Homegrown
Timothy McVeigh and the Rise of Right-Wing Extremism
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- $24.99
Publisher Description
The definitive account of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and the enduring legacy of Timothy McVeigh, leading to the January 6 insurrection—from acclaimed journalist Jeffrey Toobin.
Timothy McVeigh wanted to start a movement.
Speaking to his lawyers days after the Oklahoma City bombing, the Gulf War veteran expressed no regrets: killing 168 people was his patriotic duty. He cited the Declaration of Independence from memory: “Whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it.” He had obsessively followed the siege of Waco and seethed at the imposition of President Bill Clinton’s assault weapons ban. A self-proclaimed white separatist, he abhorred immigration and wanted women to return to traditional roles. As he watched the industrial decline of his native Buffalo, McVeigh longed for when America was great.
New York Times bestselling author Jeffrey Toobin traces the dramatic history and profound legacy of Timothy McVeigh, who once declared, “I believe there is an army out there, ready to rise up, even though I never found it.” But that doesn’t mean his army wasn’t there. With news-breaking reportage, Toobin details how McVeigh’s principles and tactics have flourished in the decades since his death in 2001, reaching an apotheosis on January 6 when hundreds of rioters stormed the Capitol. Based on nearly a million previously unreleased tapes, photographs, and documents, including detailed communications between McVeigh and his lawyers, as well as interviews with such key figures as Bill Clinton, Homegrown reveals how the story of Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City bombing is not only a powerful retelling of one of the great outrages of our time, but a warning for our future.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Toobin (True Crimes and Misdemeanors) delivers an eye-opening study of Timothy McVeigh's bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in 1995. Drawing on the defense team's internal records, interviews with McVeigh's family members, and other primary sources, Toobin recounts how McVeigh became obsessed with guns when he was young; grew fixated on the white supremacist novel The Turner Diaries, whose protagonist bombs an FBI building; and joined the Army in 1988, meeting his future coconspirator Terry Nichols on the first day of basic training. After serving in the First Gulf War, McVeigh was largely aimless upon his return stateside. Angered by the federal government's handling of the 1992 Ruby Ridge standoff, the 1993 raid on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Tex., and Bill Clinton's signing of the 1994 assault weapons ban, McVeigh and Nichols believed the government had declared war on gun owners and planned to strike back, assembling the materials to make a bomb that killed more than 160 lives, including 15 children. Toobin also delves into McVeigh's anti-tax convictions, veneration of the Declaration of Independence, and conspiracy thinking, building a persuasive case that the bombing was motivated by beliefs that have come to dominate right-wing politics. It's a tragic and edifying account of the road to domestic terrorism.
