Category Archives: Antifa

Reports have surfaced Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Bakersfield, privately urged President Donald Trump Monday to recognize President-elect Joe Biden won the election and accept that the rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol last week were Trump supporters, not members of the leftist group Antifa.

Together with an account Tuesday that McCarthy has floated the idea of asking the president to step down, the anonymously sourced reports suggest the House minority leader's famed loyalty to the president may have diminished in the aftermath of the deadly riot.

The online news service Axios reported McCarthy rebuked Trump on Monday in a "tense, 30-minute-plus call," at one point interrupting a presidential rant about election fraud to say, "Stop it. It's over. The election is over."

The Axios report, citing two unnamed sources including one at the White House, said McCarthy countered the president's insistence "Antifa people" were responsible for Wednesday's riot, in which a Capital Police officer was killed along with four others as a large crowd forced its way into and vandalized the halls of Congress.

"It's not Antifa, it's MAGA," McCarthy was quoted as saying, using the acronym for the president's call to "Make America Great Again."

"I know," McCarthy reportedly continued, "I was there."

McCarthy and his aides did not respond to requests for comment Tuesday. Neither did the White House.

The reported exchanges may mean that, behind the congressman's public and politically costly support for Trump, the congressman is privately pushing the president to meet the national crisis in part by dropping some of his more contentious claims.

McCarthy has twice recounted recent phone conversations with the president in which the congressman said he called for urgent action.

The first was around Christmas when, McCarthy told The Californian, he spent days trying to persuade the president to sign a bill extending federal unemployment benefits and offering individuals a $600 stimulus check. Trump was initially against it but ultimately signed the bill.

The other instance McCarthy recalled was during the riot, when he told CBS News he had asked the president "to talk to the nation to tell them to stop this."

One implication is that McCarthy has exceptional access to the president. By contrast, The New York Times reported Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky another Republican leader in Congresshas not spoken with Trump since mid-December.

McCarthy has said the Central Valley benefits from his close relationship with Trump. But there has been a political price to pay: Since the riot, which was followed hours later by McCarthy voting against certifying the results of the Electoral College, at least four members of the House have called for the congressman to resign.

Publicly, McCarthy has called the riot "unacceptable, undemocratic and unAmerican." Speaking on the floor of the House after the riot, he said members of Congress should work to solve the nation's problems through debate and to unite in "condemning the mob together."

Recent news reports raise questions about McCarthy's loyalty to Trump.

The Timesreported McCarthy had asked fellow Republicans whether he should call on the president to resign in the aftermath of the riot.

The Times, citing three unidentified Republican officials briefed on the conversations, added that McCarthy and other party leaders have opted not to lobby fellow Republicans to vote against impeaching the president, even as the minority leader publicly opposes such a move.

Axios reported that during Monday's call with the president McCarthy specifically recommended Trump call and even meet with Biden, thereby following tradition, then leave a welcome letter for the president-elect on the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office of the White House. Trump indicated he had not decided whether to leave such a letter, Axios wrote.

Trump said at a rally shortly before last week's riot he would "never concede" the election. The next day White House Deputy Chief of Staff Dan Scavino posted on Twitter there will be an "orderly transition" at Biden's inauguration Jan. 20.

Several news organizations have reported McCarthy told House Republicans in a conference call Monday the president had acknowledged some responsibility for the riot.

Follow John Cox on Twitter: @TheThirdGraf

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Reports: McCarthy rebuked Trump over Antifa, election claims - The Bakersfield Californian

QAnon is a pro-Trump conspiracy theory. Believers think that Donald Trump is fighting against Satan worshipping pedophiles who control all aspects of life, such as the media. Many of those who invaded the U.S. Capitol were believers in QAnon, such as Ashley Babbitt.

How did it start?

An anonymous user by the name of Q posted messages on a 4chan message board. The user claimed to have Q level security clearance at the U.S. government. The user would continue posting and gained a following of thousands.

Followers believe that Q intentionally posts some false information, which makes it harder to disprove QAnons ideologies to its supporters.

Impacts of QAnon:

Ashli Babbitt, a supposed follower of QAnon, attempted to break into the Capitol building and was shot and killed.

QAnon believers have made threats, attacked public figures, and obstructed public areas while heavily armed. Eric Trump, Donald Trumps son, reposted a QAnon meme, and Donald Trump retweeted supporters of QAnon. Donald Trump seemingly endorsing QAnon affects peoples support of the theory.

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Scot Scoop News | ScotSkim: Ashli Babbitt, QAnon, and Antifa - Scot Scoop News

While publicly condemning the violence at the U.S. Capitol, Virginia Republican Party Chair Rich Anderson claimed on social media Thursday there is anecdotal evidence that antifa helped storm the Capitol building, despite law-enforcements assertions there is no evidence they played a role in the attack.

U.S. Department of Justice officialstold reporterson Friday that there isno indicationthat anti-fascist activists were involved in the Capitol attack that left five dead, including a Capitol police officer.

Anderson, a former Woodbridge-area state delegate, said in a private group Facebook post Thursday that he was informed by people present during the attack that the group leading the charge in the Capitol building used the signature tactics of antifa and other leftist groups.

Last night and this morning, I spoke to Virginia Republicans who were present on Capitol Hill on Wednesday and who personally witnessed the group that led the penetration of the U.S. Capitol, Anderson wrote. ... According to these eyewitness accounts from who I know and trust, this group appeared to employ the signature strategies of antifa and other leftist groups.

In the post, Anderson also expressed his strong support for President Donald Trump and for the thousands who rallied peacefully on Wednesday. I worked my fingers to the bone on [Trumps] behalf, first as a member of the General Assembly and then as chairman of the Republican Party of Virginia, he wrote.

Anderson declined to answer questions about the social media post Friday but noted that he believes the full picture of what transpired on Capitol Hill is still taking shape.

Investigations in the coming days will look into fixing responsibility and pursuing follow-on prosecutions of violent actors, Anderson said in an email.

Numerous livestreamed videos and photos showed thousands of pro-Trump supporters attacking and breaching the Capitol building on Wednesday. The attackers were caught on videosmashing windows,fightingwith police officers and trashing the offices of elected officials.

A Capitol police officer, Brian Sicknick, 42, of Springfield, was killed inside the building after reportedly being bludgeoned with a fire extinguisher. A woman trying to force her way through a broken window inside the building was shot and killed by Capitol police. Three others involved in the attack died after experiencing medical emergencies, according to law enforcement.

In apublic statementWednesday, Anderson condemned in the strongest possible terms the violence that occurred on Wednesday.

They neither represent nor speak for the Republican Party of Virginia, our fellow citizens, or any civilized people. They do not reflect our views, our values, or the Republican Creed. I and Virginia Republicans across our great commonwealth condemn these despicable acts without reservation or hesitation, Andersons statement said.

But Anderson said on Friday that he would not be commenting on the attack on the Capitol for the foreseeable future.

I think its time for all parties to tame their tongues, lower the temperature, and let healing begin, Anderson said. I wont add to that by speaking further on the Capitol tragedy during an extraordinarily divisive time in the life of our country. The war of words about Wednesdays tragedy must cease so that investigations may proceed, facts are established, and truth has emerged.

Reach Daniel Berti at dberti@fauquier.com

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Va. GOP chair, former delegate alleges without evidence that antifa was involved in attack on U.S. Capitol - Prince William Times

Photo: David Rovics.

Have you ever found yourself surrounded by masked rioters being chased by flag-waving patriots and thought, Ive seen this movie before?

I woke up this morning dreaming that I was speaking at one of your rallies. I thought then, well, if I probably wont be getting an invitation to speak at one of them, what would I say if I were to be asked to share some words?

Contrary to popular opinion in kindergarten, words are far more powerful than either sticks or stones, and I think this is something that most of us actually already know. Words can be used to divide and rule entire societies, it seems. We can have some people on some TV networks saying some sets of words, with other people on other networks using different vocabulary, and a different perspective, to talk about the same issues, and pretty soon we can achieve an endless series of tragic physical results from such words.

So I especially like to avoid alarm-bell words that require lots of defining if youre going to use them successfully, or else no one really knows what they mean. If I do use such a word, Ill tend to define it clearly first, unless Im writing for a very particular audience. Im mostly talking about ism words such as as socialism, anarchism, communism, capitalism, fascism, nationalism, supremacism, racism, anti-racism, sexism, progressivism, conservatism, liberalism, elitism.

Other words are important, or at least to some people they can be, so Id want to first say that Im so sorry Aaron Danielson was killed. Without getting into the details and not having been present, many of us were expected something like this to happen. Whether the next person killed at a protest was going to be shot or run over was unknown, but that someone else would be killed was just a matter of time.

Many people, of course, avoided downtown that day, knowing there would be lots of armed people with different opinions all in the same place at the same time, shouting at each other and worse. Other people, perhaps people with stronger political convictions than most, cant stay home. Such as many of the folks who I hope might be hearing these words right now.

There are a lot of people, from a wide variety of political orientations, who would think it pointless for me to be even attempt to communicate with you. They think the divide is too great. Theyre expecting all the predictions of civil war to come true. They think folks like you and I live in our insulated little echo chambers, in different worlds, and we couldnt even communicate with each other if we tried. And then, going to protests, as you and I have done so often, any of us can bear out the fact that there is a whole lot more bear mace being sprayed in different directions than anything resembling communication going on. Looking at my YouTube channel, the comment section on certain songs largely consists of people exchanging death threats with each other.

But I think the folks who think were hopelessly polarized and have no grounds for communication are completely wrong. I think we live in the same world, and we face the same sorts of problems, and could benefit from the same sorts of solutions, too, and I think many of you already agree with this notion. Thats what I would really want to focus on, if I were speaking at one of your rallies.

I think about so many of the rallies when Ive seen you guys around, and I dont want to judge too much by appearances, but to me you look mostly like members of the working class. Some of you might be rich, I dont know, but Id be willing to bet that at least 99% of you arent. Many of you are military veterans, which is also true of no small number of those among the ranks of the groups you oppose.

Being members of the working class living in the Portland area, as so many of you are, and as I and most of my friends are, Ill bet there are a whole lot of things we have in common.

Ill bet half of us live in the same sorts of two-story, wooden, grey, Class C apartment complexes that you can see lining most of the major roads in most of the neighborhoods of both Portland and across the river in Vancouver. Ill bet many of us have the same landlord, in the form of an investment group, such as Prime or Randall. Ill bet our apartment complexes are managed by the same stingy management company, such as CTL. And Ill bet your rent also doubled over the past ten years, and this development has caused you great consternation, made you angry, made you want to find solutions.

Oh, and did you happen to notice that during the time your rent doubled, Obama was in the White House? Hard not to notice coincidences like that.

And while your rent was doubling during the Obama years, maybe you, like me, were having kids, making a family, hoping to move into a bigger place, maybe to buy a house, only to see any such hopes dashed by the reality that the cost of buying a house or renting a bigger apartment was out of the question, if you didnt have a six-figure income.

And during that decade, who was running the city you lived in, where the rents and the taxes kept going up and up, while your income did not? Democrats. I noticed that, too.

When you look around your neighborhood at all the construction sites here in the booming Pacific Northwest, and you see the workers, and when things break at your apartment complex and you see who comes to do repairs, and who maintains the grounds, did you notice that most of the people doing most of the work are immigrants? I noticed that, too.

And who are the people always advocating for the rights of immigrants, and for taking in more immigrants and refugees, while the cost of living keeps going up and jobs are as scarce as they are? Democrats, once again, as I know you have observed.

Have you ever wondered, if we had a lot less immigration in this country, what that might do to wages in the construction industry? Theyd go up, right? Thats obvious, isnt it? Same for other industries, too, right?

A lot of people look at all of this, they put two and two together, and they conclude that the policies of the Democratic Party are not very conducive to our survival. If they want to do things like welcome lots of immigration, export jobs with free trade deals, and govern cities in such a way that the rent doubles every ten years, maybe its very reasonable to conclude that the Democratic Party isnt representing the interests of the general population. Did you reach that conclusion at some point along the line?

And then someone comes along who wants to deal with this mess, to do something on behalf of most people, drain the swamp, build the wall, stop the flood of immigrants taking so many of the jobs, end the endless wars and stop policing the world, get out of free trade deals, put up tariffs, and try to make moves to reverse the trend of everything going in the wrong direction all the time, and for supporting his evidently reasonable policies, you are called every bad name in the book.

But then, as you have been giving your support to this president, you may have also been noticing that many of the policies hes been talking about are opposed not only by the Democrats, but, at least until very recently, by most of the Republican leadership as well. You may also have begun to notice that the man doesnt necessarily support the things he says he supports, and he hasnt drained the swamp at all. Am I right? Or did I just lose you there? Im just guessing there are a lot of you who realize, on some level, along the line, that Trump is mostly just saying the things he thinks you want to hear, and then governing on behalf of big business, like very rich politicians have done in DC for a very long time.

Being a history buff, if I were speaking at one of your rallies Id want to try to talk about what I see as some pretty clear historical parallels between now and a century ago. Trump seems new and unconventional in many ways, but this kind of societal divide between large groups of economically struggling Americans on different sides of issues like immigration goes way back.

Exactly one hundred years ago here in the Pacific Northwest and around the United States, as well as across Canada, conflict raged in the streets. Veterans of the First World War made up the ranks of many of the people involved on all sides of it. The cities were full of returning soldiers, many of whom were sick with the Spanish Flu. Disease was rampant, there was insufficient housing, and not enough jobs, either. At the same time, a massive influx of immigrants from war-torn Europe was coming, along with the returning soldiers from the war.

It was a situation designed for conflict, and conflict there was. On one side were people who viewed themselves as patriots, who wanted to control the dramatic impact that widespread immigration was having on the job and housing markets, and in society generally. On the other side was a labor union led largely by immigrants, who said everyone the working class throughout the world, regardless of nation, race, gender or other such factors should be organized into One Big Union.

This movement saw the First World War and immigration from Europe that was going on at the time as just two more ways the ruling class was trying to divide the working class, and have us fighting each other, whether on different sides of trenches in European wars, or in competition over low-paying jobs here in the US, in order to make sure those jobs keep on paying badly, and the owners make more profits. Instead of opposing immigration, they organized immigrants along with everyone else. They had learned that they had to make a choice between supporting their nation, in the sense of supporting the imperial goals of their governing elite, or supporting their class, and they chose the latter.

Today, there is no massive, ecumenical movement of the working class for us all to join. No such alternative like that currently exists. When it did exist, laws were passed, called the Alien and Sedition Acts, and a national police force was formed called the FBI in order to destroy the movement. Union halls across the country were burned to the ground, and union organizers of all races were lynched under bridges here in the Pacific Northwest.

But the kind of vision that formed this movement that was so targeted by the authorities back then has in the past been so powerful that it has brought down governments, it has forced the worlds biggest corporations to make massive concessions, it has reshaped entire societies for the better. It has also brought down upon it such terrible repression, it has been so targeted by the authorities and so alternately vilified and silenced by history, that even the very concept that the movement ever existed seems like a utopian fantasy, not like a practical reality that has shaped the world as we know it, perhaps more than any other force besides gravity.

I may be a geek, but if I had the chance to speak at one of your rallies, Id want to talk about patterns. There is a pattern happening here, and these consistencies between Portland in 1920 and Portland in 2020 are not accidental. The dynamics of the conflicts in this society now are created by the same sorts of people who were creating them back then. In many cases, their direct descendants. These things tend to run in the family, as does inherited wealth.

Why does the political elite enact policies intended to create these conflicts, and why do they then make moves to exacerbate them? In the back of our minds, I think we all know the answer. If I were speaking at one of your rallies, and I asked this question, would anybody shout, divide and conquer, or am I being overly optimistic? Because it seems to me that as long as those who, for example, support increasing immigration and those who support decreasing immigration can be in conflict with each other over the scraps dropped from the table of the ruling class, the ruling elite wins.

The ruling class logic is so simple and effective on us, its hard to even see its there. Most Mexicans accept such low wages because theyre either undocumented and living in the shadows of the law, or theyre competing with people who are in that situation. And, as you know too well from personal experience, in all likelihood, the rest of us are competing with them, too. And unless we take the concept of exclusion to its logical conclusion and we really think laws and walls are going to keep out the hundreds of millions of people just on the other side of the southern border who also need to feed their children, or unless we believe genocide is the actual solution here, then all the people living in this country are going to have to have the opportunity to work, and if theyre going to work, theyre going to have to be paid, and if theyre going to to be paid, then whatever theyre paid is what youre going to get paid, too. So if you want to be paid well, and to live in an affordable place, you have to stand up for everyone elses rights to a living wage and decent housing. Thats what these conflicts in other societies have taught us. The ruling elite here learned those lessons from history, too, which is why they divide and rule the way they do.

Im a musician, by profession, and before the pandemic I used to tour a lot. Ireland is one of the places where I have the most fans. There are reasons for this, both political and cultural, but Ill save that discussion for another time. Point is, I have a fairly deep familiarity with some other countries where I have spent a lot of my time over the decades, working. In a part of Ireland called Northern Ireland, which is more a political term than a geographical one, the population is fairly evenly divided between Catholics and Protestants. The Catholics there have long lived as second-class citizens, and what has come to be known as the Troubles, which resulted in thousands of people being killed in Northern Ireland from the 1970s to the 1990s, was largely about Catholics having equality with Protestants.

So, you can see if you look at it that there is this, even now, a simmering conflict going on between two groups of people in this very conflicted part of the world that we call Northern Ireland. If youre part of the society, you will likely have developed ideas about the folks who live on the other side of the wall those Protestants only care about other Protestants, or those Catholics are criminally inclined, etc. and you likely will have developed a sort of bipolar, Catholic/Protestant view of the world, as a sort of default, whether you feel passionately about it or not.

But if you back up and look at it from the outside even if you just go work in England for a few years, like so many Irish do, from both sides of the sectarian divide what youll see looking back at Northern Ireland are two groups of people we call Catholics and Protestants, one group of which is generally a little better-off than the other, but what youll notice most of all is that the majority of both Irish Catholics and Irish Protestants are poor by European standards. I heard one speaker at a union rally in Derry note that the Catholic community in Northern Ireland has the fifth worst quality of housing in Europe, while the Protestants have the sixth worst housing standards.

Back to the US. Contrary to the rhetoric, our ruling elite consists of millionaire Democrats as well as millionaire Republicans. The Congress consists almost entirely of millionaires, the Democrats being slightly richer than their Republican counterparts. And history shows us in abundance that different elements of the two groups of millionaires are always vying, over the years, decades, and centuries, to convince us all that they represent us, or different elements of us, the people of this country. What theyre doing in their efforts to appeal to different segments of society, in effect, is practicing divide and rule politics. Who theyre trying to divide from whom doesnt even vary that much over the years, though the dynamics evolve somewhat.

What Id most want to get across, if I were ever to have access to your attention, is that the reason they need to divide us is because they cant afford to have us be united. And the reason they cant afford to see us united is because they dont rule on our behalf, they rule on behalf of the 1%. Neither party represents us, the working class majority, of whatever color or gender. And Trump doesnt, either, no matter how much he may succeed in painting himself as an outsider or a rebel of some kind.

What the elite from both ruling parties want is division. What they want is for us to shout at each other and shoot each other. They will try in so many different ways to make that happen. They and their friends who run the major social media platforms, with their conflict algorithms, and their friends in the corporate media, whether CNN or Fox will do their best to reduce the debate to some people calling others fascists who love racism, while others are called communists who hate freedom, or anarchists who love chaos and arson.

What they fear most, I would conclude, is a united working class. Or, to put it another way, a working class that is aware of its own existence. Or, to put it another way, class solidarity, and especially international class solidarity. What they love most are pawns.

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An Open Letter to Patriot Prayer and the Proud Boys (CC: ANTIFA) - CounterPunch

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Minneapolis residents protest the police shooting of Dolal Idd. Getty Images / Stephen Maturen

Happy New Year, dear reader! We at the Mercury have been hibernating the past ten days to cleanse ourselves from 2020 and to prepare for a new 12 months of unknowns. Which means: We have some catching up to do in this morning's news roundup! Let's jump right in to make sure you (and we) start this new year off somewhat informed:

- Alas, COVID-19 didn't disappear at the strike of midnight on Dec. 31, 2020. Instead, countries like the UK, Japan, Scotland, Thailand, Israel, and South Korea are ramping up regulations as COVID-19 cases surge into the new year.

- Of course, the US hasn't been spared from this uptick. While holiday health department closures have delayed reporting on the current number of US cases, the national outlook is grim. To help the COVID-19 vaccine catch up with the continuing case count, some health officials are proposing halving vaccine doses or even holding off on distributing the second dose of the vaccine to stretch the vaccine across more Americans. (Dr. Fauci isn't on board).

- In a Saturday phone call, Donald Trump urged Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to "find" more votes the flip the state's presidential race results in Trump's favor. In the recording obtained by the Washington Post, Trump cited baseless conspiracy theories as to why he believes he still won the stateall rejected by Republican Raffensperger, who put it this way: Well, Mr. President, the challenge that you have is, the data you have is wrong.

- This incredibly shady, probably illegal move comes days before Georgia is set to hold its much-anticipated runoff elections for its two US Senate seats. The Tuesday election will determine which party will have political majority over the Senate in president-elect Joe Biden's first years in office, a sure way to predict how difficult (or easy!) it will be for him to pass progressive policies through our deeply partisan legislative branch. Here's what you need to know about tomorrow's dual races.

- Some good news:

- A UK judge has denied the US' request to extradite Wikileaks' Julian Assange to face charges of espionage and government hacking, citing concerns about the threats to Assange's mental health in US prison. Another opportunity to discuss the US' incredibly fucked-up incarceration system wasted on the privileged, white, and wealthy.

- At least one person has died from a COVID-19 outbreak in a San Jose hospital that might have been spurred by a staffer who "wore an inflatable holiday costume to lift spirits," according to the Los Angeles Times. Investigators believed the staffer's fan-powered Christmas Tree costume spread the infection across the medical facility.

- In Minneapolis, 2021 began with a scene reminiscent of 2020: Hundreds of people in the streets protesting the police killing of a Black man. On December 30, Minneapolis police fatally shot 23-year-old Dolal Idd during a traffic stop, where police say Idd had fired a gun. Information about the case remains predictably hazy, but the way local law enforcement have responded to the caseincluding conducting a raid on Idd's family home before telling Idd's family members he had been killedhas been enough to spark outrage.

- In Oregon, the last week of the year was also defined by protests. On New Year's Eve, some 100 Portlanders gathered downtown to demonstrate against police violence, a gathering that ended with looting, vandalism, and small fires. Mayor Ted Wheeler called the protest "selfish," and led largely by young white men associated with violent antifa and anarchists (Editor's note: cringe). Wheeler vowed to increase penalties for people repeatedly arrested for protest-related vandalism. The following day, about 200 right-wing protesters met in Salem to oppose the state government's COVID-19 safety restrictions and spread false information about the virus' spread in Oregon. Three were arrested.

- Multnomah County District Attorney will finally be sworn-in today, where he'll hopefully unveil some hints of how he'll fulfill his bold campaign promises of criminal justice reform. Watch the 1 pm ceremony here.

- A weather check: Expect rain to continue throughout the day with some bonus wind. Fun!

-Finally, the most meaningful thing I watched on my time off:

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New Year, Same News: Trump Pushes for Election Fraud, Minneapolis Police Kill Black Man, and Wheeler Bemoans Antifa - The Portland Mercury

Trump supporters gather for the Stop the Steal rally at Freedom Plaza in Washington, D.C., on Dec. 12, 2020.

Photo: Yuri Gripas/Abaca/Sipa USA/AP

On Wednesday, President Donald Trumps craven loyalists in Congress plan to disrupt the certification of President-elect Joe Bidens victory. Whether cynical or delusional, their plan to reject swing-state electors will fail to overturn the election results. Meanwhile, Trump has called upon his supporters to descend on Washington, D.C., that day to demand that Congress hand him a second term. The protest, he tweeted, will be wild.

Under the auspices of Trumps last stand, violence from his furious supporters seems all but inevitable.For Black communities and other communities of color in Washington, thousands of white supremacists amassing in their city is in itself a threat of violence. For far-right groups, the presidents call represents a follow-up to his earlier, perturbing suggestion that the Proud Boys stand by. Now, they are being activated.

Posts about Wednesdays protests shared on Telegram and Parler,the social media platform preferred by the far right, include promises of boots on the ground and anonymous tips for smuggling guns into Washington, where gun laws are strict. Enrique Tarrio, the leader of the Proud Boys, posted that his group would turn up in record numbers. The last major Stop the Steal rally inWashington in December ended in four stabbings as Proud Boys attacked passersby and anti-fascist counterprotesters after dark.

Yet the last stand narrative surrounding Wednesdays planned protests is no more than the rhetoric of escalation. There should be little doubt that Trump, desperate and wretched in defeat, will continue to call upon his base of white nationalists, conspiracy theorists, Proud Boys, and other fascists to rally after the election is certified perhaps long after Biden is inaugurated.

Even without Trumps direct incitements, the far-right violence emboldened under his presidency is not going away.

Even without Trumps direct incitements, though, the far-right violence emboldened under his presidency is not going away. While the stated aim of die-hard Trump supporters may for the moment be to reverse a stolen election, these groups will continue to exist and spread violence as a central part of their ethos when they gather en masse. That ethos, of course, is white supremacy. It is no accident that in addition to the stabbings, Decembers Stop the Steal rally inWashington saw members of the fascistic group vandalize two Black churches and tear down and burn Black Lives Matter flags an act of destruction for which Tarrio was arrested inWashington on Monday.

An exclusive focus on far-right attacks in response to Trumps loss risks overlooking the ways already extant white supremacist violence will remain the core extremist threat under Biden. Attacks might come from far-right vigilantes, but we should also be wary of violence perpetrated by government agencies, such asimmigration authorities and police.

Its clear that white supremacy undergirds the commitment to restoring Trump as president. While the fight to overturn the election could well dissipate, the racist, fascistic ideology driving the effort will remain intact.

Armed militia members watch members of antifa during a Stop the Steal protest at the Georgia Capitol in Atlanta on Dec. 12, 2020.

Photo: Rich von Biberstein/Icon Sportswire/Getty Images

Focusing on the roots of Trumpian violence does not mean ignoring the new dangers posed by the spread of baseless conspiracies around the presidents electoral loss, which have now become central to the true believers worldview. We now have millions of people that essentially believe that an evil cabal has staged a coup on the government and that militant action is the only solution, Shane Burley, the Portland, Oregon-based author of Fascism Today: What It Is and How to End It, told me. That is the recipe for seemingly impulsive acts of violence. Im more concerned about lethal far-right vigilante attacks now than I was when Trump was elected.

The loss and his refusal to concede have infused a renewed and dangerous millenarianism into a significant portion of his base, who believe in the necessity of Trumps presidency with ultrareligious zeal. It makes for fertile ground for sporadic political violence: Numerous election officials and Republicans who have challenged Trumps lies have been threatened since November.

Thedanger posed by even a tiny percentage of those who believe the election fraud conspiracies and are willing to take violent action is disturbing. If just one in 100,000 of the people who voted for Trump came to that conclusion, youd have an army of 740 domestic terrorists, wrote Paul Waldman in the Washington Post. How much death and chaos could they cause with a campaign of bombings and mass shootings?

The concerns are entirely valid but not to the exclusion of the larger, ongoing white supremacist threat.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies found that white supremacist groups were responsible for two-thirds of the 61 terrorist plots and attacks in the first eight months of 2020. Since 2009, the far right has been responsible for over 70 percent of extremist murders. In 2019,the FBIs annual Hate Crime Statistics Act report recorded 7,314 hate crimes, up from 7,120 the year before. These frightening numbers have led to calls for new policies: A number of national security experts have urged Biden to take on right-wing extremism through a strategy of counterterrorist law enforcement.

While a shift away from the Trump administrations blustering and dangerous focus on anti-fascists, leftists, and Black liberation fighters would be welcome, it would be misguided to treat the states law enforcement apparatus as an ally in the struggle against white supremacist violence. The intractable racism in U.S. policing is reason enough to draw this conclusion. And while certain far-right groups, like Boogaloo adherents, see an enemy in law enforcement, we should keep in mind that our enemies enemies are not our friends. Instead, the conflict between anti-racist anti-fascists, white supremacists, and law enforcement is rightly described by some anti-fascist theorists as a three-way fight.

It is for this reason that calls for anti-fascists and anti-racists to simply ignore the far-right rallies like the one inWashingtonare understandable but wrongheaded. They amount to a call to treat violent racists as a passing nuisancethat will disappear under the Biden administration a belief nearly as delusional as the conviction that Trump won the election. One need not take up the militant tactics associated with antifa to see the importance of gathering in great numbers to overwhelm a rally of white supremacists. Indeed, large numbers of counterprotesters lessen the need for physical confrontation to stop the far right from roaming the streets.

In this pandemic moment, the far right holds an advantage: Trumpian fanatics who either dont believe in the danger of Covid-19 or dont care about spreading it to those around them are more willing to travel from around the country to converge,as they will this week. Undue burden thus rests on local anti-fascist, anti-racist organizers. Yet this summers potent uprisings made clear that in every city, those who would crush white supremacy are able to gather in vast numbers in our own hometowns and with a message of Black liberation in robust opposition to everything for which white supremacists stand.

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Far-Right Violence Will Continue With or Without Trump - The Intercept

Antifa wishes you a happy or rather, angry and anarchic New Year.

Over the New Year holiday, far-left rioters in Portland firebombed police. In Seattle, a marauding group of activists terrorized businesses. And their counterparts in San Francisco vandalized Nancy Pelosis home and left a bloody pigs head at the House speakers door.

Unless leaders in blue states and cities get serious about repressing Antifa, the radical brutality that disfigured 2020 will extend into 2021.

Last year, Dems allowed violent activists to hold their cities hostage. On both coasts and in blue-governed heartland cities like Minneapolis, left-wing rioting was met with sheepish apologies and acquiescence to insane demands. National Democratic leaders, meanwhile, denied that any rioting was taking place (New Yorks Rep. Jerry Nadler) or that such a group as Antifa even exists (Joe Biden).

A cynic might wonder ifAntifa was a useful tool for mainstream liberals, since the groups fiery mischief served to underscore how America under President Trump had spiraled into chaos. Whatever the motivation for empowering Antifa, now is the time to disempower it.

The New Years Eve violence in the Pacific Northwest, a hotbed of radical activism, was instructive. Just before the clock struck midnight, Portland experienced yet another riot, as Antifa threw multiple firebombs at officers and launched commercial-grade fireworks at the federal courthouse, according to police.

Nearly a dozen businesses and government agencies were vandalized, and social-media footage showed law enforcers retreating from a mob of about 100 militants.

In Seattle, an unruly group terrorized the neighborhood around the East Precinct in the former Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone, the touch point for the Emerald Citys summer of love. The group burned a US flag and blasted fireworks at the King County Youth Services Center.

Militants also targeted the nearby Cafe Argento, damaging the storefront. Why did the self-proclaimed anti-racists hurt a small business owned by a person of color? The owner, Faizel Kahn, suspects its because he asked the city to help people living in the nearby homeless encampment that Antifa helped establish. After a standoff, police cleared out the encampment. This was Antifas revenge.

The radicals act with the impunity blue leaders granted them.

Portland militants rioted for more than 100 consecutive nights, yet activist Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt declined to prosecute some 70 percent of cases. He justified his position by acknowledging that he agreed with the activists anger. When Antifa showed up to harass Mayor Ted Wheeler at his home, the mayor said hed move, quite literally allowing thugs to chase him from his own home.

In Seattle, Mayor Jenny Durkan ceded a piece of her city to militants to create the regions original autonomous zone. She then stayed silent for months as activists tried to murder police, even cementing shut a door to a precinct while trying to set fire to the building. The city council rewarded such actions by defunding the police.

Antifa, to be clear, doesnt want reform. It seeks the abolition of police and prisons of the state as such.

But thats not all. The group also rejects private property, borders, free speech and self-defense. These loosely aligned anarchists and Marxists, in other words, abhor the basic principles of the democratic West. And they have no qualms about using violence to advance their agenda. Your average activist doesnt leave a severed pigs head outside the home of the House speaker. Thats the work of a committed extremist.

With the election over, there is some mild pushback against monsters that in many ways are of the Dems own making. The normally submissive Mayor Wheeler condemned the lawlessness of radical antifa and anarchists rhetoric that would have been roundly fact-checked by mainstream media had Trump uttered them three months ago.

Wheeler also asked a silly question: Why would a group of largely white good-for-nothings harm people struggling to get by. Why? Because Democrats allowed them to.

At any rate, words will go nowhere. Only a harshly decisive and punitive response from the state will stop Antifa. For that to happen, the politicians who turned a blind eye last year will have to let police forces do their jobs. And they must convince prosecutors, who are releasing Antifa members without charge, to dole out charges and convictions. That wont be easy.

Jason Rantz is a talk-radio host on KTTH Seattle and a frequent FOX News guest.

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Democrats are now paying the price for empowering Antifa - New York Post

After a judge tossed Republican Congressman Louie Gohmerts baseless lawsuit that challenged President-elect Joe Bidens victory, the Trump sycophant responded by suggesting that those who live in a MAGA reality should go to the streets and be violent.

Gohmert made the dangerous remarks on the Trump-friendly news network Newsmax on Saturday morning while discussing his lawsuit against Vice President Mike Pence that U.S. District Judge Jeremy Kernodle dismissed on Friday.

The right-wing bomb-thrower was apoplectic because the judge ruled that the plaintiffs do not have standing to sue, meaning Gohmert and his ilk did not because they could not demonstrate injury or harm, which is required to proceed.

The bottom line is, the court is saying, Were not going to touch this. You have no remedy basically, in effect, the ruling would be that you gotta go the streets and be as violent as antifa and BLM, Gohmert said.

But comparing Trumps followers to the Black Lives Matter movement or antifa is absurd, especially because those groups do not go around instigating violence as Gohmert suggests.

Gohmerts unsuccessful suit argued that the Constitution gives the vice president the power to choose which electors will certify Bidens victory on Jan. 6th, but even Pence himself said in a court filing that he was the wrong person to sue.

As NPR pointed out, law experts like Ned Foley, director of the election law program at the Ohio State University, found the congressmans suit breathtaking and preposterous.

The Gohmert reply is breathtaking and preposterous in claiming (p4) a Vice President can ignore all electors whose votes he dislikes. The Constitution never intended this monarchical power to disenfranchise Electoral College votes based on personal whim, Foley wrote on Twitter.

In 2013, Rolling Stone included Gohmert on a list of Tea Party morons destroying America, and hes done nothing to prove his inclusion incorrect. But a current version of that list would show many more officeholders deserve a spot.

According to CNN, at least 140 House Republicans are expected to vote against the certification of President-elect Biden on January 6th. And Republican Senator Josh Hawley said this week that he will also object which will force a floor debate and votes in both chambers of Congress.

Of course, its all theatrics. None of the challenges are expected to succeed, but the motive for those who went full MAGA during the Trump years is clear: maintain the love of the president and his followers and hold on to power or, like in the case of Hawley who many see a GOP presidential hopeful, cash in by seeking higher office in 2024 no matter if the nation and democracy suffer.

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Louie Gohmert Suggests People Go to the Streets and Be Violent After Judge Throws Out Baseless Election Suit - Rolling Stone

If fear of 5G technology proves to be the motive for the Christmas-Day bombing in Nashville, Tennessee, no one should be surprised. The pandemic has accelerated awareness of digital technologies and given individuals, groups, and state proxies room to agitate. One result is a heightened link between violence and technology both attacks against technology (e.g., anti-5G, anti-vaccination, anarcho-primitivism) and attacks exploiting technology (e.g., armed quadcopters, additive manufacturing, the Internet of Things). Regardless of how the Nashville bombing comes out, authorities need to strengthen their ability to meet anti-technology attacks on our vulnerable critical infrastructure, especially by looking close to home.

Knowing the motive behind the powerful detonation that damaged nearby buildings will help illuminate whether the act was a dramatic suicide or an act of domestic terrorism. But some things are already clear: DNA found at the scene matched that of a local computer expert, 63-year-old Anthony Q. Warner and we know that he acted freely. Warner gave away his property and power-washed the vehicle in the weeks before he took his own life. He did not want mass casualties Warner drove his bomb-laden RV through the target zone, broadcasting evacuation warnings. Aside from the bomber, no one was seriously hurt, though 41 businesses were damaged. Government officials were puzzled. It looks to me like terrorism against infrastructure was involved, U.S. Rep. Jim Cooper speculated, and Nashvilles mayor, John Cooper, described it as a one-off.

Circumstantial evidence suggests that Warner was protesting 5G technology reportedly an FBI line of inquiry. The campervan was parked in front of an AT&T transmission building and the explosion knocked down a network hub. The company website called the blast devastating, reporting secondary fires, loss of power, damaged equipment, and hazardous work in a disaster zone. Internet and cellphone service across parts of Tennessee, Kentucky, and Alabama was badly affected. AT&T scrambled to reroute service or deploy portable cell sites, with 65 percent of service restored two days later.

In the polarized American domestic context, U.S. experts have focused on right-wing radicals like white supremacists (the Ku Klux Klan and the Base), anti-federal government groups (the Boogaloo movement), misogynistic attackers (the incels), and anti-Antifa protesters (the Proud Boys), as well as left-wing groups such as anarchists and anti-fascist organizations (Antifa). But anti-technology violence also has deep roots and may have broader impact, since it often targets critical infrastructure and could affect millions.

Experts saw this coming. In May 2020, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security issued alerts about potential attacks on cellphone infrastructure due to conspiracy theories about 5G technology spreading COVID-19 misinformation promoted by gullible individuals, celebrities, and nefarious actors like QAnon. U.S. alerts followed dozens of arson and vandalism attacks abroad, including on U.K., Belgian, Canadian, and Dutch cell towers. And in the wake of the Nashville bombing, federal, state, and local law enforcement feared copycat attacks on other U.S. communications infrastructure.

State actors have also been involved in promoting these conspiracy theories. Last year, Russias RT America, a cable, satellite and online streaming network headquartered in Washington, D.C., began warning of a 5G Apocalypse, falsely connecting 5G signals to brain cancer, infertility, autism, and Alzheimers disease. Warner reportedly believed 5G caused his fathers dementia and other deaths in the region. Anti-5G stories have been picked up by hundreds of other websites and on social media platforms. In the midst of a pandemic, with millions of people losing their lives and livelihoods, fears tend to multiply.

Intelligence agencies have been worried about foreign cyberattacks on U.S. critical infrastructure for decades. But state actors capable of pulling off serious cyberattacks would be engaging in an act of war if they went through with such acts. Why attack critical infrastructure directly, if Americans will do it themselves?

Anti-technology violence long predates 5G. In the late 20th century, backlash against computer technology was intertwined with environmentalism and anti-globalization protests. Between 1996 and 2002, groups such as the Earth Liberation Front and the Animal Liberation Front engaged in some 600 criminal acts of arson, sabotage, and vandalism on research laboratories, multinational corporations, and the logging industry. Like the Nashville attack, the purpose was to harm property, not people.

The most notorious anti-technology American terrorist was Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber. Kaczynski was a Harvard-educated mathematics prodigy who carried out mail bombings against professors, the heads of airlines, and computer executives between 1978 and 1996. He killed three and injured 23 before being arrested, tried, and sentenced to life in prison in 1998.

Kaczynskis 1995 manifesto, published by the Washington Post and the New York Times, is a technophobic screed. It reads in part:

The Industrial Revolution and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race. The continued development of technology willsubject human beings to greater indignities and inflict greater damage on the natural world . We therefore advocate a revolution against the industrial systemto overthrow not governments but the economic and technological basis of the present society.

A similarly technophobic 2018 paper written by retired Washington State University professor, Martin Pall, zeroes in on 5G technology. While it does not advocate violence, the 90-page document explains Palls theories, promoted on Twitter and Instagram by celebrities and influencers such as Woody Harrelson and John Cusack. Pall maintains:

[W]hen we have substantial risk of multiple existential threats to every single technologically advanced country on earth, failure to act vigorously means there is a very high probability of complete destruction of these societies. And the chaos which would inevitably ensue, in a world that still has nuclear weapons, may well lead to extinction. In the face of these types or risk, the only reasonable course is to move with great vigor to stop new exposures and lower current exposures.

Digital technology is playing an outsized role in peoples lives during the pandemic, leaving many behind. Misinformation, economic insecurity, and rapid change are triggering anti-technology anger, especially against the high tech and telecommunications industries, fragile backbones of a digital economy. If Anthony Warner was indeed protesting 5G networks, it shines a light on the long-standing need for U.S. intelligence and law enforcement to meld global and local efforts to get ahead of cyber-driven threats to critical infrastructure.

Audrey Kurth Cronin is professor of international security at American University and founding director of the Center for Security, Innovation and New Technologies. Her latest book, Power to the People: How Open Technology Innovation Is Arming Tomorrows Terrorists (Oxford University Press, 2020) won the 2020 Airey Neave Prize for the most significant, original, relevant, and practically valuable contribution to the understanding of terrorism. Twitter: @akcronin. Website: audreykurthcronin.com.

Image: Metro Nashville Police Department

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The Nashville Bombing and Threats to Critical Infrastructure: We Saw This Coming - War on the Rocks

From left to right, Julio lvarez del Vayo, the Spanish foreign minister; unknown; Francisco Largo Caballero, the Spanish prime minister; and Lieutenant Colonel Rabio, commander of the troops in Madrid, inspect troops on the front during the Spanish Civil War in November 1936. (Fox Photos / Hulton Archive / Getty Images)

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On November 30, the Spanish government announced that it would step in to save the tomb of a longtime Nation journalist, Julio lvarez del Vayo, who worked as one of the magazines editors from the early 1940s to the mid-1950s.

Vayo, as he was generally known, was a socialist politician and diplomat who served as Spains foreign minister during the Spanish Civil War (193639). After Francisco Francos victory, he lived in exile in France, the United Stateswhere he became a close friend of Nation editor Freda Kirchweyand Switzerland, where hed traveled during the war years as well, trying to rally support in the League of Nations for the beleaguered Spanish Republic. He was buried in Geneva. As the rent on his tomb was running out, his remains were set to be exhumed and moved to an ossuary.

The decision of Spains progressive coalition government to protect Vayos tomb from destruction comes at a time when the countrys anti-fascist legacy is once more under dispute. In September, Prime Minister Pedro Snchezs cabinet approved a Law of Democratic Memory, meant to meet the long-standing demands for justice and recognition of thousands of victims of the Franco dictatorship. The new law would provide material and symbolic reparations for victims of state violence and expropriation; annul judicial sentences from Francos sham courts that were designed to eliminate political dissidents; reform public history education; limit freedom of speech for antidemocratic ideologies; and remove or prohibit public tributes to the dictatorship.

The proposal has incensed the Spanish right, which accuses Spains progressive government of breaking the pact that enabled the countrys transition to democracy. Following the example of their European and US counterparts, Spains right-wing leaders hope to spin electoral wool by demonizing anti-fascism, which in Spain means questioning the legitimacy of the historical struggle against the dictatorship. One deputy from the conservative Partido Popular (PP) recently wrote that its a fallacy to identify anti-Francoism with democracy. In October, the city government of Madridruled by the right with the support of the far-right party Voxproceeded to remove a memorial plaque to Francisco Largo Caballero, a longtime socialist union leader and Republican prime minister during the civil war, who was later arrested by the Gestapo, interrogated by Klaus Barbie, and deported to a Nazi concentration camp. (He survived the war but died soon after.)More on the Spanish Civil War

In a perverse bit of irony, the city government defended the removal by invoking Spains current memory law, which was adopted in 2007 and prohibits extolling individuals who participated in the failed military coup that unleashed the civil war or in the Francoist repression. The citys defense revived old Francoist myths, claiming that it was the radicalism of leftist leaders like Largo Caballero that stoked much of the political violence in the first place. Right-wing myth-making has since only grown. The Spanish right now paints all those who participated in armed struggle against the dictator, including the guerrilla units that fought both Nazism and Francoism from southern France, as terrorists. Among them was Julio lvarez del Vayo, who in 1963 galvanized remaining guerrilla units into the Spanish Front for National Liberation. In fact, it was the association of former guerrilla fighters in France that first sounded the alarm about Vayos impending exhumation. In the Spanish government, it was Pablo Iglesias, the leader of junior coalition partner Podemos and Snchezs second in command, who took the lead in saving the former ministers tomb.

Vayo started writing for The Nation in 1939. As a member of the board of editors under Freda Kirchweys editorship from 1941 until 1955, he shaped much of the magazines editorial line on US foreign policy during World War II and the early Cold War. Identified with the left wing of the Spanish Socialist Party, he was sympathetic to the Soviet Union and reviled by the anti-Stalinist and liberal left, from Dwight Macdonald to Arthur Schlesinger, and, eventually, by his own party, which expelled him in 1946 along with some three dozen other left-wingers, including former prime minister Juan Negrnwho also wrote for The Nation. (They were posthumously reinstated in 2009.)

Vayos ubiquitous presence at The Nation, where he had Kirchweys unconditional support, fueled complaints about undue Communist influence and rumors that Vayo was a Stalinist agent. When, in 1951, The New Leader printed a letter from former Nation art critic Clement Greenberg that claimed Vayo had turned the magazine into a Soviet mouthpiece, Kirchwey sued Greenberg for libel. According to Kirchwey biographer Sara Alpern, the editor wanted to protect Del Vayo, who, as a political migr, faced possible deportation if the authorities believed the serious charges directed against him. The controversy led contributing editor Robert Bendiner and staff contributor Reinhold Niebuhr to resign from the masthead. According to historian David Jorge, Vayo was never more than a fellow traveler. The rumors against him, Jorge told us, were first circulated by his former party colleagues and later picked up by the Congress for Cultural Freedom, which, alongside The New Leader, Encounter, and other magazines, was secretly funded by the CIA. In early 1952, Vayo and his wife, returning to the United States after a trip to Europe, were arrested under the McCarran Act and detained for several days.

In his decade and a half at the magazine, Vayo wrote more than 400 articles. Among his most personal pieces is a hair-raising 4,000-word dispatch he filed in August 1949 describing a clandestine trip to Francos Spain. Triumphantly titled I Got into Spain, Vayos article narrates how he disguised himself as a tourist to enter Spain before being detained by the Spanish police, who let him go after being fooled by his fake American accent and the American-made items he had on him. By the time Vayo was informally deported back across the border to France, he had managed to report on the lives of everyday people under the Franco regime. He paints a bleak picture. People who go to France return to Spain talking about how much there is to eat in France, he explained. To stop these reports travelers who say too much are often arrested. French bread is a luxury article to be smuggled over the border. Yet the trip left Vayo hopeful. He reported that the anti-Franco resistance had been encouraged by the US refusal, the month before, to grant Franco a $50 million loan. I can assure Americans today, he wrote, that the Spanish people are as worthy of American sympathy and support in their present magnificent struggle against the last heir of Hitler as they were during the active period of the civil war. Vayo included the story in his memoir, The Last Optimist, which came out the following year.

Vayo would never see his anti-Francoist wishes fulfilled. His editorship at The Nation ended shortly after Kirchweys retirement in 1955. By the end of that year, Francos Spain was admitted to the United Nations. Vayo, who lived out his exile in Switzerland, died in May 1975, age 84, six months before Francos death that November.

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How the Fight Over Spains Anti-Fascist Legacy Involves a Former Nation Editor - The Nation