Police in Kenosha, Wisconsin, fined a man $4,300 this week for distributing antisemitic flyers, some of which advertised the video-sharing website Goyim TV. It marks the first public report of a police-imposed penalty related to the group’s flyers since fans of the site launched their campaign more than a year ago to distribute leaflets with antisemitic messages in cities and towns across the U.S.
Similar incidents have occurred in Windsor (Sonoma County), Berkeley , Palo Alto, San Francisco and other cities in the Bay Area and more than a dozen states. The Goyim TV propaganda campaigns have alarmed local Jewish communities and generated a torrent of news coverage, as well as public statements from politicians urging action tackling hate crimes.
The charge in Kenosha is not for hate speech, but for 23 counts of littering.
The flyers did not qualify as a hate crime, the Kenosha Police Department wrote in a statement , but did fall under city ordinance 11.02U, which forbids residents from throwing, placing or depositing “any paper, glass, bottle, cans, containers, grass clippings, rubbish, waste, filth or other debris upon private property without consent of the owner.” Each citation comes with a $187 fine.
The suspect was described as a 56-year-old Wisconsin man.
Kenosha police said they have been investigating complaints of antisemitic flyers in the area since December 2021. In the most recent incident, in May, the flyers were discovered in yards across the city. Attributed to Goyim TV, they listed the names of media executives who are Jewish or believed to be Jewish and showed photos of some of them with Stars of David on their foreheads. The flyers said , “Every single aspect of the media is Jewish.” Goyim TV also prints and distributes flyers claiming, “Every single aspect of the Covid agenda is Jewish.”
This was the 12th round of flyers found in the area, Kenosha Police Lt. Joseph Nosalik told the Wisconsin Examiner .
Goyim TV is run by Jon Minadeo Jr., a former Petaluma resident who now lives in Florida, according to J. sources. Minadeo performs daily in live video streams on the site, attracting between 200 and 300 anonymous viewers from all over the world and generating revenue via digital payments.
In the videos, Minadeo spreads antisemitic conspiracy theories about Jewish control over the media, politics and finance; says Jews systematically molest children; and propagates the so-called “Great Replacement” theory, which holds that Jews are seeking to overrun white Western countries by orchestrating mass migrations.
“I do this for the love of my people,” Minadeo said during a recent stream. “I don’t hate everyone. I hate the Jews that have brainwashed our people, the non-white people, to make people like myself come off as a domestic terrorist.”
Minadeo encourages his followers to paper cities and towns with Goyim TV flyers; he recently offered a free T-shirt to anyone who succeeded in getting their campaign covered on local TV news.
U.S. police departments have not been successful investigating Goyim TV flyer drops, saying the cases either fall into a gray area or do not constitute a crime.
In June, Windsor Police Chief Mike Raasch said in a statement that “no crime had been committed” after a flyer drop in his town, though he called the messages “incredibly disturbing.”
The Anti-Defamation League’s Midwest office thanked Kenosha police for their efforts in a tweet Friday morning.
“This is a big deal. Those who try to spread hate, antisemitism, and fear will be held accountable,” the organization wrote. “This is a model of what can and should be done in communities across the U.S.”
Tags: antisemitism, Goyim TV, Goyim Defense League