The one big problem with Trump’s executive order “Designating Antifa as a Domestic Terrorist Organization” is that they haven’t demonstrated that sometjhing called antifa actually exists as more than as a vaguely-defined anti-authoritarian tendency. What better way then to conjure up antifa than to try to bait Portland into the mother of all antifascist confrontations,

Diagrams is a new series that aims to diagnose our contemporary authoritarian condition through conversations with left scholars, journalists, and activists including Melinda Cooper, Thea Riofrancos, and Quinn Slobodian. I spoke with them recently about the past and future of the far right in the US.  

Mayor Ras Baraka, Judge Hannah Dugan, Rep. LaMonica McIver, Sen. Alex Padilla, and Comptroller Brad Lander have all been physically assaulted, detained, and/or arrested by federal agents in the last two months. This organized fascist strategy of targeting public officials differs from the demonization of vulnerable populations themselves in that the use of state violence

The White House release of that ‘ASMR’ video of a migrant being shackled and deported was rightly attacked for its shocking dehumanization. But it revealed something else. From Nuremberg rallies to Trump rallies, we usually think of fascist leaders mobilizing popular support by igniting feelings of fear, anger, vengeance, and the violent targeting of demonized

Dear Readers, I’d like to share two new articles. The first, for LOGOS, is on the Trump rally at Madison Square Garden I attended last week. The second, for New Lines Magazine, is on the deeper crisis of liberal democracy of which fascist election denialism is a critical symptom. Hoping for the best tomorrow, or