The City University of New York’s (CUNY) Graduate Center has an English course called “Global Antifa” that is “oriented towards militant co-research” developing “research projects that contribute to the work of global movements fighting fascism.”
Militant research, according to a paper from Newcastle University, “prioritises political struggle over the academic pursuit of knowledge” where the “researcher must become an active participant in a political movement, while still doing research – it essentially means devoting lots of time to working as an activist or as an organiser.”
In other words, that method would have students be active members of Antifa, not just embedding with them, but potentially participating in violence and destruction with them. It “seeks different ways to generate knowledge, with a particular focus on processes and methods, and it offers a blurring of the boundaries between activism/organising and research, between researcher and researched, and between theory and practice.”
According to the course syllabus, obtained through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request submitted by Defending Education, the class “surveys and draws on these antifascist traditions, linking them to a deep engagement with racial justice, anti-imperialist movements, intersectional feminism, and an analysis of the changing character and contradictions of capitalism” and “begins from the premise that racialized and colonized peoples have been at the forefront of theorizing, challenging, and dismantling fascism, white supremacy, and other modes of authoritarian rule over the last century.”
“The syllabus reveals an insidious side of academia where professors use the time honored tradition of academic freedom as cover to indoctrinate students into the far-left anti-fascist ideology,” Defending Education Director of Research Rhyen Staley told The Federalist. “What is even more concerning is that this course appears to also double as a series of strategy sessions intended to develop new tactics for improved radical acts of street activism. Courses such as this have no place in American institutions of higher education.”
The course is taught by Professor Ashley Dawson, who in 2024 was named a Social Practice Fellow for the Peaker Project, which is “designed to bring together the resources of academic research institutions and the activism of creative practitioners, mobilize CUNY’s interdisciplinary arts fields, and help diversify M.F.A. graduates in New York City.”
It also receives funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, which is most well known for supporting far-left race activism on college campuses and should certainly be on the target list of the Trump administration’s investigations into left-wing networks that fund political violence.
Moreover, schools like CUNY and a wide variety of others that include explicitly militant programming, and the professors who teach the courses, should be treated as an integral part of the terrorist networks that encourage left-wing political violence rampant in the country today.
After all, while the Trump administration only recently designated Antifa a terrorist organization, the group’s violence and destruction have been well-documented for years, making it impossible for CUNY or Dawson not to understand the implications of such a class.
However, neither the school nor Dawson replied to a request for comment from The Federalist asking if they were concerned about encouraging terrorism or whether they have a responsibility to stop such programming in light of all the political violence inspired by the group’s ideology.
As The Federalist has reported, Antifa and the assassination left have become bolder and more violent. They have been overlooked for years as the government has focused on the fake threat of “white supremacy,” as opposed to actual violent cells of disgruntled leftists.
The only answer, as The Federalist CEO Sean Davis said, is for them to be crushed before they become even more emboldened.
While universities have been free to encourage the militant Antifa mindset, and, in CUNY’s and Dawson’s case, actually attempting to help their movement, the government must immediately remove any federal funding from schools that commiserate with terrorists and arrest anyone aiding them.