate in the United States is Rep. Adam Kinzinger, who has interacted frequently with its founder, and has helped to solicit funds for the foreign operation. NAFO’s online troll army has also received endless applause in the D.C. neoconservative and neoliberal foreign policy think tank circuit

Kinzinger, who frequently tags the NAFO internet community in his posts, has gone as far as to change his profile photo to support the movement. He has encouraged his followers to donate money to Saint Javelin, the outfit that employs the NAFO founder and sells his meme “artwork,” and it claims to donate some of the proceeds to buy military hardware.

On Saturday, Kinzinger made it clear that he was aware of the NAFO founder’s rabid antisemitism and Holocaust denial. Instead of apologizing for raising money for a neo-Nazi, Kinzinger doubled down on his support.

The congressman, who, along with Rep. Liz Cheney, is the only other Republican who sits on the U.S. House Committee on January 6, labeled the neo-Nazi revelations as a big nothingburger. In a tweet posted Saturday evening, Kinzinger complained that people are making a “big deal” out of nothing and demanded it was time to “move on” and continue to support NAFO.

Ivana Stradner of the neoconservative Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD), who claims to act as an unofficial spokesperson for the movement, jumped into the fray to dismiss the NAFO controversy as Russian propaganda.

And the retiring congressman wasn’t done yet. Kinzinger continued his advocacy for NAFO through the weekend, fiercely defending it against any and all allegations of misconduct. Kinzinger spent much of Sunday attacking the American Jewish entrepreneur David Sacks as a Russian propagandist, repeatedly and bizarrely highlighting his Jewish last name in the process.  

Sacks has called for a peaceful settlement to the Russia-Ukraine war, warning about the increasing prospect of nuclear warfare.

And on Monday, Kinzinger continued his defense of NAFO, attacking the State of Israel for supposedly not doing enough to support Ukraine.

Neither the official NAFO Twitter account nor Saint Javelin, the internet merchandise shop that sells the neo-Nazi’s artwork, have commented on the matter.

For more on the disturbing origins of NAFO and the campaign to support its growth, I encourage you to read Moss Robeson’s NAFO deep dive on Medium.

The Dossier reached out to Rep. Kinzinger for a request for comment. It went unanswered.