XPost: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, alt.atheism, talk.politics.guns   
   XPost: talk.politics.misc   
   From: nowomr@protonmail.com   
      
   By Eric Tucker, Associated Press   
    A Look at the movement Trump is blaming for violence at protests   
      
      
   WASHINGTON (AP) Disgraced President Donald Trump has blamed antifa   
   activists for violence at protests over police killings of black people,   
   but antifa isn’t an organization and targeting it isn’t simple. What is   
   antifa?   
      
   Short for “anti-fascists,” antifa is not a single organization but rather   
   an umbrella term for far-left-leaning movements that confront or resist   
   neo-Nazis and white supremacists at demonstrations.   
      
   There is no hierarchical structure to antifa or universal set of tactics   
   that makes its presence immediately recognizable, though members tend to   
   espouse revolutionary and anti-authoritarian views, said Mark Bray, a   
   historian at Rutgers University and author of “Antifa: The Anti-Fascist   
   Handbook.”   
      
   “They do different things at different times in different ways, some of   
   which there is evidence of them breaking the law. Other times there is   
   not,” Bray said.   
      
   Literature from the antifa movement encourages followers to monitor the   
   activities of white supremacist groups, publicize the personal information   
   of perceived enemies, develop self-defense training regimens and compel   
   outside organizations to cancel any speakers or events with “a fascist   
   bent,” according to a 2018 Congressional Research Service report.   
      
   People associated with antifa have been present for significant   
   demonstrations and counterdemonstrations over the last three years,   
   sometimes involving brawls and property damage.   
      
   They mobilized against a white supremacist march in Charlottesville,   
   Virginia, in August 2017 and have clashed repeatedly with far-right groups   
   in Portland, Oregon, including at a rally last summer that resulted in   
   arrests and the seizure of shields, poles and other weapons. What role is   
   antifa playing in these demonstrations?   
      
   Trump and members of his administration have singled out antifa as being   
   responsible for the violence at protests triggered by the killing of   
   George Floyd, a black man who died after a white Minneapolis police   
   officer pressed his knee into his neck for several minutes even after   
   Floyd stopped moving and pleading for air.   
      
   In a pair of statements over the weekend, Attorney General William Barr   
   described “antifa-like tactics” by out-of-state agitators and said antifa   
   was instigating violence and engaging in “domestic terrorism” and would be   
   dealt with accordingly.   
      
   White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany told reporters Monday that   
   antifa is a “big element of this protest,” though deferred to the Justice   
   Department on the question of how one could be identified as a member.   
      
   But it’s unclear how big its involvement is.   
      
   Bray said that although he believes people associated with antifa are   
   participating in the demonstrations, it is difficult to determine how big   
   of a role they’re playing since there is no membership uniform or calling   
   card and since the movement lacks the numbers to mobilize nationwide in   
   such a dramatic, forceful way.   
      
   “The radical left is much bigger than antifa, much, much bigger, and the   
   number of people who are participating in the property destruction are   
   much, much bigger than the radical left,” Bray said.   
      
   Others have seen evidence of right-wing extremists.   
   What does the Trump administration want to do about antifa?   
      
   Trump tweeted Sunday, “The United States of America will be designating   
   ANTIFA as a Terrorist Organization.”   
      
   It’s not the first time he’s endorsed that approach. Trump tweeted a   
   similar sentiment last summer, joining some Republican lawmakers who   
   called for antifa to be designated as a terror organization following the   
   skirmishes in Portland.   
      
      
   For one thing, antifa is not a discrete or centralized group, so it’s   
   unclear how the government could give it a designation.   
      
   Beyond that, though, antifa is a domestic entity and, as such, not a   
   candidate for inclusion on the State Department’s list of foreign terror   
   organizations. Those groups, which include Islamic extremist organizations   
   and the Real Irish Republican Army, are based overseas rather than in the   
   U.S.   
      
   That designation matters for a variety of legal reasons, not least of   
   which anyone in the United States who lends support to an organization on   
   that list can face terrorism-related charges.   
      
   But “there is not a domestic equivalent,” said Joshua Geltzer, a former   
   senior counterterrorism official in the Obama White House and founding   
   executive director at the Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and   
   Protection at the Georgetown University Law Center.   
      
   There have been periodic calls, particularly after mass shootings by white   
   supremacists, to establish a domestic terrorism law, but none has passed.   
      
   Asked Monday what legal authority the president would have for labeling   
   antifa a terror organization, McEnany pointed to the existing statute   
   under the U.S. criminal code that defines acts of domestic and   
   international terrorism.   
      
   But defining an act of terrorism is different than designating an entire   
   group as a terror organization.   
      
   “U.S. law does the 1st. It doesn’t permit the 2nd,” Geltzer tweeted after   
   McEnany’s remarks.   
      
   Even if antifa is not a designated terror organization, FBI Director Chris   
   Wray has made clear that it’s on the radar of federal law enforcement. He   
   has said that while the FBI does not investigate on the basis of ideology,   
   agents have pursued investigations across the country against people   
   motivated to commit acts of violence “on kind of an antifa ideology.”   
      
   Associated Press writers Gillian Flaccus in Portland, Ore., and Aamer   
   Madhani in Washington contributed to this report.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)