Craig Rosebraugh
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Craig Rosebraugh is an environmental activist who has been associated with the Earth Liberation Front (ELF) and the Animal Liberation Front (ALF), and who has served as a spokesman for both groups' press office.
Rosebraugh owned and operated a vegan bakery in Portland, Oregon, to which ELF and ALF members would anonymously send claims for direct action events. Upon receiving such a claim, Rosebraugh would judge its authenticity, then issue a press release on his website, www.earthliberationfront.com which was started in January 2001 [1]. Information was delivered via anonymous remailers encrypted with Rosebraugh's PGP key, and through paper letters hand delivered or mailed to the bakery's address. Rosebraugh denied any direct involvement in the organizations and claimed to have no knowledge of the identity of those who sent messages.
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, Rosebraugh's association with the movement began in 1997, after spending a night in jail with an ALF activist. "Eleven weeks later, he delivered his first message on behalf of the ALF: Activists had broken into a mink farm and released hundreds of animals, costing the business some $300,000" [2]. The following year he made his first ELF claim, an arson attack in Vail, Colorado, on the ALF's Web site.
Since 1997, Rosebraugh has received more than seven subpoenas to appear before grand juries to discuss his sources, but he has said he has no knowledge of them. He was ordered to appear before a federal grand jury on April 18, 2001, which was investigating the fire bombing of Sports Utility Vehicles (SUVs) in Eugene, Oregon.
Rosebraugh later resigned his position as spokesman for the organizations as a result of FBI surveillance. Despite the seizure of his computer equipment; searches of his business, person, and home; grand jury investigations; and FBI questioning, he did not reveal the identities of members of the movements.
Although not advocating violence against people, Rosebraugh has supported the destruction of property activities, online sabotage, and the occupation of financial centers in the United States. He has also advocated urban rioting in the U.S. and shutting down the media, specifically:
- "Using any means necessary, shut down the national networks of NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, etc. Not just occupations but actually engage in strategies and tactics which knock the networks off the air."
He advocates guerrilla tactics:
- "[S]trike hard and fast and retreat in anonymity. Select another location, strike again hard and fast and quickly retreat in anonymity."
And when asked by a congressional subcommittee whether he feared an ELF action could one day kill someone, he answered:
- "No, I am more concerned with massive numbers of people dying at the hands of greedy capitalists if such actions are not taken." [3]
In 2003, his organization, Arissa, released a book entitled The Logic of Political Violence. The book examines the role that political violence has played in social justice struggles in the twentieth century, and concludes that a revolution which employs a diversity of tactics (including political violence) is needed in the United States.
Arissa's website states that their primary goal is to create a political and social revolution in the United States of America.
[edit] External links
- Arissa.org
- ArrisaMediaGroup.com
- CraigRosebraugh.com
- Essay on Craig Rosebraugh's The Logic of Political Violence
[edit] References
- Interview with Craig Rosebraugh: E.L.F. Spokesperson targeted by Oregon Grand Jury
- Philly IMC interview
- FBI, B.A.T.F., & OSP Raid ELF Spokesperson's Home, Vehicles, And Business
- Burning Rage of a Dying Planet: Speaking for the Earth Liberation Front; Craig Rosebraugh; ISBN 1-59056-064-7
- Craig Rosebraugh's War
- EarthLiberationFront.com
