From NY to Texas, KKK recruits with candies and fliers

http://www.cnn.com/2014/08/31/us/new-york-kkk-recruitment/

(CNN) -- Carlos Enrique Londoño laughs at the Ku Klux Klan recruitment flier recently left on the driveway of his suburban New York home. It's unlikely the group would accept him.

"I'm Colombian and dark-skinned," said Londoño, a painter and construction worker who has lived in Hampton Bays on Long Island for 30 years.

The flier was tucked into a plastic bag along with a membership application, the address for the KKK national office in North Carolina, a list of beliefs and three Jolly Rancher candies.

The packages appear to be part of a wider recruitment effort by the Klan across the country, Ryan Lenz, senior writer for the Southern Poverty Law Center, told CNN on Saturday.

Similar fliers have turned up in dozens of U.S. cities over the past six months, Lenz said. The SPLC was founded by civil rights lawyers, and is known for tracking and exposing the activities of such groups.

The SPLC says the Ku Klux Klan is the most infamous and oldest of American hate groups. African-Americans have been the main target of the historically violent group, but the Klan also has targeted Jews, immigrants, gays, lesbians and Catholics.

The center estimates that there are between 5,000 and 8,000 Klan members nationwide, divided among dozens of divergent and warring groups.