President Trump said Wednesday that he would take steps to declare Antifa a foreign terrorist organization after hearing from journalists who say they were battered while covering the organization.
“I think it’s the kind of thing I’d like to do,” Mr. Trump said when asked if he was considering declaring the black-clad group of demonstrators an FTO.
“Does everybody agree? If you agree, I agree. Let’s get it done,” Mr. Trump said before giving Secretary of State Marco Rubio the task of making it happen and asking Steve Witkoff, his special envoy to the Middle East, whether he was OK with it.
“Yes, it’s true. There are extensive foreign ties [to Antifa],” Mr. Witkoff said. “I think that would be a very good step to take.”
“I think so too,” Mr. Trump said, who already declared Antifa a “domestic terrorist” threat last month through an executive order.
According to the State Department, FTOs are foreign groups designated as terrorist in accordance with section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act.
It is unlawful for a person in the U.S. or subject to the jurisdiction of the U.S. to knowingly provide “material support or resources” to a designated FTO, which includes such groups as Hamas, al Qaeda, the Tiger Tamils, some wings of the Irish Republican Army and several Latin American drug cartels.
The decision came as Mr. Trump sat at a round table discussing how to dismantle Antifa with Attorney General Pam Bondi, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, Mr. Rubio, Mr. Witkoff and several journalists who have covered the radical left-wing violent protest organization on the ground.
Those reporters recounted their experiences of being physically assaulted by members of the group and their stories often being ignored or discounted by local officials and media outlets.
Andy Ngo, a Portland, Oregon, native and editor at the Post Millennial, began covering Antifa as a graduate student studying political science at Portland State in 2016 on the night Mr. Trump won his first election.
Riots broke out in the city that very night, Mr. Ngo said, adding that he was surprised at how the media reported the violence and Marxist messaging of the protesters.
“I was really shocked to see that the narrative was that, in my view, anti-democratic political violence was legitimate acts of protest because people were concerned about racism or all these other lies,” he said.
“For the next four years, I just continued going out with my video camera … and in 2019 it led to me nearly losing my life. I was covering another Antifa protest turned … and then I was ambushed in a mob beating,” he said.
“I didn’t even realize that I was being assaulted until seconds in and the punches came from everywhere on my head and my face, and I was bleeding out of my eyes and ears, and then they threw all the drinks in my eyes to humiliate me further and to laugh at me.”
Mr. Ngo was rushed to the hospital and a CT scan showed he had bleeding of the brain and nearly died.
He said the reporting from media outlets seemed to say that he had “deserved” his beat down “because they branded me far right, and some even went so far as to suggest that I may have faked my injuries.”
Mr. Ngo was attacked again at a 2021 Antifa protest, where he was choked out.
“The person who was trying to choke me out held me so tightly that the blood vessels in my eyes burst, so one of the symptoms were my eyes were completely red after that and I was hospitalized,” he said.
Other journalists, including Nick Shirley, have reported on more recent cases of Antifa members swarming local residents and Portland Police being indifferent to it.
“Just last week in Portland, Oregon, I watched a lady get trapped in her car surrounded by Antifa, and her sister messaged me after seeing the video,” Mr. Shirley said.
“She said, ‘The only reason I think my sister was safe is because you were there recording.’ I also was chased out by a member of Antifa who said he would ‘smoke me’ and next thing he knew, a DHS sniper had lasers on his chest if he was not there, who knows what would have happened that day,” he said.
“These people are very dangerous, and people wonder how they’re able to do it,” he continued. “It’s the reason is because these cities are not enforcing the law. And why should these people be worried if the law is not being enforced.”
• Kerry Picket can be reached at kpicket@washingtontimes.com.