Interview Episode: The Hate Next Door with Matson & Tawni Browning
Special Guest: Matt & Tawni Browning
Matson Browning is an internationally recognised authority on the inner workings of white supremacy groups. As an undercover detective for more than two decades in Arizona, he thought he knew what hate looked like. That is, until he got a front-row seat. For more than 25 years, Matt has been infiltrating, documenting, and disrupting white supremacy movements from the inside, gaining an intimate vantage point into the KKK, skinheads, border militias, Proud Boys, and other white power groups, as they organised and grew, their ranks including police force and military veterans.
Tawni Browning was the supervising and casting producer for A&E’s Secrets of Polygamy, premiering on 8 January 2024, as well as 5 seasons of A&E’s Escaping Polygamy. For years, Tawni has been assisting her husband in the investigations of numerous skinhead organisations. With her covert investigative tactics, Tawni was instrumental in the shutting down of one of the world's largest and most violent skinhead organisations.
ABOUT THIS EPISODE
Matson Browning is a law enforcement officer who, along with his wife Tawni, spent years undercover infiltrating various hate groups to research and report on the rise of hate crimes and white supremacy in the United States. Together they wrote the book The Hate Next Door: Undercover Within the New Face of White Supremacy, which was published in July 2023.
What others dismissed as fringe groups, Matson quickly recognised as large and interconnected organisations permeating every facet of American society, effectively spreading their dangerous and repugnant rhetoric at unprecedented speeds. Now, with the violent polarisation in our communities and an increase in hate crimes, the threat posed by these toxic organisations feels as acute as ever.
If you have been personally affected by involvement in a cult, or would like to support those who have been, you can find support with or donate to Cult Information and Family Support if you’re in Australia (via www.cifs.org.au), and you can find resources outside of Australia with the International Cultic Studies Association (via www.icsahome.com).
If you or someone you know is in crisis or needs support right now, please call Lifeline on 13 11 14 in Australia, or find your local crisis centre via the International Association for Suicide Prevention website at www.iasp.info.
EPISODE LINKS
Matt & Tawni Browning — Matson and Tawni's website
The Hate Next Door: Undercover Within the New Face of White Supremacy — by Matson & Tawni Browning, Sourcebooks, 2023
EPISODE DETAILS
Produced by Sarah Steel
Music by Joe Gould
Edited and Mixed by Matt Brazel
December 13th, 2023
43 mins 26 secs