Red Flags

Illustrations by Joe McKendry

Americans love flying flags. Not just the Stars and Stripes—flags of their state, their city, their alma mater. Last year, three flags were flown outside Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s New Jersey vacation home: the flag of Long Beach Island, where he summers; a flag commemorating the Philadelphia Phillies’ 2022 National League championship; and the Appeal to Heaven flag, also known as the Pine Tree flag.

The last of these caught the attention of The New York Times. The Pine Tree flag, which dates to the Revolutionary War, has become a symbol of the far right. The Times had previously reported that an upside-down American flag had flown outside Alito’s Virginia home in January 2021—a gesture of protest that had been adopted by the pro–Donald Trump “Stop the Steal” movement.

Alito explained that his wife had inverted the flag to signal displeasure with some querulous neighbors, and that she had flown the Pine Tree flag without knowing about its “Stop the Steal” association. But the incidents raised concerns that the flags revealed political views that would color Alito’s judgment in cases before the Court.

[Adam Serwer: Why was Alito flying the flag upside down after January 6?]

Antique American flags, obscure foreign ones, and a host of newly designed banners are now common wherever elements of the far right congregate, whether in real life or online. An array of flags dotted the crowds outside the U.S. Capitol on January 6— symbolic weapons that sometimes turned into actual ones: Several rioters used flagpoles to assault police officers or destroy property. After the attempted assassination of Trump in July, some of his supporters circulated an image of a tangled American flag, in which they saw the outline of an angel—a sign that the former president had been the beneficiary of divine protection.

Understanding what these sometimes-recondite symbols mean can shed light on how extremist ideology is evolving. Below is a guide to some of the most prominent symbols.

The Betsy Ross flag was created in the early years of the Revolutionary War, though likely not by Ross herself. It has been co-opted by far-right groups to invoke revolution against perceived tyranny. Some groups, such as the Three Percenters, a right-wing militia, have spun up new versions of the flag, incorporating their own symbols within the circle of 13 stars.

Historically, flying the American flag upside down was a way for sailors to indicate distress or to call for help. In the 1960s and ’70s, it was used by Vietnam War protesters. (Opponents of the war also burned U.S. flags, a practice that has been far more common on the left than the right.) Now parts of the American right are bringing back the upside-down flag, to protest the 2020 election and, more recently, Donald Trump’s felony conviction. Flying the flag upside down when not in distress is a violation of the United States flag code, though the code is not legally enforceable.

The Christian flag was designed in the 1890s by a Sunday-school superintendent on Coney Island who is said to have wanted a single flag representing the whole of Christianity. The flag is still used by Christians without explicitly political connotations, but it has been flown at right-wing rallies in support of the Christian-nationalist desire to break down the walls between Church and state.

The Pine Tree flag first appeared on American naval ships in 1775. Since the 2010s, and especially after the insurrection on January 6, 2021, it has been appropriated by members of the Christian-nationalist far right, who want to transform America into a theocracy. The phrase An appeal to heaven was taken from the British philosopher John Locke, who wrote in his Second Treatise on government that men deprived of their rights are justified in revolting against their oppressors.

The Celtic Cross dates back to the Middle Ages, or perhaps even Late Antiquity. Though not initially a Christian symbol, it has long been used in Christian contexts. Now it’s become a fixture at rallies for neo-Nazis, the Ku Klux Klan, and other white supremacists. It is also part of the logo for a prominent neo-Nazi website, Stormfront. Norwegian fascists in the 1930s and ’40s wielded a similar version of the cross as their party symbol, which has likely led to its modern usage.

The Black Sun, or Sonnenrad, symbol was used by Nazis during the Third Reich. It consists of 12 lightning-bolt runes—similar to the ones in a familiar insignia of the SS—arranged into a disk. It has appeared at neo-Nazi rallies around the world and has become a fixture of online memes. The symbol even showed up in a video shared by a Ron DeSantis campaign staffer, which depicted the then–presidential candidate’s head in the center of a spinning Black Sun. (The DeSantis campaign fired the staffer.)

At many of Patriot Front’s marches across the country, the white-nationalist group totes its signature flag, featuring an axe surrounded by a bundle of sticks. The fasces, as it is known, was a popular Roman symbol indicating a leader’s power, authority, and ability to punish his subordinates. Benito Mussolini and his allies adopted the fasces as an emblem and derived the name of their movement from it: fascism.

The Groypers are a group of mostly Gen Z white supremacists led by 26-year-old Nick Fuentes. Their precise numbers and influence are hard to pin down; they have more of an online presence than a physical one. When they do show up in person, it’s often with flags for “America First,” the name of Fuentes’s movement. The phrase was originally popularized by President Woodrow Wilson and later used by Pat Buchanan and Donald Trump to their own political ends.

Anyone who flies a flag for “Kek,” or the “Republic of Kekistan,” probably spends a tremendous amount of time online, specifically on 4chan. Kek became popular as an alternative term for LOL among players of World of Warcraft, and has evolved to embody an entire ethos: trolling. The Kek flag is designed like a Nazi war flag, with a spiral of K ’s around an E to replace the swastika, and a 4chan logo in the corner. Like the other right-wing symbols that have been incubated on the image board over the years, it is intended to trigger outrage.

There isn’t much to say about the Trump Rambo flag, because the flag itself says it all. It was flown on January 6 by MAGA diehards, and is perhaps the most prominent flag in a genre that reimagines Trump as imposing, physically impressive, and often armed—including Trump as the Terminator and Trump as a character from the Japanese anime series Dragon Ball Z.

This article appears in the September 2024 print edition with the headline “Red Flags.”