3 major developments impacting Antifa heading into 2023

A series of events rocked major Antifa groups in the last several days, leading to sputtering outrage online and calls for violence.

The first incident was an attack on a Colorado Springs LGBT night club, known as Club Q, by an individual identified as Anderson Lee Aldrich. The attack killed five and wounded at least a dozen. Prosecutors filed hate crime charges, and multiple news commentaries blamed a rise in conservative media stories related to the on-going phenomena of drag queen shows performed before audiences which include children. In a court filing however, lawyers for Aldrich identified the shooter as “non-binary” and utilized “They/Them” pronouns, a move which, if true, raises questions about the shooter’s ultimate motivations.

In response, unknown individuals targeted the Colorado Springs offices of the conservative Christian group Focus on the Family, spray painting a number of slogans including “Their Blood is On Your Hands.” The Antifa group Colorado Springs Anti-fascists celebrated the vandalism incident on their twitter account.

Antifa groups have long positioned themselves as defenders of the “LGBT community” as part of their doctrine of “community armed self-defense.” Antifa rejects a traditional American understanding of an individual’s right to self-defense in favor of a communal right possessed only by perceived oppressed classes. Clearly, Antifa groups saw the recent attack as justification for their on-going behavior. Armed Antifa group Elms Fork John Brown Gun Club recently made national news for an armed and masked show of force outside a drag queen show for children at Denton, Texas restaurant. That protest was the recipient of a First amendment-protected protest by Protect Our Kids Texas, a non-profit which opposes the shows.

The second important event was Twitter, recently acquired by Elon Musk,  began banning Antifa accounts, which have long been utilized to promote and organize violent activities with little to no action by the social media giant.  The previously mentioned Elms Fork John Brown Gun Club had its account banned, as did the Antifa-linked web magazine Crimethinc, following Musk interacting with journalist and long-time Antifa critic Andy Ngo. As the Center previously testified before a U.S. Senate subcommittee, Crimethinc provides material support for acts of Antifa violence, including distributing Tactics, Techniques and Procedures (TTPS), publishing manifesto and claims of responsibility for criminal acts, as well as conducting After Action Reports (AARs) of recently conducted acts of sabotage, rioting or political violence. Antifa groups responded to the account bans by producing a number of back up accounts and issuing threats of violence against Musk, including distributing flyers calling for the targeted arson of Tesla car dealerships. Musk responded on Twitter calling the calls for arson, “concerning.” The ban should be seen as a boon for investigators and law enforcement intelligence, as multiple Antifa accounts began hurriedly publicizing lists of connected and affiliated accounts in preparation for a possible ban.

The third event was 5 defendants plead guilty to a number of charges including felony conspiracy to riot, in the on-going San Diego Antifa conspiracy case. The case focuses on a premeditated attack, organized by San Diego Antifa groups, which assaulted numerous beachgoers during a January 2021 protest. As the Post Millennial reports:

In the five new plea deals, court paperwork reveals that Antifa members Christian Martinez, Bryan Rivera, Joseph Austin Gaskins, Samuel Howard Ogden, and Alexander Akridge-Jacobs all agreed to two years probation, a fourth amendment search waiver that includes electronic devices, and to not associate with any co-defendant. Any actual custody time will be determined by the judge at a sentencing hearing in three months. Until then, all five defendants will remain at liberty on their own recognizance.

While Antifa members have faced charges because of the 2020 BLM riots and other incidents, the San Diego case represents a significant effort as a local prosecutor effectively demonstrated evidence that Antifa operates as a bona fide criminal conspiracy whose members are known to each other and who premeditate violence against political opponents.

Taken together, all three events are likely to further energize U.S-based Antifa networks heading into 2023. The Colorado Springs attack will be seen as justifying Antifa’s approach to aggressively targeting protestors at these kinds of drag show protest events, as they interpret lawful protests as equivalent to, and likely to provoke, actual violence against LGBT individuals. It’s reasonable to expect that Antifa groups will increase armed demonstrations of force at such events. Vandalism will continue and may escalate into violent retaliation against groups or individuals perceived as “anti-LGBT.”

Musk’s move to ban Antifa social media appears far from orchestrated or preplanned but if it persists it is likely to fuel the perception by Antifa members that they are beset by a growing “fascist” threat which justifies an increased response. Antifa is no stranger to seeking to exploit social media terms of service enforcement, and organized efforts to cause social media companies to ban their opponents is a time-tested Antifa tactic. Antifa groups may move recruiting and indoctrination efforts to less visible platforms, while twitter serves to interact with opponents and media and issue threats and communiques.

The decision by Antifa members in the San Diego case to plead guilty is likely intended to avoid an extensive and detailed trial which would further draw public attention to the interworkings of Antifa networks. There are historical examples of such “movement lawyering” by member of the National Lawyers Guild, who urge defendants to plea guilty in order to protect secrets rather than to further the best interest of their clients. Even so the case by San Diego District Attorney’s Office should be congratulated for demonstrating publicly the nature of Antifa’s conspiracy to suppress the constitutional rights of Americans by criminal violence. The successful outcome of the San Diego case is likely to also encourage Antifa organizers to go further underground, eschewing more visible outlets like Twitter (which played a role in the San Diego case) in favor of alternative platforms.

In conclusion, November has proven to be a month of setbacks for the Anarcho-communist movement, but it is also likely to gather some strength from the attention earned, and to be further encouraged to adopt more complex and difficult to observe security measures in the future.