Richard Girnt Butler (1918-2004) was an American white supremacist and the founder and longtime leader of the Aryan Nations, a neo-Nazi organization based in Hayden Lake, Idaho. Born in Denver, Colorado, Butler grew up in a working-class family and developed far-right views influenced by anti-Semitic and racist ideologies. He worked as an aeronautical engineer in the aircraft industry in California during and after World War II, where he served in the U.S. Navy. In the 1960s, Butler became involved in the Christian Identity movement, a theology that posits white Europeans as the true Israelites and Jews as descendants of Satan. He joined and later led various hate groups, including the Church of Jesus Christ–Christian, before establishing the Aryan Nations in the 1970s as a compound that served as a hub for white supremacists, hosting annual congresses that attracted neo-Nazis, Klansmen, and other extremists.

Under Butler's leadership, the Aryan Nations promoted violent white separatism, anti-Semitism, and opposition to the U.S. government, earning it designation as a terrorist threat by the FBI. The group was linked to several criminal acts, including the 1996 bank robbery and assassination plot by Aryan Nations members that targeted The Order, a related splinter group. Butler himself faced legal challenges; in 2000, the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Kootenai County Task Force on Human Relations won a civil lawsuit against him and the Aryan Nations for $6.3 million after security guards at the compound attacked a woman and her son, mistaking them for Jewish. This judgment bankrupted the organization and forced the sale of the 20-acre compound in 2001. Butler continued to lead a diminished group until his death from natural causes in 2004 at age 85.

Butler was criticized and condemned by civil rights groups for fostering hate and violence, with the Aryan Nations under his tenure inspiring numerous acts of domestic terrorism. He was accused of harboring fugitives and promoting sedition, though he faced no criminal convictions himself. His influence extended through associations with figures like David Duke and Louis Beam, solidifying his role in American far-right networks.