Group that asked US governors to quit, looked to Gandhi, Mandela

WASHINGTON - The Guardians of the free Republics, an anti-government group that recently asked 50 US governors to quit office within three days, claims their ideology is non-violent and inspired by the likes of Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King, Jr.

In the letters sent to the governors this week, the group demanded they leave office within three days or they would be removed. There were no details about how exactly that would be achieved.

“We would simply like to urge patriots everywhere to champion their faith instead of force, and allow The Restore America Plan an uneventful 30 to 60 days for visible implementation which will ultimately end the bogus prosecutions and terrorist activities once and for all,” wrote Sam Kennedy, a member of the organisation.

Kennedy warned the modern-day “original government” revolutionaries to approach their March 31 plan with Martin Luther King, Jr., Nelson Mandela and Mohandas Gandhi in mind, the Christian Science Monitor reported Saturday.

The FBI said the letters could incite violence.

The Guardians believe the US government is a corporate imposter put in place by corrupt bankers as part of the New Deal in 1933.

The group, spawned from the anti-IRS Posse Comitatus movement of the 1980s, has been actively recruiting across the country in the past few months and promoted on a Texas radio station.

The alleged threats against US governors come at a tense time.

In February, disgruntled tax protester Joseph Stack flew his single-engine plane into an IRS office in Austin, and last week, nine members of an anti-government militia, the Hutaree, were arrested in the Midwest.