Jesse F. Keeler responds to allegations that he’s connected to alt-right group Proud Boys

Death From Above 1979’s Jesse F. Keeler has responded to allegations that he’s a member of the alt-right group Proud Boys, saying he is “not ‘Alt-Right,’ nor a White Supremacist”.

The accusations surfaced from a Medium article, which alleges that Keeler has befriended Gavin McInnes, who founded Proud Boys in 2016 and is the co-founder of Vice Media. The article includes a screenshot, claiming that Gavin McInnes announced Keeler to be a member of the Proud Boys in February 2016. Furthermore, the article highlights how Keeler had made several appearances on McInnes’ podcast series.

In response, Keeler said via a statement posted to Death From Above 1979’s Facebook: “In his article, Gavin claimed that I was part of his group, the ‘Proud Boys.’ This is completely false. I would never join that group.” He details how he “became loosely acquainted” with Keeler through Vice Records, a label that’s released his work in the past.

“Our first interaction was back around 2004 when he called me up to do an interview with our band for his magazine. He offered to either do an interview or ‘just make some stuff up.’ The latter seemed more fun/interesting to me at the time and so that’s what he did. Back then he was mostly known as the writer of Vice magazines famed, and often not so politically correct fashion section, ‘Dos and Don’ts’. In short, he was a comedian,” Keeler writes.

He continues, “When he started a video podcast and invited me on as a guest, I obliged. When he invited me to his talk-show and a party on election night last year, regrettably, I attended. Never without a morbid curiosity. Anyone who knows me, or has met me for longer than 5 minutes knows how curious I am.”

“Soon after the election, I began noticing that Gavin was promoting violence and a form of radical politics that I absolutely do not agree with. I have always been anti-war and anti-violence. That is my baseline position. As far as immigration and nationalism: I am the child of an Indian mother and a Canadian father.”

In Episode 133 of The Gavin McInnes Show, from April 2016, Keeler made an appearance on the podcast to discuss the presence of Muslim individuals in Luton, and British identity. Before Keeler’s appearance, McInnes talked about how guest Tommy Robinson “noticed that Muslims don’t assimilate”. As Keeler came on the show, he said, “I’m excited about Tommy Robinson now.” McInnes discussed how “there’s dozens of mosques” in Luton, and Keeler described his experience: “I walked blocks and blocks and blocks, no pub.” He followed up with the comment, “You’re in Britain by name”.

The two segued onto the discussion of “social justice warriors”, on which Keeler said, “Is it that the social justice warriors have no kids so they’re not interested in the future? Is that part of it? They’re just thinking it doesn’t matter if our cultures or our country doesn’t exist anymore because we’re not going to have anyone there.”

He also talked about how he’d rather women complained about sexual harassment and pronouns than “complaining about things in the house or the garden or the dog shit”. Upon McInnes’ questioning of whether Keeler would prefer his wife to be a “social justice warrior”, Keeler replied, “It’s only because it’s not happening”.

You can listen to the archived podcast episode via Player FMJesse F. Keeler appears at around the 25:57 mark. Read his full response below.