NIU and Bradley University have something in common—problems with white supremacist groups.

A group, called the American White Supremacist Party, distributed fliers last week which caused demonstrations by minority and other students from Bradley University, Peoria, Ill.

The Crusade Against Corruption, another white supremacist group based in Georgia, sent racist fliers to a random group of NIU students last semester.

Matt Hale, the American White Supremacist Party leader, said he has been forced to go before the University’s Judicial Review Board to face allegations regarding the fliers.

The distributors of the racist fliers at NIU were never apprehended.

“I’ve been charged with violating the student handbook, posing an educational threat and violating the rights of other students,” Hale said. If he is found guilty, he could be expelled from school, he said.

The party is not a university sponsored and funded organization, so the charges brought against him are not valid, Hale said.

“I didn’t violate the rights of any student. The only thing I did that is illegal is put up the fliers without permission,” he said.

“I wouldn’t do it again and I don’t think they’re justified in doing this to me,” Hale said.

He said a great deal of the controversy has to do with a series of anti-black letters that a different white supremacist group mailed out to students last week.

ale said he had nothing to do with those letters and his fliers were merely announcing a meeting of the group.

“We tried to have our weekly meeting at a local church and when we got there the doors were locked” because the priest said the group could not use the church for meetings, Hale said.

The priest, Elia Fauzey, denied to comment on the incident.

Ken Giordano, a Bradley student, said the racial situation at Bradley is very tense.

“The tension is thick—you can cut it with a knife,” Giordano said.

Calvin Butler, a member of the Bradley Minority Coalition, said 600 students marched from the Bradley Student Center to the president’s office last Wednesday to protest the university’s failure to respond to racial incidents.

He said the case involving Hale was just one of the things that caused the protest march.

“What Matt Hale’s flier and another flier from the Klu Klux Klan on campus did was to provide a catalyst toward ending racial tension at Bradley,” Butler said.

Members of the NIU Black Student Union were unavailable for comment.