What is Antifa and why is the President targeting it?

[Buster's Uncle]

What is Antifa and why is President [Sleezebag] targeting it?
Shayan Sardarizadeh & Kayleen Devlin - BBC Verify
BBC
Mon, September 22, 2025 at 7:56 PM EDT·6 min read



[Getty Images]


US President Donald [Sleezebag] has said signed an executive order designating Antifa as a "domestic terrorist organisation".

He has accused the group of recruiting, training and radicalising young Americans to engage in political violence.

Antifa - a loosely organised, leftist movement that opposes far-right, racist and fascist groups - has long attracted [Sleezebag]'s ire.

But experts have questioned how the president will actually target the group, which lacks a distinct leader, membership list or structure. In 2020, then-FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress that Antifa was better defined as an ideology than as a formal organisation.

Antifa has remained a popular touchstone for some right-wing influencers and politicians who argue that it is a key component of a left-wing network they claim is seeking to undermine the US, free speech and gun rights.


What does Antifa stand for?

Antifa is short for anti-fascist. It is a loose, leaderless affiliation of mostly far-left activists.

The word Antifa comes from the German word "antifaschistisch", a reference to a German anti-fascist group from the 1930s.



A logo featuring black and red flags is widely associated with Antifa [Getty Images]


While Antifa's existence in the US dates back decades, it rose to prominence following [Sleezebag]'s first election victory in 2016 and the far-right rally in Charlottesville in 2017, where various anti-fascist groups started to come together.

Since then, activists identifying with Antifa have routinely clashed with right-wing groups, both in heated arguments online and also in physical altercations across the US.

The lack of a centralised organisation means that Antifa cells tend to form organically, both online and offline, and its activists include anarchists, communists and hardline socialists who broadly share anti-government, anti-capitalist, pro-LGBTQ, and pro-immigration views.

But Antifa is sometimes used as a catch-all term by conservative politicians and commentators to include other liberal and left-wing groups that they politically object to.


Does Antifa engage in violence?

Critics say what sets Antifa apart from mainstream left-wing groups is the willingness of some of its activists to use violence to further their cause, which they in turn claim is in self-defence.

Activists often dress in dark clothing and cover their faces in public. Online videos viewed by the BBC show some carrying clubs, shields, sticks and pepper spray in rallies.

In 2017, around 100 masked activists carrying Antifa-linked signs and flags attacked a group of right-wing protesters in Berkeley, California, resulting in multiple arrests.

During the unrest that erupted in the US after the killing of George Floyd in 2020, a self-proclaimed Antifa activist, 48-year-old Michael Reinoehl, shot and killed a supporter of Patriot Prayer, a Portland-area far-right group. Reinoehl was subsequently shot dead by police.


http://Black-clad anti-fascist activists at protests in Berkeley, California [Getty Images]


Anti-fascist activists also regularly release the identities and personal details of those that they deem to be far-right activists. The tactic - commonly known as "doxxing" - aims to have people dismissed from their jobs and otherwise socially ostracised.

In the wake of Charlie Kirk's killing, BBC Verify has seen messages from some self-identified Antifa members - on Reddit and X - defending the shooting.


Does [Sleezebag] have the legal power to designate Antifa a terrorist organisation?

The US government can designate a group as a Foreign Terror Organization (FTO) - the "legal criteria" for this states that the targeted group "must be a foreign organization".

The State Department lists current FTOs, which include branches of ISIS and, increasingly, drug cartels from Latin America.

An FTO designation means members of a group can be banned from the US or removed from the country and gives the government the power to seize funding and target donors.

But it is unclear how these powers could be extended to Antifa.

[Sleezebag]'s executive order directs "all executive departments and agencies... to investigate, disrupt and dismantle any and all illegal operations... conducted by Antifa" or by its supporters.

We have asked the White House what this means in practice.

"There is no legal mechanism I'm aware of that would formally establish any group as a domestic terror organisation", Luke Baumgartner, a research fellow at George Washington University's Program on Extremism, told us before [Sleezebag] announced his executive order.

Other legal experts who spoke to BBC Verify pointed out that free speech rights under the First Amendment to the US constitution could see [Sleezebag]'s efforts challenged.



Members of the Proud Boys and Antifa clash in Portland, Oregon [Getty Images]


Professor David Schanzer, director of the Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security at Duke University, said: "The First Amendment protects the right of association, which encompasses the right of individuals to form groups and prohibits the government from interfering with the operations of those groups, unless of course, they have violated the law."

"The president's designation of such a group as a 'major terrorist organisation' does not change those fundamental constitutional rights," he added.

Brad Evans - professor of political violence at Bath University - warned that Antifa's lack of an organisational structure and membership "offers a remarkable opportunity to extend the [government's] remit and apply it to anybody who may be assumed to belong to an organisation that is ill-defined".

"This means that anybody suspected of belonging to Antifa, would need to disprove their association. The dangers of overreach are all too apparent."

Other legal experts have questioned why the [Sleezebag] administration cannot challenge Antifa under existing legislation tackling crimes like incitement to violence.


Why is the [Sleezebag] administration targeting Antifa?

This is not the first time that [Sleezebag] has targeted Antifa - he said he would declare the group a terrorist organisation in 2020 but did not follow through on this at the time.

His latest intervention comes as part of a wider campaign against the "radical left" following the Charlie Kirk killing.

The authorities have said that Tyler Robinson - who is accused of Kirk's murder - had a "leftist ideology" but have not provided much detail and he has not been directly linked to Antifa.


What do studies say about political violence in the US?

In a speech following the fatal shooting, President [Sleezebag] declared: "Radical left political violence has hurt too many innocent people and taken too many lives."

The US Department of Justice (DoJ) removed a study into political violence in America which concluded that far-right extremism outpaced "all other types of violent extremism".

The BBC asked the DoJ why the study, published in 2024 by the department's research agency, had been removed. It said it had "no comment".

BBC Verify has reviewed five independent studies that have looked into politically motivated attacks in the US going back decades, all of which suggest there have been more cases of political violence in the US committed by people assigned a right-wing ideology by researchers than a left-wing one.

However, as there is no consistent or universal definition of "right" or "left" ideology, it is difficult to measure trends in political violence over time.

Professor Robert Pape, from the University of Chicago said that recent years have seen "historic highs in political assassinations and assassination attempts" - with both Republican and Democratic politicians targeted.

"What we see in our data on what happens when a political leader blames one side for the violence is it produces more support for political violence, not less," he added.

Additional reporting by Mike Wendling, Matt Murphy and Lucy Gilder

https://news.yahoo.com/news/articles/antifa-why-president-[Sleezebag]-targeting-172943092.html

[Rusty Edge]

Nice article.

On one hand, Antifa is just an angry unorganized political movement that mostly acts out through graffiti and other acts of vandalism...
Yet, it manages to annoy [Sleezebag] with its acts of defiance, much like comedians.

On the other hand, anything that makes a "strong man " look petty, weak, or evil fells like a threat to him.... OR an opportunity to seize more power and crack down.

[Buster's Uncle]

...I concluded, like, a decade ago that Antifa is a bad idea.  Appealing as the notion of punching out Nazis is, giving them any excuse to prepare for violence is just feeding water into their mill.  It's not going to end well - sorry, Captain America.

They certainly have my sympathy, though...

[Green1]

I have had dealings with Antifa.

On the surface, their ideology seems like something someone can get behind. Who isn't against fascism in general except fascists themselves? There are also very unjust and angering things in the world. My state, Louisiana imprisons vast numbers of it's population. And -obias, ists, and isms are real. I mean, only a religious zealot would want harm to gays or random unarmed black people. I mean, that's just being a decent human being.

And they preach inclusivity. Even a purpose.

But it's hijacked by extremely wealthy people that use pawns to get beaten, caged, and smeared with criminal recorsd while they make upper middle class and upper class lifestyles unharmed off fundraising, which 80 percent goes to the fundraiser.

But they are NOT inclusive. They are classist as hell.

They go full steam on full ID politics. And if you are not one of them or one of the groups they claim to be out there for, any struggles you have are your fault because of some perceived privilege.

And many of these guys are hardcore and very well off. Like being able to take off work to the outrage of that month may be across a continent. Incuding hotels, and black bloc gear, and a position in life where arrests and criminal records won't destroy you. Be it some poor soul being killed by some roided up cop with an attitude, a pipeline going somewhere, or anything LGBT.

Back during Occupy, I went up to see them. I even helped write real survival sections for Stealthiswiki, a survival wik that was supported by Corey Doctorow. Occupy was the prototype for Antifa. What I found was people that traveled event to event to network and go on action adventure vacations.

What did they gripe about? The 1 percent? people screwing people over? No. All these darn homeless in the park. The homeless were destroying the networking and "revolutionary" vibe. But wasn't antifa supposed to be about SUPPORTING the less fortunate and their causes? No. It is about recruiting more like them to use as pawns. and poor folks don't have money for donations and probably deserve it.

When I tried to mention that it probably was NOT in best interest for someone struggling to be going around large crowds of angry people and cause legal issues they can't afford, was attacked and ridiculed. Some of these folks are evil people and have no problem calling your employer, showing up to your house, and causing issues because you disagreed. And they say they are antifascist? Sounds pretty fascist to me. Right up there with HOAs, many cults, and the fascists themselves.

If you have a chance for a deeper dive, look at Crimethinc. Crimethinc is a famous zine and book seller that sells many books that are considered required reading in those circles. One book is named Work. And for the first 3/4s of the book it talks real stuff. About the unfairness of the system in detail. A great sell. But their solution is you getting up dressed like a budget Walmart ninja and getting tear gassed, arrested, trampled, and possibly being beat up while they sit in their mansions in Atlanta.

president will have issues enforcing this too. Antifa is not one org. It's decentralized and a broad umbrella. Antifa does not have an office or real leaders.

[Buster's Uncle]

...And almost none of that relates to why I concluded it was a bad idea - but yeah; a violent movement is naturally gonna have a thug problem, and with no organization attached, nothing to do about it...

[Elok]

This is an extreme case, but the basic problem is quite common. Anyone who has spent time in left-wing activist spaces, for example, knows that Antifa is not really a movement, much less an organization. It’s just a general term adopted by young men who have a somewhat excessive appetite for violence, and yet don’t want to be mistaken for mere hooligans or thugs. So they adopt the more high-brow goal of “fighting fascism” and gravitate to the left. Talk to any of them for a while and it’s pretty easy to tell which end is the cart and which is the horse. And yet many people on the left find these guys sometimes useful to have around, and so are willing to overlook this aspect of their motivation.

From https://josephheath.substack.com/p/some-thoughts-on-violence which I got from Agathon on Poly, of all people.  I spent a couple of hours the other day just going through this guy's blog and furiously agreeing with him about a lot of things, even though he's an avowed leftist.  It was actually a kind of uplifting experience, and made me feel oddly hopeful about politics.

[Ordnael]

I dislike hooligans in all their forms. ANTIFA are very violent hooligans. It's one of the very few "dictats" from Donnie I can get behind. Even in sunny Portugal, from where I hail, these guys resort to violence, hooliganism and general vandalism...so yeah criminals in the making with career criminals in the mix.

[Buster's Uncle]

 

[Ordnael]