Alleged killer of British MP Jo Cox was neo-Nazi group supporter with ‘history of mental illness’

The alleged killer of British lawmaker Jo Cox was a “dedicated supporter” of a neo-Nazi group based in the United States, a civil rights group reported Thursday.

The Southern Poverty Law Centre said that the man named by British media as the attacker, Thomas Mair, had a “long history with white nationalism”. Other reports have said Mair battled mental illness.

Anti-Brexit lawmaker Jo Cox shot dead, with killer shouting ‘Britain first’, reports say

“According to records obtained by the Southern Poverty Law Centre Mair was a dedicated supporter of the National Alliance (NA), the once premier neo-Nazi organisation in the United States, for decades,” the legal advocacy group said on its website.

Cox, a 41-year-old lawmaker with the opposition Labour Party who was known for campaigning for refugee rights and was a supporter of Britain remaining in the EU, was killed in a daylight attack Thursday in her home constituency in Yorkshire in northern England.

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Police said an investigation was underway to establish the motive for the murder, which halted campaigning a week before Britain’s referendum on whether to leave the European Union, a debate marked by divisions over immigration.