Trump signs order designating Antifa domestic terrorist organization

WASHINGTON

US President Donald Trump signed an executive order Monday designating the Antifa movement as a domestic terrorist organization.

The order designates the movement as "a militarist, anarchist enterprise that explicitly calls for the overthrow of the United States Government, law enforcement authorities, and our system of law." It describes Antifa as an "organized effort designed to achieve policy objectives by coercion and intimidation is domestic terrorism."

It is unclear what legal framework the president is using to make the declaration, as there is no statute under US law for designating domestic terror groups.

Antifa, short for anti-fascist, is a left-wing political culture more than an organization with a fixed leadership and members.

"We look at Antifa as more of an ideology or a movement than an organization," former FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress in 2020.

Trump announced via a social media post last Wednesday that he intended to blacklist Antifa, calling it "a sick, dangerous, radical left disaster," and vowing that it will be "thoroughly investigated."

"I will also be strongly recommending that those funding ANTIFA be thoroughly investigated in accordance with the highest legal standards and practices," he wrote on his Truth Social platform.

Following the killing of far-right activist Charlie Kirk earlier this month, the White House vowed to step up its targeting of left-wing groups, accusing them of being behind the killing, as well as most other political violence.

Trump’s critics have pointed out that no motive has been announced for Kirk’s killing, and no groups have been implicated. They also cite numerous studies saying that right-wing groups and actors are responsible for most of the violent political acts committed in the US.

The White House issued a statement in which it accused Antifa of being behind 11 violent acts over the course of the past eight years.

They include shooting an immigration enforcement officer in July, and a 2017 incident in which "Antifa radicals threw rocks at police and attacked the attendees of several conservative political events at the University of California, Berkeley."