A top FBI official toed the White House line about antifa as a major domestic terror threat at a House hearing on Thursday — but he struggled to answer questions about the leaderless movement.

Pressed repeatedly by a top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee about antifa’s size and location, the operations director of the FBI’s national security division didn’t have answers.

At one point, the FBI’s Michael Glasheen fumbled with his hands as he tried to find an answer for the question from Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss.

“Well, the investigations are active,” Glasheen said.

Glasheen’s comments came three months after President Donald Trump proclaimed that antifa is a “major terror organization,” even though it the broad political movement does not have a hierarchy or leadership.

Trump followed his designation with a presidential memo on September 25 directing the FBI-led Joint Terrorism Task Forces to investigate and prosecute antifascists and other adherents of “anti-Americanism.”

The formless nature of the antifascist movement, however, appears to have flummoxed the FBI as it attempts to carry out Trump’s orders.

Glasheen called antifa “our primary concern right now” and called it “the most immediate, violent threat” from domestic terrorists. That led Thompson to ask him where antifa is located and how many members it has.

“We are building out the infrastructure right now,” Glasheen said.

“So what does that mean?” Thompson shot back. “I’m just — we’re trying to get the information. You said antifa is a terrorist organization. Tell us, as a committee, how did you come to that? Where do they exist? How many members do they have in the United States as of right now?”

“Well, that’s very fluid,” Glasheen said. “It’s ongoing for us to understand that. The same, no different than Al Qaeda or ISIS.”

Glasheen visibly struggled to answer the question before saying that the FBI’s investigations were “active.”

  • who@feddit.org
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    2 months ago

    I wonder when Trump will learn that his claim to power comes from one of the most famous antifascist documents in the world: The Constitution of the United States.

    Edit: If anyone ever needs incontrovertible evidence that Trump is anti-American, I think his position on this qualifies.

  • anugeshtu@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    Holy shit, this is getting wilder and wilder. What’s next on the dystopian agenda? Burning all books considered as “woke”? Having everybody not voting for Trump wear some kind of marker? Censoring anything having another ideology and imprison (or worse) anybody trying to spread that information? Declaring prescription drugs as weapons of mass destruction? Oh, wait.

  • Tarquinn2049@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    Did they do the math on that sentence?

    Anti-fascists and other anti-americans.

    Anti-fascist = Anti-american

    Divide both sides by anti.

    Fascist = American

    • Logi@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      It’s a tiny bit more subtle. “and other” gives us a subset relation:

      Anti-fascists ⊂ Anti-americans

      And then applying a negation flips it to

      Fascists ⊃ Americans

      And I’m hoping this still qualifies as reductio ad absurdum.

      • Zombie@feddit.uk
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        2 months ago

        What do the horseshoe shapes mean?

        I would search online but I have no idea how to phrase it because I don’t know what I’m looking at.

        • belluck@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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          Don’t know the proper English terminology but it’s the mathematic way to write „all anti-fascists are anti-american“ and „all Americans are Fascists“ respectively

  • Today@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    I like when people show pictures of their parents and grandparents in their antifa uniforms.

  • Sam_Bass@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    Approx. 270 million members with headquarters at the corner of East and Capitol vstreets Washington, d.c. 20510

  • some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org
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    All right, fine. We meet at my place on Tuesdays. Every third Saturday is Activity Club and we vote on the event the meeting before. Last month was bowling. This month we’re taking a tour of a working farm that lets you milk their cows.

    Sorry for all the confusion, everyone. We aim to operate with complete transparency from now on.

  • k0e3@lemmy.ca
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    2 months ago

    I… I don’t have your Antifa… It’s in Bill’s house, and Fred’s House!

  • MagicShel@lemmy.zip
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    2 months ago

    Antifa headquarters are at 1060 W. Addison, Chicago, IL. And we hate Illinois Nazis.

    • metallic_substance@lemmy.world
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      I’ve been looking for my stolen bike. If anyone sees it down there, please let me know. It’s red and has tassles on the handlegrips