Federal authorities arrested nine members of a Christian militia group in Michigan called the Hutaree last month for allegedly plotting the murder of a number of police officers. The group was small, almost a family affair. Although Michigan volunteer militias are still big on gun rights, and wary of Washington, they aren’t necessarily violent. In fact, National Public Radio says, “there is a new, gentler militia in America.”
Mike Lackomar, who speaks for an umbrella militia group in Michigan called the Southeast Michigan Volunteer Militia, says that people have got the modern militia movement all wrong. “The first thing that is always thrown at us is that we are a racist group,” he said. “That’s most definitely not the fact. The second one is that militias in general are paranoid – or prepared to fight if things don’t go their way. And the truth of that matter is that militia is a defensive organization and always needs to be structured that way.”