HEMET -- The public face for the anti-Muslim film inflaming the Middle East is not the filmmaker, but an insurance agent and Vietnam War veteran whose unabashed and outspoken hatred of radical Muslims has drawn the attention of civil libertarians, who say he's a hate monger.
With the Coptic Christian filmmaker Nakoula Basseley Nakoula in hiding, film promoter Steve Klein has taken center stage in the unfolding international drama. He has given a stream of interviews about the film and the man he says he knew only as Sam Bacile, and is using the attention to talk about his own political views.
Nakoula, who used Bacile spelled multiple ways as a pseudonym, contacted Klein months ago for advice about the limits of American free speech and asked for help vetting the movie's script, Klein said in an interview with The Associated Press. The filmmaker asked the 61-year-old grandfather if he would act as a spokesman if the film "caught on," and he agreed.
The role dovetailed with Klein's relentless pursuit of radical Muslims in America, an activity he says he began after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. It took on more meaning in 2007, when his son, a 32-year-old Army staff sergeant, was seriously injured in Iraq in 2007.
Matthew Klein, a medic, was awarded the Bronze Star for bravery and a Purple Heart for injuries he suffered in the attack by a suicide bomber, according to the Army Human Resources Command.
"What do I get out of this? I get to die one of these days hoping my granddaughters and my grandsons will be safe from these monsters," Klein said while sipping a beer on the front porch of his home.
He claimed to have visited "every mosque in California" and identified "500 to 750 of these people who are future suicide bombers and murderers."
"Those are the guys I'm looking for. I'm not interested in mom and pop running a pizza store or running a smoky shop, a hookah shop," he said.
Klein works with his wife as an insurance agent out of a small office on the second floor of a downtrodden business complex in Hemet. He describes himself as a failed real estate investor who lost 20 properties in the recession.
In 2002, he was the American Independent Party's candidate for state insurance commissioner in 2002, receiving 2 percent of the vote.
The Southern Poverty Law Center says it has been tracking Klein for several years and has labeled two of the organizations he is affiliated with as hate groups.
Klein founded Courageous Christians United, which conducts protests outside abortion clinics, Mormon temples and mosques, and started Concerned Citizens for the First Amendment, which preaches against Muslims and publishes volumes of anti-Muslim propaganda that Klein distributes.
