On September 22, Trump issued an executive order titled “Designating Antifa As A Domestic Terrorist Organization.” On September 25, he signed “National Security Presidential Memorandum/NSPM-7: Countering Terrorism and Organized Political Violence.”
Together, these two documents amount to a blueprint and a launch event for focusing the vast repressive power of the U.S. government on disrupting, dismantling or destroying all opposition to the fascist regime.
Officials claimed that both documents officially target “political violence.” In reality, the executive order and national security memorandum form the framework for an all-out attack on dissenters of all kinds, and on the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution itself (the one that is supposed to guarantee freedom of speech and the right to protest.) They started targeting radical-minded people drawn to the antifa orientation, but the attack quickly escalated. Now under the gun are a whole variety of other anti-fascist groups (including, reportedly, Refuse Fascism, which has a nine-year history of consistently adhering to nonviolent resistance to fascism). And it has taken aim at even broader liberal and progressive forces.
As senior Trump official Stephen Miller put it himself: “This is the first time in American history that there is an all-of-government effort to dismantle left wing terrorism.” Translation: “we are going after anyone who does not go along with our full-out fascist remaking of every part of American society.”
The Antifa Executive Order—Lie After Lie!
Trump’s order “designat[es]” antifa “as a Domestic Terrorist Organization.” It also characterizes antifa as “a militarist, anarchist enterprise” that “explicitly calls for the overthrow of the United States Government.”
In fact, “antifa” is not an “organization” or an “enterprise” at all—it is an orientation towards taking on fascists, racists, and various forms of injustice that many people, in particular youth, are attracted to. It is essentially an idea, the core of which is opposition to fascism.1 It has no membership rolls, no leadership structure, no treasury. It doesn’t have a “terrorist” strategy nor a unified set of tactics of any kind. Nor are there unified antifa political positions on anything.
NSPM-7: Blueprint for All-Out Repression
From the flagrant lies and demonization of antifa in the executive order, Trump moves to a much more convoluted, “legalistic” assault on “the left” as a whole. NSPM-7 starts by citing the killing of Charlie Kirk, assassination attempts against Trump himself, and other incidents of violence against fascist leaders in the last few years.2 Then, without any evidence, he declares that these incidents are the “culmination of sophisticated, organized campaigns of targeted intimidation, radicalization, threats, and violence” carried out by radical leftists.
But Trump is not going to let facts stop him—he is directing an investigation of “all participants in these criminal and terroristic conspiracies—including the organized structures, networks, entities, organizations, funding sources, and predicate actions behind them.” And these “investigations” are to be followed by a whole array of actions aimed at disrupting, breaking up or crushing all opposition, and stifling society as a whole to a truly terrifying degree.
NSPM-7 states that “the United States requires a national strategy to investigate and disrupt networks, entities, and organizations that foment political violence so that law enforcement can intervene in criminal conspiracies before they result in violent political acts.” (Emphasis added.) Pay attention to those three words: “disrupt” “foment” and—especially—“before.” What these are saying is that organizations and people have to be “disrupted” before they have done anything wrong, based on the government’s belief that they are fomenting bad things.
Targeting Thought Crimes
How will the regime know that people are “fomenting” crime? NSPM-7 warns that “These campaigns [of violence] often begin by isolating and dehumanizing specific targets.” “Isolating” a specific target—saying, for instance, nobody should agree with one or another outrageous statement from one or another fascist—might make someone “isolated,” but it is actually legitimate political criticism.
Check out what NSPM-7 says: the “isolating and dehumanizing” that supposedly fuels the (non-existent) campaign of murder of fascists goes on in “chat forums, in-person meetings, social media, and even educational institutions.” In other words, the places people customarily feel free to exchange their sincere views should be targeted for “investigation” or these conversations will lead to “murder.”
And what kind of private speech will set off alarm bells for the “investigators”? NSPM-7 says, “There are common recurrent motivations and indicia uniting this pattern of violent and terroristic activities under the umbrella of self-described ‘anti-fascism.’” And it provides a list of these dangerous ideas that fuel “terrorism”: “anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, and anti-Christianity; support for the overthrow of the United States Government; extremism on migration, race, and gender; and hostility towards those who hold traditional American views on family, religion, and morality.”
Look at that list carefully, because if you are not a Christian-fascist, white-supremacist, America-first, LGBT-hating MAGA acolyte, you probably hold to some of the ideas that are “indicia” (indicators) that you are planning terrorist attacks!
Stephen Miller’s “Full-Court (Fascist) Press”
What is Stephen Miller referring to when he speaks of “an all-of-government effort to dismantle left wing terrorism”? He means that the roughly 4,000 members of the FBI’s 200 Joint Terrorism Task Forces (JTTFs) will now be focused on “investigating” and “disrupting” the anti-fascist forces. (These task forces bring together FBI with state and local police.) He means the IRS will be poring over the income tax returns of people who exhibit dissident thinking. He means that people who donate to leftist causes will be suspected of “terrorism.”
NSPM-7 also dictates that people arrested at protests will be subjected to interrogations “regarding the entity or individual organizing such actions and any related financial sponsorship of those actions prior to adjudication or initiation of a plea agreement.” (Emphasis added.) Translation: you can snitch (and worse) and get a light sentence, or refuse to talk and get a harsh sentence.
Major Investigations Already Launched …
Read/listen to this social media message from @BobAvakianOfficial.
On October 16, independent journalist Ken Klippenstein reported that two sources involved in the investigations of groups or individuals allegedly part of antifa said that “investigations will likely rival in scope those conducted under the Biden administration on January 6 perpetrators,” and that “no one should doubt the orders that have come down from on high to destroy Antifa.” Attorney general Pam Bondi said, “It’s breaking down the organization brick by brick, just like we did with cartels.”
As part of this, national security officials are meeting with right-wing influencers like Glen Beck and Andy Ngo. These fascists who virulently hate “the left” are being relied on as sources of trustworthy information.
Funders of Liberal and Progressive Causes Being Investigated…
Klippenstein also reports that the Treasury Department is investigating nonprofits that fund liberal and progressive causes. They are looking at The Tides Foundation, a 49-year-old group that started People for the American Way with Norman Lear, and funds groups ranging from Pew Internet to Jewish Voice for Peace to Code Pink. They could be subject to criminal prosecution if they are found to have donated money that even indirectly supported antifa (e.g., supported some group that the regime claims works with antifa).
Klippenstein also reports that major DC law firms are now warning their clients of the possible risks to them if they donate money to philanthropies that donate money to groups that are in some way “linked” to the amorphous antifa movement. All of this is likely to seriously chill or cut off donations very broadly, including to groups that are not yet under investigation but that take “dangerous” positions such as “gender extremism” (which is fascist-speak for being supportive of transgender people).
Chicago Refuse Fascism at No Kings Day rally, June 14, 2025.
There Is No Time to Lose
As the Call for protests in DC beginning November 5 initiated by Refuse Fascism states: “Fascism is not a looming threat. It is upon us now.”
The MAGA fascists are moving now to use the vast power they already have to crush any opposition to their lockdown of every section of society.
In this light, it is worth reflecting on—and it is important to spread—this critical point from Bob Avakian (BA):
If this fascist regime is allowed to remain in power, everything that decent people have felt they could rely on to seek justice will be brutally shut down...every uplifting moral value will be reviled and repressed...every sphere of society will be remade, in terrible ways, in line with the male supremacist, anti-LGBT, white supremacist and anti-immigrant cruelty and the anti-scientific, health and climate destroying madness of the Trump fascist regime and the bloodthirsty ravings and depraved violence of fanatics heading “the department of war,” with the deranged maniac Trump having his finger on the nuclear button.
Every vision, and every active striving, for a better, more just world, for a future worth living in, will be violently suppressed and effectively foreclosed, at least for the foreseeable future.
This is not hyperbole—it is the bitter reality that is being rapidly enforced. (From social media message REVOLUTION #133: Yes, this Trump/MAGA fascism really is that bad. And, if it is not driven from power soon, it will get far worse.)
BA goes on to say:
But here is another profound reality: The massive mobilization called for by Refuse Fascism, and open to all, represents the real possibility—the ONLY real possibility—of actually driving out this fascist regime, and putting an end to the endless horrors it is determined to perpetrate.
Rutgers University Professor Leaves the U.S. in Response to Fascist Threats
Mark Bray is a history professor at Rutgers University in New Jersey, with extensive work on anti-fascist movements. That work includes the 2017 book Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook, described by the publisher as “a detailed survey of the full history of anti-fascism from its origins fighting Hitler and Mussolini, to the present day—the first transnational history of postwar anti-fascism in English.” Shortly after Trump issued his antifa executive order, fascist influencers began targeting Bray as a “domestic terrorist professor” and “Dr. Antifa.” Fascist media claimed he was “an antifa financier.”
The Rutgers University chapter of Turning Point USA (a fascist student group founded by Charlie Kirk) launched an online petition to get Bray fired. According to the American History Association, the threats against Bray have extended to his partner, Yesenia Barragan, also a professor at the Rutgers History Department.
Bray said in a Democracy Now! interview that after the Trump executive order, “a series of far-right trolls, online influencers started attacking me. I received a number of death threats. Someone published my home address on X. So I started to fear for the safety of my family staying in our home. More and more death threats came in, and I knew I needed to get away.”
Bray has made it clear that he is strongly against fascism but is not part of any “antifa” groups (and, as he points out, “antifa” is not an organization): “It’s a useful bogeyman term to demonize protest, demonize resistance, equate it with terrorism. And it’s really, you know, an obvious page out of the textbooks about fascist and authoritarian leaders.” Bray said that “what we’re seeing today in the U.S. is increasingly fascist. MAGA, I believe—and I study fascism, I don’t say this lightly—is a fascist movement. And if we don’t organize, if we don’t take action in the streets, we’re going to end up somewhere really bad.”
On October 9, gripped by fear because of the threats from fascists, Bray and his family decided to leave the U.S. temporarily and go to Spain, where he will teach his Rutgers classes remotely with the university’s support.
Rutgers University said they did not comment on specific personnel matters but made clear: “Rutgers University is committed to providing a secure environment—to learn, teach, work and research—where all members of our community can share their opinions without fear of intimidation or harassment.” The American Association of University Professors/American Federation of Teachers at Rutgers issued a statement in defense of Bray and Barragan, which said in part: “Silence in the face of these assaults will only embolden the far right. With that in mind, the Rutgers faculty unions reject Turning Point USA’s smear campaigns and proudly stand with our colleagues.”
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