Fergie Chambers
American heir and political activist
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
James Cox Chambers Jr. (born c. 1985),[1] also known as Fergie Chambers, is an American communist political activist and heir in the Cox family, which derives its wealth from Cox Enterprises.[2] Chambers owned a portion of Cox Enterprises until separating from the company in 2023, resulting in a payout estimated by Rolling Stone of at least $250 million.[3][4]
1985 (age 40–41)
Fergie Chambers | |
|---|---|
Chambers in 2023 | |
| Born | James Chambers 1985 (age 40–41) |
| Other name | Fergie |
| Occupation | Political activist |
| Years active | 2023–present |
| Organization | Berkshire Communists |
| Title | General Secretary |
| Spouses | |
| Father | James Cox Chambers |
| Family |
|
Early life
Chambers is the son of James Cox Chambers and Lauren Hamilton; the Cox family controls Cox Enterprises.[5] He spent his childhood in Brooklyn, New York, primarily with his mother, as his parents divorced when he was two years old.[5][4][2]
Around age 12, Chambers was introduced to Marxist literature by a teacher, including Howard Zinn’s A People's History of the United States, something which made a lasting impression, although by his account, his focus on political activism has ebbed and flowed throughout his life.[2][3]
Chambers began suffering from severe mental health issues as a child, in part, he says, because of "intense" levels of "focus and attention and pathologization" from his family.[2][6] Chambers recalls turning toward drugs and being depressed and suicidal as an adolescent, spending nearly three years in hospitals and rehabs, which radicalized him, as he "ended up [...] coming up against the discipline of the ruling class in that way.[3][2]
He attended Saint Ann's School and was admitted to Bard College, where he met his first wife, but dropped out before completing a degree.[4][2]
Career and activism
Chambers has described himself as a communist and has provided funding for leftist causes, including through paying legal fees for others.[1] Chambers began funding left-wing causes in the early 2000s and later founded the Babochki Collective, a grantmaking initiative. Members of the Babochki Collective (Babochki is Russian for "Butterfly") served as his ideological advisers, including Calla Walsh and Paige Belanger of direct-action network Unity of Fields.[3]
In his 20s, Chambers moved to Smyrna, Georgia, to work as a management trainer at the Cox Enterprises-owned Manheim, but returned to Bard for further study before moving with his wife Anya Vostrova to Russia after the 2008 financial crisis.[4][5] He returned in 2012, where he operated two gyms in the Atlanta area, including a CrossFit gym in Alpharetta, Georgia.[4] In 2012, an employee of Chambers' was Marjorie Taylor Greene. In 2020, Chambers claimed to have witnessed Greene conduct multiple extramarital affairs while employed by him.[7][4]
His public activism began in Atlanta in 2014, during protests and organizing efforts following the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.[4]
Dakota Access Pipeline protests & Madison, Georgia commune
In 2017, Chambers participated in the Dakota Access Pipeline protests.[3] Following the end of the Standing Rock protest camp, he bought property in Madison, Georgia, outside of Atlanta, and moved there with his then-wife, Cameron Park, and another couple.[3] He soon expanded the commune, which hosted more than a dozen people at its height; many were Standing Rock protestors. Chambers provided a stipend of $2,000 a month for members, in exchange for working on the property and participating in political study groups. Three former commune members recall in 2024 interviews with Rolling Stone that little happened on the commune aside from rampant psychedelic usage, with one describing Chambers as "seeking a shamanistic path of healing and trying to prescribe that to other people as well."[3] Chambers lived in a house on the property with his then-wife and another woman, who said that she had been attracted to the property because Chambers "wanted us to be able to live not having to be slaves of capitalism."[3] Rachael and another resident, Tai Lee, told the reporter that Chambers and his wife were committed to polyamory. Lee said that Chambers "wanted to do this whole swinger place. He wanted to have free love. It was totally sex-oriented." [3] The Georgia commune was closed in early 2019 and the property sold by Chambers in 2020.[3]
Berkshire Communists & Alford, Massachusetts commune
Chambers moved to New England after selling his Georgia property. In Massachusetts, he founded a group called the Berkshire Communists, which identifies itself as a "revolutionary Marxist-Leninist collective."[8][5][9][10] As a project of the Berkshire Communists, he bought at least 65 acres in Alford, Massachusetts, where he set up a six-home residential collective, Alford Family Farm, and a multipurpose community center, the Berkshire People's Gym, which was closed to "landlords and capitalists", among others.[10][11] Anyone who identified as a communist could live on the property for free, in exchange for property maintenance work and participation in communist theory study groups.[12] Residents included Babochki member Paige Belanger, who met Chambers through the People's Gym programs.[3] Chambers also bought property in New Hampshire and moved there in mid-2023, where he planned to build an MMA gym and invite people to live in residential properties he owned there.[3]
Elbit Systems protests
In October 2023, Chambers participated in an action at the Cambridge, Massachusetts office of defense contractor Elbit Systems.[13] In November 2023, shortly after October 7, Chambers and several other protestors staged a direct action protest at Elbit's Merrimack, New Hampshire, blocking the entrance, pouring paint on the building, breaking windows, and locking a lobby door; eight people were arrested.[2][14] Chambers paid $50,000 to bail three out.[3][15]
Following the Elbit protest, in January 2024, the Berkshire People's Gym was shut down when Alford town officials enforced a cease‑and‑desist over zoning violations, finding that the gym had been operating in a barn permitted solely for agricultural storage.[16] The Berkshire People's Gym Project and commune in Alford were featured in the 2026 documentary film All About the Money.[17] Director Sinead O'Shea, introduced to the commune by a friend who lived there during the COVID-19 pandemic, followed Chambers for two years.[17]
Other activities
In 2022, while living in Europe, he traveled to the Donbas region during the war in eastern Ukraine.[2]
In Georgia, Chambers has provided financial support for members of the Stop Cop City movement, including paying bail and lawyers' fees for people arrested in connection with the protests of the construction of the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center.[4][18] After learning in 2023 that Cox Enterprises had invested $10 million in the construction of the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center, he chose to divest from the company.[2]
Views
In 2020, Chambers described his political ideology as "somewhere between an eco-anarchist and a Marxist-Leninist",[7] while in 2024 he simply stated his ideology was a Marxist-Leninist and praised Stalin and Mao.[3]
Chambers is a vocal supporter of Hamas; he described the 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel as "a moment of hope and inspiration".[4][10] Chambers previously told Mother Jones in an interview that he believes "the most important thing for the prosperity of humanity is the destruction of the US",[4] Los Angeles magazine quoted him as saying, "I chant death to America every day. Imperialism is the death of humanity." He denies that he does so, but agrees with that assessment of imperialism.[1][4]
Chambers believes that the U.S. has "us[ed] Ukraine as a proxy for" its imperialist ambitions.[4] Chambers has also been supportive of Russia's invasion of Ukraine and visited Russian-occupied Donbas.[2] Chambers has referred to Vladimir Putin as a "great man".[3]
Personal life
Chambers first married a Russian woman, Anya Vostrova, whom he met at Bard. They lived in Russia for some time after 2008, and have three children together.[4][2][3] Chambers and his second wife, Cameron Park, met in Atlanta after his return from Russia.[2] In 2013, Chambers was arrested for domestic battery and false imprisonment of Park, although he was not prosecuted; they divorced after 2020.[5][2][3] In February 2024, he married Stella Schnabel, daughter of filmmaker Julian Schnabel; they have a son together.[4][3] Chambers and Schnabel had attended Saint Ann’s School in Brooklyn together and reconnected in New York decades later, when Chambers was with Park and spotted Schnabel across the room at a cafe.[2]
Chambers has changed religions several times during his life. Born into a White Anglo-Saxon Protestant (WASP) family, Cox stated that, at times in his life, he tried to commit to being a conservative Protestant.[2] In his early 20s, Chambers converted to Catholicism and embraced hardline anti-abortion views.[2] In the late 2010s, Chambers attended the Peyote Way Church of God, a Native American Church in Arizona.[3] In 2023, Chambers converted to Islam, which, he says, helped him manage his "discomfort in Western society and the world in general" and to lessen his reliance on "sex, drugs, and violence."[3]
He resided in Tunis, Tunisia until 2025, where he is a sponsor of the football club Club Africain.[19][20][3] Chambers previously lived in New Hampshire and the Berkshires region of Massachusetts.[1][16] His wealth is self-reported to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars.[1] According to a Boston Globe piece on associate Calla Walsh, Chambers now lives in Ireland.[21]