THREAT NETWORKS

Black Live Matter

BLM or Black Lives Matter was formed in response to alleged police brutality, mistreatment, racial targeting and other greivances. Many chapters and unaffiliated groups formed, some sticking close to those ideas, but other promoted socialist and Marxist ideologies.

BLM riots broke out across 2020 resulting in over $1 billion dollars in propterty damage. Additionally, there was widespread violence and even murders during BLM protests and riots in which tens of thousands participated in cities around the United States.

Despite the large number of participants and extreme actions, the movement has been dying. The Black Lives Matter Global Iniaitive and affiliates have been exposed as fronts primarily ran for the personal enrichment of a few members.

Local groups using the name Black Lives Matter are mostly inactive. Very few protest actions are conducted by any self-proclaimed BLM group.

ANTIFA

ANTIFA is a loose affiliation of groups and participants who believe they are fighting a war against fascists. The name ANTIFA is short for anti-fascist and draws inspiration from from European antifascist movements in the 1920’s and 1930’s.

Despite the name ANTIFA groups commonly align with left-wing causes, often providing protection to other groups or engaging in direct actions like vandalism, assault, and property destruction.

ANTIFA remains active although attributing specific action to ANTIFA or even a specific ANTIFA group is difficult as this is a loose confederation of actors. Some self-identified ANTIFA members do not engage or act through any specific group at all, they simply show up to protests and commit actions.

ANTIFA members commonly dress in all-black and hide their faces with a mask, a tactic called the “Black Bloc.”

Cause-Specific Groups

While BLM and ANTIFA have been the predominant groups responsible for property destruction, assaults, and other crimes in recent years, radicals are now rallying behind specific causes and groups. For example, many ANTIFA members and sympathizers participated in the Cop City protests, to protest the construction of a new police training center in Georgia.

Another example is Tyre Extinguishers, a group originating in the United Kingdom, but with unofficial chapters in multiple American cities, which let’s the air out of SUV tires to protest the resultant carbon emissions and their alleged contribution to a climate crisis.

Jane’s Revenge is group that destroys pregnancy centers across the US in protest of abortion rights.

These groups are made up of left-wing radicals. They form quickly in response to a specific issue or cause and seem to fade out of relevance quite quickly too. Many of the groups appear to have a couple dozen to a few hundred active participants, far smaller than the mass BLM protests in 2020.

Despite the smaller size and shorter lifespan, increasing division and radicalization appears to be fueling an escalation in tactics. These left-wing extremists have the capacity to conduct larger-scale violent acts. 

Lone Actors

An emerging trend is left-wing lone actors engaging in acts of violence in order to bring attention to a specific cause. Connor Sturgeon opened fire on his coworkers of the Old National Bank in Louisville, KY, to “showcase how easy it was to buy a gun in Kentucky and wanted to highlight the mental health crisis in America.” [Source]

In another instance a Female-to-Male trans person killed 3 children and 3 adults in a private Christian School in Nashville. The shooter, Audrey Hale, wrote a manifesto that presumubly includes a motive for the attack, but so far the FBI and Nashville police have refused to release it to the public. We assess thw manifesto is being witheld because the motive is related to the trans movement and would not media’s ongoing narrative that mass shootings are driven by White males.