Attorney General Pam Bondi sent a memo Thursday to all federal prosecutors outlining methods for bringing charges against various entities they accuse of being aligned with antifa.
Bondi’s memo could be the starting point for charges against a number of left-leaning advocacy groups and nonprofits the Trump administration has accused without evidence of having ties to extremists.
While broadly drafted as a memo on how to combat domestic terrorism and political violence, the memo cites only antifa as an example and lists its opposition to issues favored by the Trump administration.
A portmanteau for anti-fascism, experts have said antifa is not a group but rather an ideology, criticizing President Trump’s September order labeling them a domestic terror group. That designation is typically used to target groups with a clear structure and financial backing.
“President Trump directed the federal government to implement a focused strategy to root out all culpable participants-including organizers and funders-in all domestic terrorism activities,” Bondi wrote in the memo obtained by The Hill.
The Justice Department and the FBI for years have tracked the activities of extremist groups, but rather than focus on a political divide, groups have been labeled based on their motivation, including whether they are anti-government extremists.
Bondi’s memo is a departure, with its focus on one ideology. And that has drawn criticism.
“We can all agree that violence is unacceptable and should be met with the full force of the law, but that’s not what this memo does. The Justice Department already has all of the authority it needs to investigate and prosecute violence, including heinous acts of domestic terrorism,” Whistleblower Aid chief legal counsel Andrew Bakaj, who has represented whistleblowers that have spoken out against Trump.
“But instead, this memo expressly seeks to redefine political dissent against the President as domestic terrorism, directing federal law enforcement to treat categories of people as broad as ‘anti-American’ and ‘anti-Christian’ as potential domestic terrorists based solely on their beliefs.”
“Violence against what extremists claim to be fascism is the clarion call of recent domestic terrorism,” she wrote in the memo.
“These domestic terrorists use violence or the threat of violence to advance political and social agendas, including opposition to law and immigration enforcement; extreme views in favor of mass migration and open borders; adherence to radical gender ideology, anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, or anti-Christianity; support for the overthrow of the United States Government; hostility towards traditional views on family, religion, and morality; and an elevation of violence to achieve policy outcomes, such as political assassinations.”
She also directs the FBI to “disseminate an intelligence bulletin on Antifa and Antifa-aligned anarchist violent extremist groups.”
Bondi’s memo lists a number of possible statutes prosecutors could use to go after groups, including various conspiracy charges, mail and wire fraud and Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) charges.
The memo also cites the assassination of Charlie Kirk, the event that sparked the Trump administration calls to go after left-wing groups.
“With God as my witness, we are going to use every resource we have at the Department of Justice, Homeland Security and throughout this government to identify, disrupt, dismantle and destroy these networks and make America safe again for the American people,” White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller said in a conversation with Vice President Vance, who hosted Kirk’s show in September shortly after his death.
“We’re going to go after the NGO [nongovernmental organization] network that foments, facilitates and engages in violence,” Vance added.
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