Infiltration, Ego, and the Fragile Brotherhood: Case Studies in a Patriot Group

One group's contribution to the "one bad apple" metaphor.

Photo by Timon Studler on Unsplash

Several years ago, I was asked by the activism group I was in at the time to reach out to a fast-growing state group for potential collaboration. Regional groups are constantly cross-referencing each other, trying to sort out who is serious. Making contact was standard; about 25 groups in the area were competing for growth and visibility, mostly measured by online chatter. In that economy, more chatter equaled more credibility and legitimacy.

The chapter’s leader, who reported to a national founder, was terse when I reached out. He told me I’d need to be vetted before he would speak to me — which, ironically, confirmed his leadership role and revealed part of their process upfront.

Strike one.

Then I was contacted by their “intel officer”…via Facebook Messenger. That was apparently their standard operating platform. Not Signal, not PGP, not even Protonmail, but Facebook. I was told that I needed to add this person as a friend so that they could go through my page and look for ‘evidence that our beliefs are in sync.’ In other words: “Are you posting the right content?” They even mentioned “liberty memes” on my Facebook as being something necessary for my credibility. Keep in mind that we were in the same general metro area. They could have set up an in-person meet.

Strike 2.

The conversation was oddly tense; the officer seemed both arrogant and defensive. When I questioned their use of unsecured comms, I was told that’s where they did most of their coordination. The questions I was asked weren’t designed to assess risk or threat potential — they were measuring loyalty, looking for deference to their group. In fact, when I floated the idea of collaboration, I was told that they would only consider doing so if all of our members and even our group leadership subjected themselves to their leadership in any joint work.

I reported back to my group that we should disengage. Not because I had proof of malice, but because there were too many flags: linguistic cues, procedural failures, and that gut-level tension that comes when you can tell someone’s identity is fused to their position. When that’s the case, criticism becomes a threat. If the group leadership couldn’t handle me asking why posting memes would prove my viability, that was a bad sign.

Roughly 18 months later, it all started to unravel. The group’s leader vanished amid a wave of accusations that seemed too wild to be true but had plenty of proof: false claims, an exposed record of informing for the FBI, infiltration ties, and some pretty advanced, even ballsy, grifting and scamming going back years. What looked like a structured operation had been a house of cards. As a special bonus, that intel officer got exposed later for exaggerating details about their military service and training.

I don’t bring this up to suggest that I had some kind of foresight or special skill. I made mistakes, too—why would I even bring up collaboration when I already knew this group had two obvious strikes and a gut third? None of us are infallible, and if I were in that situation now, I’d handle it a lot differently. Learning from our mistakes is critical.

But it reinforced two lessons that I have seen play out over and over.

1. When ego becomes more important than discipline, collapse is inevitable.

2. There is no substitute for having—and heeding—early warnings about what motivates someone’s decision-making process.

Now let’s look at another example.

The Double Agent Who Didn’t Work for the Government

Between 2021 and 2024, a wilderness survival trainer named John Williams (a pseudonym) quietly embedded himself in several right-wing militia groups, including the American Patriots Three Percent (AP3). He didn’t work for the feds. He didn’t share his findings with law enforcement. Instead, he reported everything to a journalist at ProPublica, which published a scathing expose in January of this year.

Williams was described as an extraordinarily talented liar, and that’s exactly what the group rewarded; after all, their own founder had built his entire persona on deception. Williams was allowed to rise through the ranks because he looked right, talked the talk, and validated leadership egos. He was never properly vetted.

When the article dropped, it detonated. Paranoia took over. AP3’s founder, Scot Seddon, went public with rants about turncoats, warning members not to talk to anyone, but it was too late. Williams had already handed over thousands of internal documents to the media, and they painted a picture of internal dysfunction, groupthink, and members caught in the crossfire between their desire to make a difference and their own moral code.

This wasn’t a well-placed FBI plant. It was something potentially even more damaging: a private actor exploiting the fact that these groups mistake mutual outrage for mutual trust. The group’s internal controls, that should have prevented this kind of debacle, simply didn’t exist in practice.

What followed was collapse by exposure. But that wasn’t the only blow AP3 took. The real implosion came from inside, as their founder, Scot Seddon, got exposed as a fraud, liar, and grifter.

Meanwhile, the rank-and-file, many of whom were genuine, honest people trying to further a cause they believed in, got burned.

🔒 Subscriber Brief

What’s behind today’s paywall:

• The in-depth breakdown of what they missed, and the red flags they not only ignored, but leaned into.

• The emotional cracks that the infiltrator saw, and why they worked.

• The damage to the cause that ensued.

• The framework that would have protected those members.

Get the rest of the story, and protect your own organization from the same fate.