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Right-Wing Media’s Antifa Obsession Is Creating A Justification For Harsh Protest Crackdowns

As nationwide protests escalated over the weekend, most national media labored to track complex developments, both peaceful and violent, in cities and towns across the country. But on Fox News and across right-wing media, the narrative was simple: anti-fascist activists and vague “organized groups” intent on chaos were responsible for all the ills flashing across TV screens.

President Donald Trump has leaned heavily into this narrative, tweeting over the weekend that he would declare anti-fascists, known as antifa, as a terrorist group (which he has no clear legal authority to do; in addition, it’s also not a real organization with any centralized leadership or defined members). U.S. Attorney General William Barr issued a statement on Sunday linking “Antifa” with domestic terrorism and a day later dispatched federal riot teams to multiple cities.

If one accepts that rogue domestic terrorists are the driving force behind any demonstrations that turn violent, then a strong police and military response might seem justified. Right-wing media and the Trump administration have worked in tandem to create that reality.

Fox News contributor Dan Bongino claimed that anti-fascist activists were conducting a “sophisticated insurrection-type attack.” Conservative radio and Fox News host Mark Levin railed against antifa and tweeted of the unrest that “it’s not about George Floyd ... time to put it down.” Disgraced former New York Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik, whom Trump pardoned of corruption and tax fraud earlier this year, told Fox News that antifa was behind the chaos and spread a conspiracy theory that liberal billionaire George Soros had funded the demonstrations. John Solomon, a right-wing columnist who mainstreamed shaky allegations against Vice President Joe Biden related to his son’s work for a Ukrainian energy company, promoted a poll asking if readers thought antifa was a terrorist organization.

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