For three consecutive weekends, hate groups waving swastika flags and throwing up the Nazi salute have made odious appearances around Nashville. They’ve marched through downtown harassing minorities and intimidating passersby, dropped banners over highway overpasses, and disrupted a metro council meeting with vile rhetoric.
But their July 14 pop-up has been their most nonsensical: assembling in front of a Raising Cane’s chicken tenders restaurant on the corner of Nashville’s Broadway and 3rd Avenue North. Dressed in black T-shirts that read “Pro White” and choosing to show their faces (unlike a recent masked demonstration by members of white supremacist group Patriot Front), the half dozen or so mostly bearded men put on their little show of hate, as signs advertising chicken fingers and dipping sauce lit up behind them. A photo captured by The Tennessean illustrates just how ludicrous the spectacle was.
The downtown location of Raising Cane’s opened to much fanfare — customers lined up in the wee hours to order chicken and get a glimpse of a Johnny Cash tribute inside the restaurant. A little over two weeks after the grand opening, the Nazis set up shop outside for a Sunday afternoon demonstration. Needless to say, Raising Cane’s wasn’t happy about the association.
In an emailed statement to Rolling Stone, the brand essentially said their hands were tied and denounced the hate group. “Unfortunately, those individuals were on public property,” a Raising Cane’s spokesperson said. “While we can’t control where they stand, we vehemently disagree with what they stand for.”
Raising Cane’s is a Louisiana-based chicken chain that has more than 800 locations around the country. Its slogan is “One Love,” a reference to their devotion to what the company calls “craveable chicken finger meals.” Post Malone is such a passionate fan that he asked the restaurant to build a store near his home in Utah and partnered with Raising Cane’s to open a Post Malone- and Dallas Cowboys-themed restaurant in Dallas, Texas, last year.
The brand is also popular with country singers. Hardy performed at the opening of the Broadway location, while Parker McCollum and Cole Swindell have made appearances at other stores. The Texas country artist Koe Wetzel has a tattoo of a Cane’s chicken finger on his thigh.
Nashville continues to deal with a uptick in hate groups, especially in the heart of tourist-friendly downtown. Local journalist Betsy Phillips, who just released the book Dynamite Nashville: Unmasking the FBI, the KKK, and the Bombers Beyond Their Control, about unsolved racially motivated bombings during the civil rights era, wrote in an essay, “Nazis come here because they feel welcome here.” During a recent appearance on the City Cast Nashville podcast, state senator Heidi Campbell said she wasn’t surprised to see the Nazis march downtown: “That’s alarming. But it’s important to understand that Nashville is targeted to be our first big conservative Christian nationalist city.”
Christine Wonsley with her husband, Elmore (second from left), attorney Ben Crump (left), and Rev. Al Sharpton (right), during a memorial service for her son Nolan Xavier Wells.Gerald Herbert/AP
Donald Trump and FIFA President Gianni Infantino stand as Spain celebrates its World Cup victory, on July 19, 2026.
America Got the World Cup It Deserves — Good and Bad
For the past six weeks or so I’ve been having a recurring fight with my friends. The dispute is over whether or not it’s ethical to support the U.S. national team in the World Cup.
To the vast majority of people reading this article, this is an absurd question: of course you can and should support the United States Men’s National Team, you weirdo. And look, I’m with you. But despite the fact that my friends are pompous dorks who are no fun to watch the game with, the question they raise is valid: Are our national teams avatars of the administration in power, or of the people and promise of that country?
If you believe the former, then yeah, it’s pretty fucking weird to support the USMNT. In doing so, by that thinking, you’d be engaging in a sort of athletic nationalism on behalf of a country run by Donald Trump, the most corrupt president in history, who forced the Iranian national team to flee across the border immediately after the final whistle of each of their games, whose federal police have shot numerous civilians dead in the street during a brutal immigration crackdown, who has started a war and supported a genocide while covering up his close personal friendship with the most notorious pedophile in modern history.
I mean just look at him. On Sunday he waddled down onto the field to present Spain with their trophy, lingering on stage with the victorious team as they tried to celebrate. The presence of Mexican President Claudia Steinbaum and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney did little to dilute the image of Trump standing next to his crony Gianni Infantino, grinning at all the trappings of their power, hands caressing a trophy they’d done nothing to earn, lingering well past his cue to leave Spain to their glory. This World Cup, literally, had Donald Trump’s fingerprints all over it.
And yet, this was one of the most thrilling, beautiful World Cups in recent memory. That’s America, baby — contradictions abound.
Over the past five weeks of the greatest athletic competition on Earth, we’ve seen games that will literally never leave my memory. The final, which I attended yesterday in New Jersey, was remarkably forgettable — a 0-0 draw until the 106th minute, with Spain dominating every second of play and yet unable to score, undone time and time again by their insistence on tricksy passing and the personal heroics of Argentina’s goalkeeper Emi Martinez. The rest of the tournament, however, delivered. Cabo Verde, refusing to lose until the very last moments of the first knockout round, battling back again and again against both teams that would eventually play in the final. The sheer dominance of France’s Kylian Mbappe in front of goal, scoring at will, rivaled only by the aging GOAT Leo Messi and the Norwegian warlord Erling Haaland. England’s heroic stand at the Estadio Azteca in Mexico City, 45 minutes in the rain, a man down, holding out for the win and singing “Wonderwall” with what felt like half the stadium when it ended. Off the pitch, too: the Algerian national team being welcomed with open arms by Lawrence, Kansas; Scottish braves drinking Boston dry and partying wildly with Haitian fans that overcame so much just to be at the tournament. In Mexico, of course, the World Cup was everything, and its fans threw joyous South Koreans pumped full of tequila into the air, and celebrated in the streets with opposing fans even after their hard-fought defeat to England.
For the United States, what the 2026 World Cup was — what our team was, what our fans were, what our performance as hosts was — is a reflection of two things at once: what our nation is and what it can be.
Our star striker, Folarin Balogun, was born here by accident, a citizen only because of a birthright system that our president is currently trying to erase. We have Ricardo and Giovanni and Freeman and Zendejas. We have another striker whose name is Haji, for goodness sake. I look at that team and I see the country America can be, one in which any soul born in or living within our arbitrary borders can become part of a great national project that seeks to improve the lives of everyone it can. And yet, I can also look at that team and see a reflection of what the country is, because there is an anchor around its neck. When Balogun was — albeit unjustly — suspended for a crucial match, Trump himself stepped in. Cronyism saved the day and got Balogun reinstated, but ruined the fragile harmony the team had enjoyed. On the pitch against Belgium, they came apart. Temperamental star Christian Pulisic tried to go alone and then quit, aging defender Tim Ream’s legs failed him when he needed them most, a young goalkeeper slipped and fell when he had no good options for support.
What more can you say about a team, about our country? The team is an entity that is capable of more but still has so far to go, that is vulnerable to the same forces of avarice and selfishness and fear that plague our national identity writ large.
It’s possible to end the story there, to say good riddance to another failed year and fractured team. But I think that’s a mistake. I think if you believe that you haven’t really been watching. I think that’s also why it pissed me off so much that some of my friends wouldn’t root for the U.S. Yes, we have flaws, like every country involved in the tournament. Yes, our current team management and political government are filled with morons. But if you won’t put on the shirt you’re essentially opting out of our future. We can’t wait around for a better world, a better team, a better president, before we deign to lend our support. Progress only comes from effort, from caring, from believing in something more.
One of my favorite images of the World Cup was a crowd shot of the opening match against Paraguay in Los Angeles: every race, color and creed of American there is, all covered in red white and blue. It’s corny and trite, sure. But that’s what it’s all about. That’s why we’re here. You have to believe. The U.S. won that game 4-2. In four years, we’ll be even better.