Former Virginia congressional candidate charged with kidnapping 12-year-old girl

An avowed white supremacist who ran for Congress in 2018 while advocating for pedophilia and rape was arrested last week for allegedly kidnapping a 12-year-old girl.

The Fresno County Sheriff’s Department said in statement that Nathan Daniel Larson of Virginia was taken into custody during a flight layover in Denver.

Authorities said they had received a report of a missing 12-year-old girl from Fresno, Calif., on Dec. 14. Police believe the girl met Larson on social media in mid-October, and that she was coerced into running away with him to the East Coast.

Police believe she headed to Fresno Yosemite International Airport to catch a cross-country flight to Virginia to be with Larson. Authorities in Denver say they checked the airport and discovered Larson with the child during a layover.

“Agents rescued the girl, who was uninjured, and made arrangements to have her reunited with her family in Fresno, which she was later on Monday night,” the sheriff’s office said in a statement.

Investigators say Larson had flown to California and traveled to the child’s home, where he persuaded her to sneak out of her house around 2 a.m.

“Larson made her wear a long hair wig to alter her appearance,” authorities said in the statement. “He also told her to act as though she was disabled and unable to speak to ensure she would not converse with anyone at the airport while making their way onto the airplane.”

Detectives searched Larson’s home in Virginia and found electronic devices that revealed he runs a website that encourages pedophilia and child rape, according to deputies.

“During the past two months, Larson was able to convince the Fresno girl, through manipulation and grooming, to send him pornographic images of herself,” authorities said.

Larson was described by law enforcement as a “white supremacist and a well-known advocate for pedophilia.”

Officials said they believe Larson has victimized other children in the past “due to the sophisticated nature of how Larson groomed this Fresno girl” and encouraged people to come forward if they or someone they know had inappropriate contact with him.

He is being held at the Denver county jail on a misdemeanor charge of harboring a minor. He is also facing charges in Fresno County of kidnapping, child abduction, soliciting child pornography from a minor and meeting a child for the intention of sex.

The 40-year-old unsuccessfully ran as a candidate for Virginia’s House of Delegates in 2017. The next year, he made a long-shot bid for Virginia’s 10th Congressional District as an independent.

He referred to himself as a a “quasi-neoreactionary libertarian” who is open about his pedophilia so as to remain unconstrained by “political correctness.” 

In a rambling campaign manifesto, Larson referred to Adolf Hitler as a “white supremacist hero,” argued in a section supporting gun rights that “guns don’t kill people — feminists do,” and said he wants to protect “benevolent white supremacy,” in addition to legalizing child pornography and incestuous marriage.

Larson first ran for Congress in 2008 in Virginia’s 1st District. However, he was later disqualified after threatening to kill either former President George W. Bush or former President Obama in a detailed email to the Secret Service.

He later pleaded guilty and served 14 months of a 16-month sentence.