America's Talking - Trump designates Antifa a 'major terrorist organization'

Starting point is 00:00:00 Greetings, everyone, and welcome to America's Talking, powered by the Center Square. I'm Dan McAulb, Chief Content Officer at Franklin News Foundation, publisher of the Center Square Newswire Service. President Donald Trump on Wednesday night said he would designate the oftentimes violent anti-conservative group Antifa, a domestic terror organization. The announcement came just two days after the Center Square's own, Sarah Roderick Fitch, asked the president that very question in an oval office gaggle in the wake of last week's assassination of Charlie Kirk. Joining me to discuss this is that buried journalist who got the newsweek started.

Starting point is 00:00:36 The Center Square's White House correspondent, Sarah Roderick Fitch. Sarah, it's been a tumultuous time since Kirk's assassination last week. You were in front of the president and much of his cabinet this week in the Oval Office and had an opportunity to ask him a question. What lady did I ask that particular question? Well, first, I go back to the Charlie Kirk thing. It was horrible. and I actually happened to be there in the White House when that happened.

Starting point is 00:01:02 And it was a very heavy moment. It was, you could feel it. You could feel all of that in everybody there. So that was weighing in everybody's mind. But what had happened was it came out that some of these shell casings that were found at the scene had some stuff inscripted in it that has been attributed to Antifa. And obviously this, we don't know for sure the motive, but it's, it's pointing to probably left-wing violence, which has been, which has been growing with, you know, assassination attempt of President Trump and everything. And so I was thinking about that. That's obviously been something that was weighing happening on my mind. And, and, you know, there's been a lot of talk about Antifa. It's, it's, it's sort of, I think, more of a, not to say everybody's, you know, would be a member of Antifa because it's a decentralized. organization. It's decentralized. It's sort of like an ideology in some ways. But it's really

Starting point is 00:02:04 kind of become sort of, I think, the rally cry for some of this left wing violence and people sort of attribute it to it. And so what I was thinking when I was going in there was, okay, wanting to ask a question that was going to obviously touch on Charlie Kirk's assassination and kind of what, you know, some of the solutions, what can be done. Obviously, like I said, this has been something on the mind. Obviously, it's been on the mind of the president since he was almost killed himself. And it seems to be rising. And it has been happening and occurring in the cities, especially in D.C. D.C., it really took a hit during the summer of 2020 with sort of the riots and stuff then. But anyway, so, you know, I went in there and that was, I really wanted to

Starting point is 00:02:49 know. I wanted something that was going to be direct. And I know the president, he is all about action and getting things done. And it just was, okay, let's see if this has been happening. This has been talked about. This is, you know, if there's going to be an opportunity, this is going to be the opportunity for that. So the president was definitely very on board. And I would say that his couldn't really see it on the cameras, but his many members of cabinets were very receptive to it, too, just some of the reactions that they were giving me, especially the Attorney General. she looked kind of pleased with the answer. But yeah, it's been a very, I think it's been a long road. And you could just sort of see that. It's coming, you know, coming to it. And what this now kind of allows is it opens up the doors for funding sources. And I asked the president, I tried pressing him. He said he's going to just go after some other organizations. I did try to get some names. He wouldn't he wouldn't budge on that. But he definitely expanded on sort of these next. steps and how they're going to tackle this problem and maybe even sort of desractalization

Starting point is 00:03:57 that's going on. So first, as you mentioned, Antifa is more of like a movement. It's a decentralized movement with factions spread out throughout the country. There's not really like an Antifa leader, a single Antifa leader. It's a series of groups. And the name itself, Antifa anti-fascist. The movement was born during President Trump's first term, and it has grown significantly across the country. The center, one place where Antiva is particularly strong and violent is, well, two places, Seattle and Portland out on the West Coast.

Starting point is 00:04:39 Our Seattle-based reporter did some follow-up reporting to your reporting and talked to the Seattle Police Chiefs. Union, which is having to deal, the Seattle police are having to deal with these violent Antifa protests across the country. And he was in support of the president's decision. I would think many police departments across the country would also be in support of that. Absolutely. Absolutely. Because, well, actually, even on the West Coast in Portland and Washington, is a bit more organized out there. There are some actual chapters and stuff. But yeah, They have, there's been targets, the, the incident that happened on the police academy or the proposed police academy in Georgia. That's sort of been connected to, hey, is that connected to Antifa?

Starting point is 00:05:29 They've targeted police officers, assaulting police officers. Obviously in these riots, it has made really difficult for police officers to go in there and try to break these up. I mean, throwing rocks. And the president did mention that, you know, concrete. He did say, where is this coming from? You know, where's the money for this? Who's funding these groups? Yes. Yeah, who's funding these groups?

Starting point is 00:05:49 And now with this, it allows the government to sort of go after the funding sources, to sort of really kind of break this up and to sort of, you know, help, you know, probably take away some of that, you know, try to, you know, alleviate some of those criminal elements, some of that stuff that allows them to get these, you know, those weapons, like the stuff that the chas, you know, that was going on. What was behind that? Who was funding that? But, yeah, that is a danger.

Starting point is 00:06:13 it's definitely dangerous, not only to public figures, but absolutely law enforcement, because part of the movement is he's trying to go after, you know, they, there's just anti-government and sort of anarchist, you know, anti-government, anti-establishment, everything like that. So seeing police officers in that respect, they, of course they do, they target, they have targeted police officers. And it does, it certainly makes it dangerous. And in places like Portland and Seattle, they already have an uphill battle with just everyday crime, not to mention, you know, the other stuff that they have to do. And I've lived in that area. I've lived in the Seattle area. It's, there are always protests, it seems, that are happening. And unfortunately, a lot of times they do turn violent. And

Starting point is 00:06:56 part of that has been attributed to Antifa. Thank you for joining us today, Sarah. It was the right question at the right moment. Listeners can keep up with this ongoing story and more at the center square.com. Thank you.

America's Talking - Trump designates Antifa a 'major terrorist organization'

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