Category Archives: Antifa

President Joe Biden is now 80 years old. He will be 82 when he campaigns for the 2024 presidency and a clearly debilitated 86 should he be elected and fill out his second term. He has been in government for over a half-century.

Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and current representative from California is 83.

Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., the second-ranking Democratic House member behind Pelosi, was House majority leader until early this year. He is 83, and has been an elected official for nearly 60 years.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., is 72, with 48 years in elected government.

Democratic luminary and former chairman of the Senate Judiciary and Intelligence Committees, Senator Diane Feinstein, D-Calif., is 89, and ailing after 53 years as an elected official.

James Clyburn, D-S.C., is House minority whip and 82.

These are the official faces of the Democratic Party.

They came into power and maturity three decades ago during the Clinton years of 1993-1999.

Decades ago, they sometimes supported strong national defense, secure borders, gas and oil development, fully funding the police, and a few restrictions on partial-birth abortions.

Not now.

Their role has changed from that of liberals of the Clinton era to serving as the thin power-holding veneer that masks the new real Democratic Party.

The party has been changed beyond recognition by Senators Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., the so-called Squad, the Congressional Black Caucus, newly elected senators like the Georgia duo of Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock and Antifa and Black Lives Matter.

Yet Biden and company are still familiar American faces.

Their final role is to acculturate the electorate to the new Democratic Party.

Its radicals are breathing down their necks to get out of the way. Yet for a while longer they still need such an ossified veneer of respectability to ease the transition to what is now essentially a socialist-European green party.

This new Democratic Party believes in defunding the police.

It supports the George-Soros-funded state and city district attorneys.

These prosecutors seek either to release violent criminals without bail or reduce their felonies to misdemeanors.

Critical legal and race theories are their creeds. So they argue that crimes have little to do with individual free will.

Criminals are not deterred by tough enforcement of the laws. Instead, crime reflects arbitrary constructs of a racially oppressive hierarchy.

They believe the woke revolution of using race and gender in lieu of a meritocracy should dominate government and corporate boardrooms.

Racial separation in graduations, dorms, and university programs are needed reparations.

Big Tech is their ally. All the better when it partners with government, especially the FBI and CIA, to suppress misinformation and disinformation.

They believe gender is socially constructed. Thus transitioning biological males can and should compete in womens sports.

They want a Green New Deal right now, one that calls for the abolition of natural gas and oil for electricity generation and transportation.

Abortion is seen as a God-given right even as a baby passes through the birth canal.

Climate change is their religion, trumping any concern for the viability of the middle-class suffering from inflation, high interest rates, and recession.

They want semiautomatic rifles to be banned. Concealed handgun permits should be almost impossible to obtain.

The more voters skip Election Day through mail-in balloting and early voting, the better.

There is no longer dark money, only useful correct money.

The more that Silicon Valley and Wall Street grandees quietly reroute hundreds of millions of dollars into hard-Left PACs and nonpartisan causes, the more the donors should expect lucrative crony-capitalist green deals and government concessions.

Much of the ideology of the new Democratic Party arose in academia, like critical race theory and modern monetary theory. The giveaway word is theory a mask for any absurd doctrine that can be dressed up as a sophisticated new idea.

When Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., the new Democratic minority leader in the House or Elizabeth Warren in the Senate advocate these positions, the voters recoil. That pushback is understandable, since almost none of these notions poll above 50 percent.

The role of a calcified Biden, Pelosi, Feinstein, Hoyer, or Clyburn is to reassure voters through their notoriety and apparently staid exteriors that they are hardly the sort to embrace revolution, although that is exactly what they do.

Ol Joe Bidens old guard and the new hard Left play a game of mutual advantage.

The new majority of radical Democrats allows the old fogies to bask in the limelight until they drop exempt from counter-revolutionary criticism or inter-party primary challenges or demands to retire.

In return, the codgers reassure the nation that old faces like theirs cannot possibly be polyester revolutionary socialists despite their role in airbrushing and photoshopping the radical catastrophe unfolding before our eyes.

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ABOUT THE WRITER

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(Victor Davis Hanson is a distinguished fellow of the Center for American Greatness. He is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and the author of The Second World Wars: How the First Global Conflict Was Fought and Won, from Basic Books. You can reach him by e-mailing authorvdh@gmail.com.)

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The useful veneer of the aging Democrat | Government/Opinion - City-sentinel

After a year of anarchy and unchecked violence, prosecutors are finally doing something about Antifas rolling riot in Portland, Ore.: These last two weeks have seen more than two dozen suspected Antifa thugscharged for an assortment of violent crimes dating as far back as November.

It shouldnt have taken a whole year of watching protesters pelt police with Molotov cocktails and destroy local businesses to realize that the do nothing strategy wasnt working, but here we are.

Its a notable turnaround for District Attorney Mike Schmidt, who after taking office last August refused to prosecute 90 percent of riot- and protest-related cases. At the time, he claimed that change sometimes takes property damage and that it requires more than just peaceful protests to get the governments attention.

But dozens of deaths, hundreds of injured cops and billions in insurance damages across the country seem to have changed his tune. Or maybe it was the fact that Mayor Ted Wheeler received death threats last month for promising to take our city back from the reign of terror.

Charges against 10 suspected Antifa were announced on Thursday alone, mostly for vandalism around Election Day and an Inauguration Day riot. Several more face federal charges.

For the sake of Portlands beleaguered citizens, and for the national rule of law, hope this is just the beginning of a long-overdue crackdown.

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Finally, Portland Antifa is being brought to justice for its violence

As protests raged in over 140 cities in the United States following the death of George Floyd, U.S. president Donald Trump raised the prospect of labeling Antifa as a terrorist group. On May 31, 2020, he tweeted, The United States of America will be designating ANTIFA as a Terrorist Organization. Attorney General William Barr also remarked that Antifa was present at some of the protests. There is clearly some high degree of organization involved at some of these events and coordinated tactics that we are seeing, he said, Some of it relates to antifa, some of it relates to groups that act very much like antifa. Barr described Antifas tactics as a new form of urban guerrilla warfare in the legacy of Mao Zedong. Other officials, such as Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) director Christopher Wray, later pushed back, instead characterizing Antifa as a movement or an ideology rather than an organized group.

Antifa is a contraction of the phrase anti-fascist and refers to a decentralized network of individuals that oppose fascism, racism, and other related ideologies. Adherents have been motivated by such philosophies as communism and anarchism. Some members of Congress, such as Senators Bill Cassidy (R-LA) and Ted Cruz (R-TX), had already introduced a resolution in 2019 calling for Antifa to be designated a domestic terrorist organization. Following Trumps comments in May 2020, Antifa became the subject of increased national attention and became a regular talking point in debates over domestic counterterrorism policy. But who are Antifa? What are its roots and its main goals? How is it organized? How much of a threat does it pose in the United States?

Many Antifaor anti-fasciststrace their roots back to the period after World War I, when German and Italian leftists worked together to fight fascist gangs in Europe. Examples of anti-fascist groups included the Arditi del Popolo in Italy and the Antifaschistische Aktion in Germany. Perhaps the most iconic incident occurred outside London on October 4, 1936, in what became known as the Battle of Cable Street. That day, Oswald Mosely led the British Union of Fascists in a march on Cable Street and Whitechapel in Londons East End. In response, tens of thousands of Zionists, socialists, anarchists, and outraged residents formed a blockade and fought Mosleys fascists and the nearly 6,000 police officers protecting them. The anti-fascist crowd lobbed homemade bombs, threw an assortment of projectiles ranging from rocks to chamber pots, and tossed marbles at the feet of police horses. While Mosley and his supporters were forced to retreat, fascism itself was at least temporarily on the ascendancy with the rise of Adolf Hitler in Germany and the onset of World War II. By 1945, however, the United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union, and other allied countries defeated fascist Germany, and Hitler committed suicide. Yet anti-fascist networks reemerged in the 1970s in response to a rise in neo-Nazi activity.

In the United States, Antifa supporters have been increasingly active in protests and rallies, especially ones that include far-right participants. Between 1987 and 2013, the Anti-Racist Action Network (ARA) was a decentralized network of anti-fascists in the United States. In the Seattle area, Antifa supporters established the Puget Sound John Brown Gun Club, which described itself as an anti-fascist, anti-racist, pro-worker community defense organization committed to active resistance to the corrosive and destructive social effects of white supremacy, sexism, bigotry, and economic exploitation.

The campaign and election of Donald Trump were a boon to many anti-fascists. As the Antifa-aligned journal, Its Going Down argued in December 2016, Suddenly, anarchists and antifa, who have been demonized and sidelined by the wider Left have been hearing from liberals and Leftists, youve been right all along. While Antifa remained decentralized, there were some local chapters, such as NYC Antifa and Anti-Fascist Sacramento.

During the 2020 riots following the death of George Floyd, there were also some reports of Antifa activity. In Newark, New Jersey, the FBI and Newark Police Department investigated possible Antifa activity and arrested an individual for possessing a knife, a hatchet, and a jar of gasoline with intent to use violence.1 In Austin, Texas, law enforcement officials reported that Antifa was involved in violent activity, including the looting of a Target store.2 There were also law enforcement reports of Antifa activity in other cities, such as Minneapolis, Minnesota; Spokane, Washington; and Portland, Oregon. The FBI nevertheless assessed that criminalsnot Antifa or other ideologically motivated individualsperpetrated the vast majority of looting and violence. Other law enforcement agencies came to a similar conclusion. We saw no organized effort of antifa here in Los Angeles, said Josh Rubenstein, the spokesman for the Los Angeles Police Department.

Today, Antifa supporters maintain that fascism remains alive and must be countered with force. Many believe that militant anti-fascism is a reasonable, historically informed response to the fascist threat that persisted after 1945 and that has become menacing in recent years. Yet Antifa is not a single-issue movement, and Antifa supporters do not simply oppose fascism. Anti-fascism, Mark Bray writes in his study of Antifa, is an illiberal politics of social revolutionism applied to fighting the Far Right, not only literal fascists. Antifa sympathizers focus on other issues, including environmental activism, anti-war mobilization, and anti-racism.

More broadly, Antifa is a decentralized movement of individuals whose ideological roots lie in various left-wing causes, such as communism, anarchism, and socialism. However, Antifa supporters do not necessarily share all aspects of these ideological inspirations. For example, though they may find common cause in opposing law enforcement or government action, Antifa adherents and anarchists often differ in their perceptions of state power. While anarchists are staunchly anti-statist, Antifa activists may support extensive reform of government institutions rather than their abolition.

While many Antifa sympathizers do not support violence as the onlyor even the maininstrument to oppose fascism, they do view violence as a legitimate option. As one article concluded, Antifa dont want the government to stop white supremacists from gathering. They want to do so themselves, rendering the government impotent. A Baltimore-based Antifa activist explained the use of violence as graduated:

You fight them by writing letters and making phone calls so you dont have to fight them with fists. You fight them with fists so you dont have to fight them with knives. You fight them with knives so you dont have to fight them with guns. You fight them with guns so you dont have to fight them with tanks.

Antifa has no central command, no definitive texts, and no clear command-and-control organizational structure. In 2020, FBI director Christopher Wray argued that Antifa is more of an ideology than an organization, though it would be more accurate to refer to Antifa supporters as adhering to multiple ideologies.

Most Antifa supporters operate in secrecy to protect themselves from law enforcement agencies and right-wing extremists, and Antifa cells exist across North America, Australia, Europeincluding the United Kingdom, Italy, and Germanyand other areas of the globe.

Antifa supporters conduct counter-protests to disrupt far-right gatherings and rallies. They sometimes organize in black blocsad hoc gatherings of individuals who wear black clothing, ski masks, scarves, sunglasses, and other material to conceal their facesuse improvised explosives and other homemade weapons, and resort to vandalism. In addition, Antifa members organize their activities through social media, encrypted peer-to-peer networks, and encrypted messaging services such as Signal. Antifa has also adopted anti-fascist symbols on their clothing, flags, and other paraphernalia, such as the two flags of the Antifaschistische Aktion and the three arrows of the Iron Front.

When Antifa adherents clash with far-right demonstrators, violence occasionally breaks out, often involving fistfights, knives, fireworks, Molotov cocktails, and other improvised weapons. In June 2016, for example, Antifa and other protesters confronted a neo-Nazi rally in Sacramento, California, resulting in a chaotic brawl in which at least eight people were injuredincluding five who were stabbed, among them Antifa activists. Similarly, in February, March, and April 2017, Antifa members fought alt-right demonstrators at the University of California, Berkeley, using bricks, pipes, hammers, and homemade incendiary devices. At the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in August 2017, Antifa activists confronted alt-right demonstrators with clubs, shields, fists, chemical irritants, and balloons filled with paint and ink.

Although Antifa extremists primarily use violence in the context of ideological clashes at demonstrationsmany of which do not match common definitions of terrorismsome have also taken independent action against government targets perceived as unjust. In July 2019, Willem Van Spronsen, a self-proclaimed Antifa supporter and member of the Puget Sound John Brown Gun Club, attacked a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention facility in Tacoma, Washington, with an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle and attempted to ignite a 500-gallon propane tank. The attack was unsuccessful, and he was killed by police. Van Spronsen had distributed a manifesto prior to the attack in which he detailed his opposition to ICE detention policies, and he became the subject of online propaganda that branded him a martyr.

According to CSIS data, the only fatal attack in recent decades attributed to an Antifa extremist occurred at a demonstration in Portland, Oregon, on August 29, 2020, when Michael Reinoehla self-identified Antifa supportershot and killed Aaron Jay Danielson, a member of the far-right group Patriot Prayer. Reinoehl was killed by law enforcement officers five days later.

As Antifa is a decentralized, shared ideology rather than a formal group or organized movement, it is difficult to predict the behavior of individual adherents. While most followers will likely continue to pursue only reactionary activitywhich most often results in spontaneous clashes at demonstrations rather than premeditated terrorist attacksthe potential for proactive attacks from radicalized individuals such as Van Spronsen may increase as political polarization in the United States worsens.

CSIS dataas well as recent threat assessments conducted by the FBI and Department of Homeland Security (DHS)indicate that Antifa poses a relatively small threat in the United States, particularly compared to violent white supremacists and anti-government extremists such as militia groups. However, CSIS data do indicate a recent increase in violent activity by Antifa extremists, anarchists, and related far-left extremists. This is likely connected to the concurrent increase in violent far-right activity, particularly from white supremacists and others whose ideology anti-fascists actively oppose. This trend indicates that while Antifa does not pose a large threat in isolation, its followers will likely become increasingly active if the real or perceived threat from white supremacists and other far-right domestic extremists continues to grow, as most do not trust the government to respond adequately. Additionally, if Antifa followers view conservative political groups as aligned with far-right extremism, they may act to disrupt mainstream political events and demonstrations as well.

Seth G. Jones is senior vice president and director of the International Security Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, D.C, and author most recently of Three Dangerous Men: Russia, China, Iran, and the Rise of Irregular Warfare (W.W. Norton). Catrina Doxsee is a program manager and research associate with the Transnational Threats Project at CSIS.

1 Author interview with law enforcement officials from Newark, NJ, June 2020.

2 Author interview with law enforcement officials from Austin, TX, July 2020.

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Examining Extremism: Antifa | Examining Extremism | CSIS

Miami Antifa is reportedly planning to counter-protest during an event focused on protecting children from sexualization featuring Moms for Liberty, Florida Fathers for Freedom, and Gays Against Groomers.

The Protect the Children Rally will take place in Fort Lauderdale on December 3. The event is described as a rally against radicalized sexual curriculum, gender ideology, child grooming, parental alienation, and gender affirming care.

Nearly every single one of us in our organization would have been led to believe we were born in the wrong body if we grew up today, and if our parents bought into the cult, would have been medically transed too, Gays for Groomers wrote on Twitter.

Its a horrific thought. We see ourselves in these children, it added:

Antifa Miami is outraged and is planning to counter-protest the individuals standing up against child grooming and sexualization.

Counter protest planned as well! South Florida dont like fascists, the group wrote, using the hashtags #FuckOffFascists, #WeAreEverywhere, and #Transtifa.

WE KEEP US SAFE, the flier reads. Assert your right to exist! Counter protest against far right bigotry and stand with the LGBTQ+ community.

The flier urges Antifa protesters to bring masks, signs and RAGE and to stand against those who aim to erase your existence:

It remains unclear why, exactly, Antifa Miami is openly protesting the protection of children, but it follows a long line of far-left attempts to insert inappropriate discussions on sexual orientation and gender identity into classrooms nationwide something the state of Florida specificallytook a stand against via the Parental Rights in Education law.

These leftist politicians, corporate media outlets, some of these activist groups, they actually have read the bill, and theyre sloganeering because they dont want to admit that they support a lot of the things were providing protections against, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) said during a press conference in March.

For example, they support sexualizing kids in kindergarten, he explained. They support injecting woke gender ideology into second grade classrooms. They support enabling schools to transition students to a different gender without the knowledge of the parent, much less with the parents consent.

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Miami Antifa to Protest 'Gays Against Groomers': 'Bring Masks, Signs ...

Lets file this one under This Would Not Have Happened Before Elon Musk.

Twitter has banned the account of CrimethInc, a far-leftist group known for inciting arson and other forms of political violence on the platform. The move comes after CEO Elon Musk began targeting users who call for violent aggression.

Andy Ngo, editor-at-large for the Post Millennial, tweeted:

Violent extremist #Antifa collective @crimethinc has been suspended at the moment. The international group operates like ISIS: makes propaganda & training material to radicalize militants toward violence. Though the main account was suspended, they operate a dozen other accounts

This move is part of Musks effort to reform Twitters content moderation policies. He previously indicated that removing child porn being disseminated on the platform is priority #1.

Incitement to violence will result in account suspension, the CEO said. Other accounts were suspended as a result.

In response, other Antifa-aligned groups threatened to carry out arson attacks on Tesla dealers.

The Post Millennial reported:

In 2021, CrimethInc ran a GoFundMe campaign that amassed thousands of dollars after its mail-order space where extremist texts were printed was destroyed in a fire in downtown Olympia, Washington.

CrimethInc became a prominent Antifa activist group in 2020 in the wake of the BLM riots, which caused upwards of 30 deaths, multiple injuries, and over 1 billion dollars in damage.

What are the odds that this would have happened under Twitters previous leadership? Sure, they were gung-ho about banning right-leaning groups. The companys censorship brigade saw fit to ban former President Donald Trump from the platform for supposedly inciting the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol building. But Antifa accounts, along with others that called for violence, were allowed to remain.

How curious.

The banning of CrimethInc is yet another indicator that under Musk, the companys policies will be applied consistently, regardless of politics. Political affiliation is not being considered as grounds for suspension or permanent bans, which is the way it should be.

This development is not going to win Musk more friends on the hard left, who overtly or covertly support left-wing violence. Indeed, one user complained that they have zero incentive to stick around when the ideology I center my whole being around had been silenced and encouraged people to switch to #Mastadon.

But it will be even more interesting when Twitters content moderation policy is applied equally even for lesser offenses. This is when leftists will truly feel the heat as they will no longer be able to engage in the type of content that would normally get a conservative censored. We can expect to see even more whining and caterwauling as the reality sets in that they will no longer enjoy the shielding that had under the pre-Musk era.

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Twitter Bans Violent Antifa-Aligned Group for Radicalizing Militants

Authored by Brad Jones via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Six of 11 alleged assailants connected with Antifa, a far-left extremist group, have taken plea deals and pled guilty to charges related to violent attacks on supporters of outgoing President Donald Trump at a Patriot March in San Diego shortly after the 2020 election.

Five defendants pled guilty on Nov. 18, just over a week after Erich Nikki Louis Yach was sentenced to four years and eight months in prison for his role in the violence near Crystal Pier in Pacific Beach on Jan. 9, 2021. Yach was the first of the 11 to be sentenced.

Yach earlier pled guilty to charges of conspiracy, assault, and the unlawful use of tear gas.

At his sentencing hearing, GG Hubbard, Yachs spouse, urged the court to send Yacha biological male who identifies as femaleto a womens prison. Yach has spent nearly the last two years in a mens prison and will be credited for time already served.

I want to make sure she gets put in the correct facility according to her gender, Hubbard told the court.

Hubbard claimed Yach is not violent and said incarceration in anything but a womens facility was violating the law and political and fascist nonsense.

San Diego County District Attorney Summer Stephan announced in June that a criminal grand jury had two weeks earlier delivered 29 indictments against all 11 defendants, including conspiracy to commit a riot, use of tear gas, assault with a deadly weapon, and assault by means likely to produce great bodily injury.

Antifa uses force, fear, and violence to further their interests and suppress the interests of others. The objective of this conspiracy was to incite and participate in a riot, the district attorneys office saidat the time.

The defendants named in the indictments are from Los Angeles and San Diego counties and are all affiliated with Antifa according to a statement from the district attorneys office last December. The named are Alexander Akridgejacobs, Jesse Merel Cannon, Brian Cortez Lightfoot Jr., Christian Martinez, Luis Francisco Mora, Samuel Howard Ogden, Bryan Rivera, Faraz Martin Talab, and Jeremy White.

Antifa supporters posted on social mediaon Jan. 2, 2021 calls for a counterprotest and direct action against Trump supporters, and then a week later gathered with other uncharged co-conspirators dressed in black garb with Antifa insignia to confront those participating in the Patriot March, the office stated.

According to the district attorneys office, such alleged action included assault, battery, assault with deadly weapons, arson, and vandalism.

Videos posted online showed one of the masked, black-clad protesters carrying an Antifascist Action banner and another with a sign saying No Nazis in PBa reference to Pacific Beachas the group of about 100 shouted Racists go home! at Trump supporters.

Antifa uses force, fear, and violence to further their interests and suppress the interests of others. The objective of this conspiracy was to incite and participate in a riot, the district attorneys office said.

The indictments accused the Antifa-affiliated group of planning the attacks and using a baseball bat, flagpole, stun gun, and tear gas on their victims. They were also accused of throwing a wooden lawn chair at a woman.

Prosecutors also allege some Antifa members in the crowd chased down several minors whom they thought were part of the Patriot March,sprayed them with mace, and pushed one to the ground. The victim was later transported to a hospital for treatment of a concussion.

Other victims included a journalist [taking] photos, a dog that was maced and a business that was also vandalized, prosecutors said.

The San Diego Police Department reported a total of 16 separate attacks on eight people.

The Antifa rioters allegedly threw eggs, rocks and bottles and sprayed mace at officers after police declared the dueling protests an unlawful assembly and tried to disperse the crowd.

All the defendants pleaded not guilty in June.

None of the Trump supporters or other bystanders were charged with any crimes.

Video evidence analysis shows that overwhelmingly the violence in this incident was perpetrated by the Antifa affiliates and was not a mutual fray with both sides crossing out of lawful First Amendment, the district attorneys office stated in June.

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Antifa Defendants Arrested In Attack On Trump Supporters Take Plea ...

WASHINGTON (AP) President Donald Trump portrays the hundreds of people arrested nationwide in protests against racial injustice as violent urban left-wing radicals. But an Associated Press review of thousands of pages of court documents tells a different story.

Very few of those charged appear to be affiliated with highly organized extremist groups, and many are young suburban adults from the very neighborhoods Trump vows to protect from the violence in his reelection push to win support from the suburbs.

Attorney General William Barr has urged his prosecutors to bring federal charges on protesters who cause violence and has suggested that rarely used sedition charges could apply. And the Department of Justice has pushed for detention even as prisons across the U.S. were releasing high-risk inmates because of COVID-19 and prosecutors had been told to consider the risks of incarceration during a pandemic when seeking detention.

Defense attorneys and civil rights activists are questioning why the Department of Justice has taken on cases to begin with. They say most belong in state court, where defendants typically get much lighter sentences. And they argue federal authorities appear to be cracking down on protesters in an effort to stymie demonstrations.

It is highly unusual, and without precedent in recent American history, said Ron Kuby, a longtime attorney who isnt involved in the cases but has represented scores of clients over the years in protest-related incidents. Almost all of the conduct thats being charged is conduct that, when it occurs, is prosecuted at the state and local level.

In one case in Utah, where a police car was burned, federal prosecutors had to defend why they were bringing arson charges in federal court. They said it was appropriate because the patrol car was used in interstate commerce.

Not to say there hasnt been violence. Other police cars have been set on fire. Officers have been injured and blinded. Windows have been smashed, stores looted, businesses destroyed.

Of more than 300 arrested, there are about 286 defendants, others had charges dropped. Some live in cities like Portland and Seattle where local prosecutors declined to bring some protest-related charges.

Some of those facing charges undoubtedly share far-left and anti-government views. Far-right protesters also have been arrested and charged. Some defendants have driven to protests from out of state. Some have criminal records and were illegally carrying weapons. Others are accused of using the protests as an opportunity to steal or create havoc.

But many have had no previous run-ins with the law and no apparent ties to antifa, the umbrella term for leftist militant groups that Trump has said he wants to declare a terrorist organization.

Even though most of the demonstrations have been peaceful, Trump has made law and order a major part of his reelection campaign, casting the protests as lawless and violent in mostly Democratic cities he says have done nothing to stymie the mayhem. If the cities refuse to properly clamp down, he says, the federal government has to step in.

I know about antifa, and I know about the radical left, and I know how violent they are and how vicious they are, and I know how they are burning down cities run by Democrats, Trump said at an NBC town hall.

In dozens of cases, the government has pushed to keep the protesters behind bars while they await their trials amid the COVID-19 pandemic, which has killed more than 220,000 people across the U.S. There have been more than 16,000 positive cases in the federal prison system, according to a tracker compiled by the AP and The Marshall Project.

In some cases, prosecutors have gone so far as appealing judges orders to release defendants. Pre-trial detention generally is reserved only for people who are clearly dangers to the community or a risk of fleeing.

In Texas, Magistrate Judge Andrew Austin repeatedly challenged the prosecutor to explain why Cyril Lartigue, who authorities say was caught on camera making a Molotov cocktail, should be behind bars while he awaits his trial. Lartigue, of Cedar Park, described his actions that night as a flash of stupidity, prosecutors said.

The 25-year-old lives with his parents in the Austin suburb and had never been in trouble with the law before and wasnt a member of a violent group.

The judge said there are lot of people who do something stupid thats dangerous that we dont even consider detaining.

Im frustrated because I dont think this is a hard case, the judge said. I have defendants in here with significant criminal histories that the government agrees to release.

We have no evidence of him at least thats been given to me being a radical or a member of a group that advocates violence toward the police or others. Weve got no criminal history. What evidence is there that hes a danger to society? the judge asked.

The judge allowed Lartigue to stay out of jail.

While some of the defendants clearly hold radical or anti-government beliefs, prosecutors have provided little evidence of any affiliations they have with organized extremist groups.

In one arrest in Erie, Pennsylvania, community members raised more than $2,500 to help with bail for a 29-year-old Black man who was arrested after they said white people had come from out of town and spray painted a parking lot.

In thousands of pages of court documents, the only apparent mention of antifa is in a Boston case in which authorities said a FBI Gang Task Force member was investigating suspected ANTIFA activity associated with the protests when a man fired at him and other officers. Authorities have not claimed that the man accused of firing the shots is a member of antifa.

Others have social media leftist ties; a Seattle man who expressed anarchist beliefs on social media is accused of sending a message through a Portland citizen communication portal threatening to blow up a police precinct.

Several of the defendants are not from the Democratic-led cities that Trump has likened to war zones but from the suburbs the Republican president has claimed to have saved. Of the 93 people arrested on federal criminal charges in Portland, 18 defendants are from out of state, the Justice Department said.

This has contributed to a blame game that has been a subplot throughout the protests. Leaders in Minneapolis and Detroit have decried people from out of state and suburbanites for coming into their cities and causing havoc. Trump in turn has blamed the cities for not doing their part.

Dont come down to Detroit and tear the city up and then go back home. Thats putting another knee on the neck of Black folk because we got to live here, the Rev. Wendell Anthony of the NAACP said in May.

More than 40% of those facing federal charges are white. At least a third are Black, and about 6% Hispanic. More than two-thirds are under the age of 30 and most are men. More than a quarter have been charged with arson, which if convicted means a five-year minimum prison sentence. More than a dozen are accused of civil disorder, and others are charged with burglary and failing to comply with a federal order. They were arrested in cities across the U.S., from Portland, Oregon, to Minneapolis, Boston and New York.

Attorneys for those facing federal charges either declined to comment or didnt respond to messages from the AP.

Brian Bartels, a 20-year-old suburban Pittsburgh man who is described by prosecutors as a self-identified left-wing anarchist, was flanked by his parents when he turned himself in to authorities. Bartels, who lives at his parents house, spray painted an A on a police cruiser before jumping on top of it and smashing its windshield during a protest in the city, prosecutors said. He pleaded guilty in September.

One defendant who was arrested during a protest in the central Massachusetts city of Worcester told authorities he was with the anarchist group. Vincent Eovacious, 18, who is accused of possessing several Molotov cocktails, told authorities that he had been waiting for an opportunity, according to court documents.

But tucked into the protest-related cases are accusations of far-right extremism and racism as well.

John Malcolm Bareswill, angry that a local Black church held a prayer vigil for George Floyd, called the church and threatened to burn it to the ground, using racial slurs in a phone call overheard by children, prosecutors said. Bareswill, 63, of Virginia Beach, faces 10 years in prison after pleading guilty to making a telephonic threat.

Two Missouri militia members who authorities say traveled to Kenosha, Wisconsin, to see Trumps visit in the wake of the police shooting of Jacob Blake were arrested at a hotel in September with a cache of guns, according to court documents. An attorney for one of the men, Michael Karmo, said he is charged criminally for conduct that many Americans would consider patriotic, as authorities have alleged his motive was to assist overwhelmed law enforcement.

Three of the men arrested are far-right extremists, members of the Boogaloo movement plotting to overthrow the government and had been stockpiling military-grade weapons and hunting around for the right public event to unleash violence for weeks before Floyds death, according to court documents.

After aborting a mission related to reopening businesses in Nevada as the coronavirus pandemic raged, they settled on a Floyd-related protest led by Black Lives Matter. Angry it had not turned violent, they brought carloads of explosives, military-grade weapons, to a meet-up about 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) from the protest site and pumped gasoline into tanks. FBI agents arrested them before they could act, according to a criminal complaint.

FBI Director Christopher Wray recently told a congressional panel that extremists driven by white supremacist or anti-government ideologies have been responsible for most deadly attacks in the U.S. over the past few years. He said that antifa is more of an ideology or a movement than an organization, though the FBI has terrorism investigations of violent anarchist extremists, any number of whom self identify with the antifa movement.

But the handling of the federal protest cases is vastly different from other recent times of unrest.

Look at Travyon (Martin) verdicts, Eric Garner verdicts, Kuby said, talking about high-profile cases in which Black people were killed but no charges were filed.

There was a tremendous amount of anger and unrest and activity that was objectively unlawful, he said. There were objections about law enforcement being militarized, but you didnt see following the quelling of those demonstrations any significant federal law enforcement involvement.

____

Richer reported from Boston.

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AP finds most arrested in protests aren't leftist radicals

Twitter owner Elon Musk started laying off employees on Friday, one of whom, ex-Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) manager Eric Shamow from Portland, Oregon, attended the violent Black Lives Matter and Antifa riots of 2020 and used the social media platform to spread misinformation pushed by far-left Portland City Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty, which blamed police for the disastrous riots.

The Post Millennial Editor-at-Large Andy Ngo tweeted, "One of the armed participants of the 2020 BLM-Antifa riots in #Portland was let go in the #TwitterLayoffs. Ex-SRE manager Eric Shamow was at the riots & used Twitter to spread fake conspiracy theory peddled by @JoAnnPDX that police were the ones behind rioting."

As The Post Millennial reported in 2020, Jo Ann Hardesty accused the police of sending in "saboteurs" amid the riots to exacerbate the conflict between cops and Antifa as Portland was at the epicenter of the 2020 BLM riots. Portland saw over 100 nights of violent protests and riots that summer, where much of the aggression was pointed at law enforcement officers. Buildings were torched, projectiles thrown, and windows broken.

Now former Twitter employee Shamow used his platform to advance Hardesty's claim. While Shamow's profile is now private, in screengrabs Ngo preserved his comments from 2020, some of which read, "The cops are not showing restraint on a nightly basis. I'm not down there tonight, but I've watched them brutalize folks on a regular basis who are causing no harm and pose no threat. Be clear: this is a police riot."

"We carry shields because you brutalize civilians and commit war crimes on our streets. @tedwheeler: resign, and take your PPB trash out with you," he also tweeted.

After getting fired he tweeted, "Locked out of Gmail and Slack, so while I don't have a letter in hand, I'm going with, 'that's all folks.' This job had the greatest density of quality humans, and world class engineers, I've ever seen. I'll be forever grateful for all of them."

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Revealed: Laid-off Twitter employee attended Antifa Portland riots ...

Masked Antifa members armed with AR-15 rifles and handguns showed up to guard what was billed as a kid-friendly drag show at a North Texas distillery. Reports indicate the show contained partial nudity and sexualized minors.

BlazeTV producer Kris Cruz tweeted photos of a group of mask-wearing Antifa members standing guard with AR-15 rifles at a kid-friendly drag sow in Roanoke, Texas. Cruz reported at least nine of the members carrying AR-15s.

Cruz and BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales tweeted photos showing alleged Antifa members posted in sniper positions near the events location.

The Anderson Distillery and Grill hosted a Barrel Babes Drag Brunch on Sunday afternoon, according to their Facebook post.

Anderson Distillery and Grill via Facebook

Sara Gonzales and journalist Tayler Hansen tweeted a video from the event showing the drag show taking place in the presence of more than 20 very young children.

Independent journalist Andy Ngo tweeted a report stating the Armed Antifa members are part of the local chapter of the John Brown Gun Club. He identified the group as an Antifa militia linked to domestic terrorism.

The gun club mobilized in response to a call from Protect Texas Kids to hold a pop-up protest outside the distillery, the Post Millennial reported.

One woman driving away from the event began arguing with the protesters. She bared her breasts while driving away from the family-friendly event, Sara Gonzales tweeted.

Local police allegedly did not respond to calls for assistance from protesters, the news outlet reported.

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Antifa Armed with AR-15s Guard 'Kid Friendly' Drag Show in Texas

An Ottawa judge has dismissed a case against journalists Jonathan Kay and Barbara Kay, which accused them of libel. The case was brought forth by the Canadian Anti-Hate Network (CAHN), which had previously received government funding for its programs.

The suit was brought forth by Richard Warman, a board member of the group, in 2019. According to Jonathan kay, Warman had claimed that the two defendants linked the organization to Antifa.

In photos of the court ruling posted to Twitter, the judge concluded that "the evidence disclosed that CAHN did in fact assist Antifa and that movement has been violent."

"The Kays submission, which I accept, is that a human rights network like CAHN arguably (except in the most extreme circumstances) should not support a violent movement, and to do so, to most reasonable overseers, would not be a "good look."

"While Warman is well know as a righteous crusader against white supremacy and right-wing racist hate and has been recognized and appropriately lauded for his work, he is also a controversial figure and I accept the evidence of the Kays that he has used litigation to silence or intimidate those he sees as his critics, or who oppose his methods of prosecuting hate groups," the court document later added.

"My clients are obviously very happy with the judgement," attorney for Jonathan and Barbara Kay told The Post Millennial. "The Court agreed that the tweets in question by Jonathan Kay and Barbara Kay did not refer to Mr. Warman at all. His Honour also found that the tweets were protected by the defences of fair comment and justification in any event. Overall, this is an important victory for free expression."

Jonathan Kay said that "litigating this to a conclusion was expensive and time-consuming," adding that he felt it was important because the organization was previously a government grant recipient, noting that the "same 'anti-racism program used to cash out Laith Marouf."

On its website, CAHN states that it was "previously the recipient of a grant from theAnti-Racism Action Program. That grant period ended in March 2022. The Canadian Anti-Hate Network is not currently receiving any government funds."

This same program had funded Canadian Heritage, where Marouf had been a senior consultant and made numerous anti-semitic statements on social media.

Recounting the trial itself, Jonathan Kay said it was "surreal," and featured "such bizarre claims as that I was 'malicious to human rights.'" During the trial, he said that "I was required to explain the plot of the Seinfeld episode that's at the root of 'Del Boca' Bernie Farber's nickname."

Jonathan Kay also noted that The Post Millennial editor-at-large Andy Ngo "played a cameo role. What happened to him is basically Exhibit A in what antifa is all about. (That's why, even here in Canada, so many people have Ngo Derangement Syndrome: The act of beating him up was pretty much the death knell on the groups legitimacy)."

"Jonathan referred to a CAHN article by the CEO Balgord dated September 20, 2017, as an apologist tract for Antifa, describing the need for 'physical disruption to get their message across," the court document stated.

"A Quillette article (Jonathan was an editor) about Columbias Journalism dated June 18, 2019, described Antifa as violent and advocating to effect change. The article described what happened to Andy Ngo, a friend of Jonathans, who was a 52" gay Vietnamese conservative journalist covering Antifa activity in Portland Oregon when he was badly beaten by Antifa members, described by Jonathan as 'thugs," the document continued.

"Jonathan described numerous instances where Antifa used intimidation, violence and generally mimicked fascist group activities in Portland, Oregon, and Hamilton Ontario and, for example, screamed at an elderly woman at a town hall event in October 2019, where they tried to block a speaker, Maxime Bernier, and called her 'Nazi scum,'" it added.

In response to the judges ruling, Barbara Kay wrote on Twitter: "This started three years ago, almost to the day!! Mills of justice grind slowly and all that, but (not always the case) they also ground fine. Our lawyer @Honickman was magnificent. Can't praise him highly enough. The judge was great too, & btw I thought that before the judgment."

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Journalists win legal battle against Antifa-linked Canadian Anti-Hate ...