FBI has ‘no intelligence’ Antifa was involved in Sunday’s violence at DC protests: report

Published on June 2, 2020 By Bob Brigham

journalism today.

Attorney General Bill Barr and President Donald Trump have tried to blame Antifa — or anti-fascists — for violence in the protests against police injustice. But the public data has backed up their case, and even their on intel disputes the argument.

“he FBI’s Washington Field Office “has no intelligence indicating Antifa involvement/presence” in the violence that occurred on May 31, according to an internal FBI situation report obtained exclusively by The Nation. That same day, President Donald Trump announced on Twitter that he would designate Antifa a terrorist organization, even though the government has no existing authority to declare a domestic group a terrorist organization,” Ken Klippenstein reported for the magazine.

“The FBI report, however, states, ‘based on CHS [Confidential Human Source] canvassing, open source/social media partner engagement, and liaison, FBI WFO has no intelligence indicating Antifa involvement/presence.’ The statement followed a list of violent acts like bricks being thrown at police and a backpack containing explosive materials, which were flagged by the FBI under a ‘Key Updates’ section of the report,” The Nation reported. “The report did warn that individuals from a far-right social media group had ‘called for far-right provocateurs to attack federal agents, use automatic weapons against protesters.’”

Read the full report.