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Spy vs Fash: Chris Mathias on His New Antifascist Spy Thriller
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On this episode of The Beautiful Idea, we speak with long-running journalist and researcher Chris Mathias on his new book, "To Catch a Fascist: The Fight to Expose the Radical Right."
In the book, Mathias profiles multiple antifascist researchers and activists, shinning a light on grassroots opposition to fascism and the everyday people that put themselves in harms way to stand up to violent white supremacists.
During our discussion, we talk about several of the people profiled in the book, as well as how many organizers and researchers are now turning their attention on ICE. We also talk about how the GOP has consumed much of the existing white nationalist movement, what happens to fascist street formations with Trump in power, and how journalists, communities, and organizers can respond.
https://bsky.app/profile/letsgomathias.bsky.social
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/30/antifa-unmasking-ice
Follow Chris and his reporting here on BlueSky and be sure to check out this piece at the Guardian about how antifascist sleuths are now turning their attention to unmasking ICE agents.
https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/To-Catch-a-Fascist/Christopher-Mathias/9781668034767
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Transcript
Introduction to Anarchist and Autonomous Movements
00:00:09
Speaker
Thanks for listening. to the beautiful idea a podcast from a collective of several anarchist and autonomous media producers scattered around the world we're bringing you interviews and stories from the front lines of autonomous social movements and struggles as well as original commentary and analysis follow us on mastodon and at the beautifulde dot show thanks for listening
00:00:44
Speaker
All right, we're joined here today with Chris
Unmasking Fascism: Chris Mathias' Insights
00:00:46
Speaker
Mathias. We're going to be talking about his book, To Catch a Fascist. The book itself is amazing. it details several anti-fascists and their work to expose white nationalist neo-Nazi groups and present an argument to you know general audience.
00:01:05
Speaker
readership That is sympathetic, but maybe on the fence about anti-fascist organizing. I think it's it's a great history. But one of the things I wanted to ask to start off is just, you know, there has been a steady stream of books about the the far right in the Charlottesville Trump moment.
00:01:22
Speaker
I'm thinking of two that are on my shelves. They're both, you know, one is kind of written by a pessimistic liberal, everything you love will burn, or sort of like a radical centrist that's like titillated and also shocked at, you know, the rise of the, you know, online far right, antisocial is that book.
00:01:39
Speaker
And all of these kind of dismiss anti-fascists or sort of belittle them. Your book is obviously much different. So why did you feel was necessary to write this book when there's already so much written about the far right and the current Trump
Understanding Antifa's Role
00:01:52
Speaker
moment? Great question. I think...
00:01:55
Speaker
You know, think you're right. Like there's a lot of, there's been a lot of books about the far right over the last 10 years in the Trump era. And, you know, a lot of people that I know from this beat i have written those books, but I didn't really see any serious time given to Antifa, which, you know, I thought fascinating.
00:02:15
Speaker
Strange because Antifa is such like a boogeyman to these very far right groups, but also so much of what we know about these far right groups comes from anti-fascist research and intelligence gathering. And I thought that, you know, that was a story that needed to be told.
00:02:33
Speaker
And, you know, also like that, like this anti-fascist research, know, you know, has really informed our understanding of this, of this political moment and all of these groups and subcultures, these fascist groups and subcultures, you know, that have, I think created or memed this moment into reality. And then, you know, I think finally, i think there's still so much confusion and dismissiveness about Antifa,
00:03:03
Speaker
and and what it is that it felt like a kind of, for like ah there was a lot of room to kind of, I think, demystify what Antifa was, to shock people, to surprise people.
00:03:15
Speaker
And, you know, I also think I had a real opportunity, and I think you touched on this in the intro, is that like, I had the opportunity because it's like a you know major publisher,
00:03:25
Speaker
and everything. i had like an opportunity, I think, to make militant anti-fascism a little more palatable or scrutable or understandable for the wider public. And i thought that was a cool task. And, you know, and also, you know, we were just talking off, you know, we weren't recording before, but we were talking about all these crazy stories we have. And there's just so many crazy stories in this line of work that rarely get told because this battle is often waged, you know, kind of in the shadows.
00:03:56
Speaker
So, you know, from like a purely narrative standpoint, you know, it's just like good stories. And, you know, I i kind of, the way I pitched the book was as a anti-fascist spy thriller.
00:04:07
Speaker
So I think, I guess that's kind of everything that, that drew me towards this subject. And, and, and also I think just that, like I say this in the introduction that, you know, I think because Antifa was the one you know, or, you know, Antifa as a phenomenon, subculture, whatever you want to call it, because they were paying such close attention to the far right and taking the threat seriously. i think they saw what was coming down the pipeline a lot sooner than the mainstream media or or the mainstream press.
Charlottesville: A Turning Point
00:04:39
Speaker
You write in the book how Charlottesville changed your perspective on, on a lot of the stuff, the threat posed by the far right, you know, its connection to Trumpism, all that stuff. you know i was listening to some of your other interviews you were doing about the book, and you were talking about how it really does seem like you know we were warned about all this stuff leading up to the killing of Renee Good and Freddie.
00:05:04
Speaker
And I'm thinking, when they were murdered, I thought automatically about Timothy Kaufman, who was a 66-year-old African-American man that was killed in Manhattan.
00:05:16
Speaker
by a neo-Nazi. Yeah, there was a fan of Richard Spencer that traveled to New York to kill black people, literally, and brought a sword and stabbed him with it. You know, it's like we didn't wake up with Heather Heyer being murdered. You know, there were people along the way that were killed leading up to this, and the media just kind of shrugged.
00:05:34
Speaker
Why was Charlottesville this turning point for you personally? Yeah, i think, you know, it was a radicalizing moment for a lot of people. I think, you know I've said this in other podcasts other interviews, but I don't think, I think if you were in Charlottesville that day, either as a fascist, anti-fascist journalist, police officer, otherwise your life kind of was irrevocably changed by that day. You know, for me, it obviously began this journey to investigate the far right and, you know, led to this book and and to me meeting you guys and then talking to you now.
00:06:09
Speaker
But I think, you know, as for maybe my my personal politics a little bit, I think I was pretty, don't know, normie, lib, lib when I turned up in Charlottesville and was not, I just, there was so much I didn't understand or or know. Yeah, I had a very dim awareness of what Antifa was at that point.
00:06:29
Speaker
And I think I still kind of probably subscribe to Antifa that notion that Antifa was kind of like the you know extremist end on the other end of the political spectrum. And it's funny, i actually haven't told this story anywhere. Maybe I'll give it to you guys. But my first kind of ah first kind of interaction maybe with what might be considered Antifa is after...
00:06:52
Speaker
the torch march, I like missed the torch march, but I was across the campus in a church where there was a service being held. And I came out as the torch march had just finished. And after all the Nazis had attacked the protesters and the protesters were, you know,
00:07:10
Speaker
They were injured. the you know The anti-fascist protesters were injured. They were putting like milk in their eyes from the pepper spray. They were recovering. And I stood up on a hill and started to record. And one of the anti-fascists was like, hey, please don't record. But like I still didn't quite have an understanding. like To me, I was like, well, they're in a public park. like This is news. I'm going to record. And then one of them came up to me and was like, basically, you know, showed me a weapon on her side and and said, yeah I needed to stop recording.
00:07:39
Speaker
That was actually kind of my introduction. And i think, you know, then the next day obviously was the, you know, just one of the more horrifying days, you know, just pitched battle battles in the streets. And I think, know,
00:07:55
Speaker
Seeing that many, you know, a thousand people, thousand white supremacists feeling kind of comfortable going, largely unmasked, feeling emboldened to hold a rally like that.
00:08:07
Speaker
And to see kind of like the actual like viciousness and and rage with which they marched into the park, I think shocked a lot of people and kind of disrupted this, I think maybe progressive or liberal notion that, you know, we're on this kind of inevitable path. March forward, you know, we're always progressing. i think what a lot of people saw that day, they had previously thought was relegated to a bygone era.
00:08:33
Speaker
And, you know, and then of course, there's what happened afterwards, you know, Trump calling everyone, calling saying there were very fine people in the park.
00:08:44
Speaker
And you know I think it just kind of signified to a lot of people that there was like a real emergency happening. And you know ah then it was the beginning of my journey where I started to investigate people. And I quickly realized that Antifa was doing the best research and I got to know them and know the work they were doing. And I think, you know, like them over the last 10 years, I've had a bit of a front row seat to what's been happening and, you know, realized pretty quickly that stuff I thought was fringe ideas that were fringe actually weren't that fringe at all.
Undercover in Anti-Fascist Efforts
00:09:22
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, so many journalists that we talked to, definitely Charlottesville was such a turning point. But yeah, there was a, I think before that, there was sort of a refrain, as you were saying, of sort of one side is, you know, rich kids with bad haircuts, and the other side is working class kids with dumb ideas.
00:09:39
Speaker
you know the extremes being stupid and the rest of us just have to suffer through it. And you know now The Atlantic is writing pieces about, yes, it is fascism. know. So it's interesting to see that trajectory. you know Much of the book details several anti-fascists personally in their undercover work. Talk about some of the challenges that they face. I don't want to give too much of the game away because it's it there's so much good stuff in it. And the the narratives...
00:10:06
Speaker
about the people undercover are so good, but just talk a little bit about that. I mean, you mentioned this is a spy novel, so tease it out a little bit. Yeah, sure. you know I think I mentioned this in the introduction to the book, but like you know I did not realize that Antifa had, you know honest to God, spies really before I arrived in Charlottesville, or did I realize that you know even in the planning server for the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, there was an anti-fascist spy in there collecting, you know, all of this, all these messages, all all these ah posts, videos, photos, that means that these Nazis were sending to each other. And, you know, I think understood kind of the murderous intent that these Nazis were going to turn up in Charlottesville with.
00:10:52
Speaker
And, you know, basically there was an effort to warn city officials about this, but they were ignored. But, you know, i think in the process of reporting this book, I ended up interviewing like 60 people probably. And,
00:11:04
Speaker
every time i asked them, like, what is you know one of your favorite kind of stories or or doxes or you know whatever from kind of the last 10 years, the the Trump era of anti-fascist work? And a lot of people kept telling me about this particular infiltration. And I don't think this gives too much away, but a big part of my book deals with a character who we'll call Vincent, who goes undercover into Patriot Front in the Pacific Northwest. And, you know, there are a lot of anti-fascist infiltrations that just occur online. You know, you might have to do, for example, the the guy that went undercover into Identity Europa, who I talked to in the book, you know, he had to do a interview over like a phone call or a, you know, video conference. And then for the most part, his infiltration was just online.
00:11:56
Speaker
But with the Patriot Front infiltration, and there are other examples of this, you know Patriot Front requires in-person activity. like You have to go on missions, you have to go on hikes, you have to go to meetings, you have to go on their marches.
00:12:11
Speaker
So when Vincent, this anti-fascist, you know infiltrates Patriot Front, he's in person, he's doing like method acting, pretending to be a white supremacist.
00:12:22
Speaker
And it's really wild and suspenseful. And I and i think you know ultimately was very fruitful for the intelligence. that he, ah he gathered. And, you know, basically i try to like a weave a theme or motif through the book, which is that, you know, there's always been masked like white supremacy or or masked fascism in America. But as long as that's exists, existed, there's been,
00:12:50
Speaker
efforts to go undercover into those groups and and and rip those masks off. And I think what makes, you know, Vincent's iteration of that interesting is that so many of those like kind of past spies in American history or the people going undercover into the Klan and whatnot, we're often doing that in conjunction with law enforcement. And ironically, were you know they would go undercover into these groups working with law enforcement and then end ending up finding out that a lot of the people in the Klan or other groups were cops.
00:13:22
Speaker
But what makes Vincent's espionage so interesting is that you know he is an anarchist and an anti-fascist and does not work with law enforcement. So he was, you know, largely doing this pretty dangerous thing on his own, you know, with some help from some other anti-fascists. But i don't know, just to me, it's just a pretty remarkable story.
00:13:42
Speaker
Yeah, there's so many aspects to it. And again, I don't want to give away too much to the listener because it's really good. It's a really good story. It's it's some some interesting, as you said, spy stuff in there.
00:13:57
Speaker
One of the other aspects is the impact that a lot of the undercover investigative stuff to the tune of you know online infiltration, people getting into servers and things like that. And some of that's coupled with IRL infiltration. But talk a little bit about the impact of publications and groups like Unicorn Riot and publishing some of these investigative dives and just big leaks. I mean, how did these play such a huge role in pushing back against some of these organizations?
Unicorn Riot: Open-Source Anti-Fascism
00:14:28
Speaker
Yeah, totally. You know, so I think we've, we kind of forget the degree to which Trump's first rise to the White House corresponded with this explosion in secretive masked white supremacist groups. And, you know, it's a bit of a chicken or egg, you know, I think Charlottesville, in a way, was a celebration. they These groups felt that they had kind of propelled Trump into the White House. They they they memed him into the White House.
00:14:52
Speaker
But you know they were oftentimes organizing in private spaces online. They would, in in Patriot Front's case, they... only knew each other by their pseudonyms.
00:15:04
Speaker
So, you know, basically this new generation of fascists was like hiding their real identities because they still realized that their views were, you know, just reprehensible enough to the wider public that they would face consequences. So a big part of the anti-fascist project became like,
00:15:24
Speaker
unmasking this new generation of fascists and figuring out who they were. And because there was such so much of the organizing and that these fascist groups did was online. And because they were using private servers, you know, the goal became, know, going and getting into those servers and getting as many messages as you could get.
00:15:42
Speaker
And, you know, in Vincent's case, I think he walks away with 440 gigabytes worth of messages and photos and videos. And there's so many examples of this, you know, starting in 2016, I think, where anti-fascists are, you know, getting so many like Nazi messages, but there needs to be like a hub for those messages, like kind of an open source database that, you know, anti-fascists from across the country can go through and and sort through and find clues to, you know, unmask Nazis. And that's where Unicorn Riot enters the the stage. And I think Unicorn Riot creates this
00:16:18
Speaker
database, and I think, you know, and still kind of maybe called the Discord Weeks database, but it ends up being this invaluable hub for anti-fascist research. And, you know, millions and millions of of messages sent by this kind of, you know, new invisible empire in in American politics of of Nazis communicating with each other. It's like a remarkable archive. Like I can imagine historians like mining through this you know, decades hence.
00:16:46
Speaker
But, you know, through those, through this open database, you know, I would argue thousands of Nazis have been identified and, you You know, what I will say is, I'm sure many of your listeners are familiar with Unicorn Riot, but it's, you know, obviously an an independent media outlet that I think most people know, a lot of them know, people know it for its like live streams from demonstrations, especially in 2020.
00:17:13
Speaker
But, you know, had like the New York Times like... compiled a database like that, they like would have, don't know. I think they would have won awards like, but because it was Unicorn Riot doing it, it didn't, I don't think it got like the amount of like attention it deserved as like, and just a complete feat of data journalism. And also that it was like, so like, you know, generous and and open source and that anyone could go through it. Like, so just a remarkable thing.
00:17:41
Speaker
Yeah, totally. It remains you know a huge resource for journalists and researchers and organizers. Well, you kind of mentioned this in another answer to one of the questions, but you know a lot of the people unmasked in neo-Nazi and white nationalist far-right groups are in positions of power and authority, either law enforcement, maybe they work in the defense industry. In some cases, they're they're literally involved in like things like the State Department. Talk a little bit about
Exposing White Supremacy in Power
00:18:08
Speaker
that.
00:18:08
Speaker
yeah What sort of things have you seen that sort of continue to pop up, and and what has their response been when these people are unmasked? Yeah, so I think like that was the really horrifying part of what anti-fascist research revealed, which was that, you know,
00:18:25
Speaker
this kind of new generation of of fascists, you know, weren't, I think as a stereotype might've gone like, you know, weird, like 4chan nerds in their basement. although Although like there were some of those, or, you know, I think there was still prior to Charlottesville, this idea that, you know, racist white supremacists were, you know, either like neo-Nazi skinheads or, you know, kind of like,
00:18:48
Speaker
redneck Klansmen. You know, what anti-fascist research did was kind of upend a lot of those stereotypes and show that like this new fascist generation was made up of people with real power.
00:19:04
Speaker
And, you know, before we started recording, we talked about Johnny O'Malley. Johnny O'Malley, that was his his nickname. His real name was Johnny Donnelly, but he was Richard Spencer's bodyguard in Charlottesville.
00:19:17
Speaker
And then he, after Charlottesville, he went home to Wilburne, Massachusetts and put on his police uniform. And he was a cop for a few more years until anti-fascist researchers figured out who he was.
00:19:29
Speaker
And then there are so many other stories like that where anti-fascist research contributed to the identification of a guy named Judd Blevins. who was in Identity Europa and ended up becoming a member of city council in Eden, Oklahoma.
00:19:45
Speaker
You had multiple cases of teachers, high school teachers, being unmasked as white supremacists or having been like marched in Charlottesville, you know, where they would brag in chats about indoctrinating their students with, you know, the red pill and and and white nationalism. And,
00:20:01
Speaker
You had professors at Oklahoma State and and Furman University in South Carolina. You had pastors in leading churches in North Dakota.
00:20:12
Speaker
In one case, there was a therapist. There was, i mean, just kind of... every conceivable position of power, you know, anti-fascists were revealing that this new generation of fascists, you know, were, were in those positions of power. And I think like they had a ah lot of success in getting a lot of these Nazis fired there for a while, you know, kind of making a real impact and and a dent on, uh, this kind of new generation, like alt-right groups.
00:20:45
Speaker
So, Yeah. Yeah, one one positive thing I do want to say, i know that you've mentioned this in this interview and several other ones, the ah Identity Europa guy, ah Blevins, that won yeah the city council race after it was revealed that he was a member of this white supremacist group. Actually, there was a recall campaign to remove him afterwards, and that was successful. And the person running against him was you know replaced him, which is interesting. And I believe she also is ah ran as a Republican.
00:21:16
Speaker
So it it was an interesting campaign. There was a whole organizing aspect to it and it was successful. So I don't know, one one success story though I would throw out there. Oh, no, totally. Yeah. I mean, you know it was interesting. I went to Union, Oklahoma for that story because basically i thought it was so fascinating. Like this dude was exposed as a Nazi. There's photos of him in Charlottesville, but the town voted him into city council anyway.
00:21:41
Speaker
And you know when i when I would talk to people in that town who voted for him, they just like they didn't believe it. They they didn't really believe the like the news stories about him being in Charlottesville. Or they alternately believed that Charlottesville actually wasn't that bad and that they had been lied to about it.
00:21:57
Speaker
But you know eventually, this like small band of progressives bands together to do a recall election. When I joined them at a city council meeting and this remarkable thing happened where, you know, we're we're talking about all these messages, private messages that Nazis sent to each other that anti-fascist spies obtained. They take turns going up to the podium and reading the words that Judd Blevins wrote in the Identity Europa Discord server to him and i to the entire city council and to all the people at this city council meeting, basically to demonstrate that he is a Nazi. it was And it was just kind of ah a remarkable thing to witness. towards the end of the book, you speak with a former member of Patriot Front.
00:22:37
Speaker
And did you speak with other people that that sort of come out, either they leave or they're pushed out of white nationalist neo-Nazi groups? I'm just curious how that
A Former Extremist's Perspective
00:22:48
Speaker
went. I mean, that's I feel like that's one of the more powerful parts of the book ah for sure is this interview with this person that is a former member and sort of the candid nature of their discussion, how they view the threat of the far right right now.
00:23:04
Speaker
Yeah, thanks for asking about that. I initially had a totally different ending to the book and then was connected to this person. And I'm i'm really glad it worked out that way. But yeah, so I have talked to, you know, I think in our world, they're often called formers, right? You know, people that were in kind of organized fascism, but decided to leave and, and, uh,
00:23:26
Speaker
kind of reform themselves. And I did talk to multiple formers for the book, but I decided to tell the story of who a guy I called George, who was in Patriot Front.
00:23:38
Speaker
And you know i don't discuss in too much detail like where or what he did in Patriot Front exactly, because he's you know still worried about his identity being known. But you know I think the maybe more remarkable aspect of his story is you know he's in Patriot Front for years.
00:23:58
Speaker
you know, for however out however long. And he has this shit job somewhere in the country where there's a lot of downtime and he has no one to talk to. He's bored out of the skull.
00:24:12
Speaker
But all of his coworkers are not white. They're Latino or black. So he just starts shooting the shit with them. Yeah. You know, very casual conversation just to pass the time. They start like watching stupid shit on their phones together, like TikTok videos, what have you. talking about it.
00:24:30
Speaker
And eventually he' you know he's in Patriot Front, but he's finding himself becoming friends with his coworkers who who aren't white. And you know for that reason, and for a lot of other reasons, I think kind of internal dysfunction in Patriot Front, he decides to leave and he I think one of the fascinating things he describes is like how scary it was to leave because when you're in these groups, your entire world is constructed around the group.
00:24:57
Speaker
It does oftentimes act like a, like a call. So to leave, to embark on ah a new life is to, you're like a lot of loneliness, like kind of looms ahead of you. It's a, it's a big step.
00:25:08
Speaker
So he he talks about that and, you know, the kind of big strides he made in in leaving Patriot Front. But then, you know, on the other end of it He sees kind of Patriot Front's talking points and its propaganda suddenly go completely mainstream. I think he has a quote to me where, you know, he's listening to a Trump speech and it sounds remarkably like a Thomas Rousseau rousseau's speech, Thomas Rousseau being the the leader of of Patriot Front.
00:25:39
Speaker
And then there's other things too, like he's like looking at ICE officers and they dress Exactly like Patriot Front members. There's another story where ICE agents pile into the back of U-Haul trucks in California to raid a Home Depot and basically, you know, abduct immigrants and send them off to the camps, which is a tactic that Patriot Front uses for its flash mob marches. They arrive by U-Haul.
00:26:02
Speaker
So at any rate, you know, he has this incredibly strange experience of leaving this cult behind him and then seeing the ideology of that cult in the White House. So, yeah, I thought his story was pretty remarkable.
00:26:17
Speaker
You know, I wanted to ask you, this kind of brings up the question is what is your read about the white nationalist movement now operating under Trump
White Nationalism Under Trump 2.0
00:26:25
Speaker
2.0? I mean, you brought a Patriot Front. I mean, i can't help but thinking about, i don't know if it was Blood Tribe or...
00:26:31
Speaker
the even dumber one, Hate Club, which they did like one of their little pop-up rallies where they dress in like, I don't know, pajamas and they, you know, just extreme stuff. But the the banner they had was like something about Trump and Epstein, you know, seemingly against Trump. So, I mean, I i guess i guess what I'm asking is like, how do you see them operating right now? Are they sort of like flying under the radar, radar trying to build up their numbers?
00:26:59
Speaker
You know, is it sort of like a a a deflation with the GOP and just kind of like kind of cribbing from their movement? Are they trying to like struggle to find stuff to do? you know, like the proud boys are kind of kicking their feet up and just sitting back and watching the show.
00:27:18
Speaker
So yeah what are these other groups? How are they kind of moving in the current terrain? Yeah. So I think you're kind of touching on you know, one of the narratives of of the book, which is that there were so many groups in like 2017, 2018, 2019, you know, now those groups are fewer and far between. i feel like um the, the like newer groups that have formed are, you know, like blood tribe, goyim defense league that are like, you know, kind of like, obviously they're scary and bad, but they're like kind of cartoonishly,
00:27:52
Speaker
Nazi, like they're like bonehead groups. You know, they're not like doing like the suit and tie thing like Identity Europa did. I think, you know, part of the reason maybe we don't see kind of fascist street organizing in the same way is that, you know, they are essentially in power. Like I think like...
00:28:10
Speaker
like the GOP is essentially Groyper-fied by this point. i I feel like most congressional, GOP congressional offices have staffers who are Groypers. You know, you look at the like White House social media accounts and they're posting straight up, straight up the kind of propaganda you would see in online far-right spaces a few years ago.
00:28:29
Speaker
And, you know, Patriot Front is still hanging around. i think one of the places that a lot of the energy for kind of organized fascism is right now is um active clubs and active clubs are, I'm sure you're a lot of your listeners know, but you know, there's like this, it's kind of headed by Robert Rundo, Rob Rundo. And it's, you know, basically Nazi organizing around MMA gyms.
00:28:53
Speaker
And I think, you know, so a lot of that organizing is kind of happening a little bit above ground. Like there are gyms that active clubs own, and are operating and they're not necessarily hiding. So, and active clubs and Patriot front have a lot of membership, like crossover and ah collaboration. So I think like as for kind of street organizing, that's I think one place to really pay attention, but yeah, I mean, it just feels like a much different landscape than it was 2017, 2018, 2019.
00:29:25
Speaker
in twenty seventeen twenty eighteen twenty nineteen this is Is that how you feel? Yeah, it's different. I think the movement has sort of split into two camps. There's sort of the, you know, speaking of the white nationalist movement, there's sort of the the groipers, which seem sort of uninterested in sort of the street stuff. You know, their interest is, you know, becoming the leader of the local TPUSA chapter or yeah becoming a staffer. you know, making videos for, you know, DeSantis or, or you know, Gosar or something like that.
00:29:56
Speaker
I mean, I think that begs the question of like, you know, how do grassroots anti-fascist movements respond to that? How do they expose these people?
Community Resistance: Anti-ICE Actions
00:30:05
Speaker
drawing in the sand. How do how do we, and I think this is ah another thing that we've talked to other people about, like what does, you know, oppositional, anti-fascist, anti-racist research and reporting and journalism look like at a time when the state is literally, you know, posting moon man memes from like 2015 or something like that, which is So then you're confronted with this reality where you have to like explain to people why this is a big deal and who they're sort of telegraphing to. Because I think a lot of that is they're just trying to, I mean, this is part of the strategy of ICE and DHS right now. like We're going to go to gun shows. we're going to like outreach to people that watch certain videos. You know, they're, they're telegraphing to people that they want them to be involved in what's going on and support it and be like, like, look, we're on your side. You know, it'd be like if Bernie came out again and said, Hey, I'm running vote for me in 2028 to get suit for your family or something like that. You know, it's just like some, like no one except if you're terminating online within this certain part of the left would understand that.
00:31:10
Speaker
And I think that's very much what they're doing right there. It's something like so stupid that most people are just going to shrug it off because they don't understand it. But if you're part of that, you understand exactly what's going on.
00:31:22
Speaker
I even think Richard Spencer, I heard said on a recent podcast where he said like, this is so dumb, like that they're doing this. But I think again, it's just like, they're trying to get people invested in their project, which is like, you know, been been a huge part of what the far right people like Steve Bannon have attempted to do for so long. They need foot soldiers. They need people online making memes about stuff. you know, this is such a huge part of their project right now is just this online sort of vibe session.
00:31:51
Speaker
And then, you know, the other aspect besides the Groypers is yeah, the, the active clubs and the white nationalists and the proud boys and sort of that whole ecosystem, know, And I think most people just kind of see it as they're trying to build themselves back up and get ready for whatever comes. I think what's interesting is that we haven't seen sort of a right wing action cycle in the street. It looked like for a second that there might be something around the Charlie Kirk stuff because you saw a couple of those people like former Ram members sort of come out. I can't remember that guy who's got like a Spanish surname, but like was part of Ram and
00:32:28
Speaker
you know ah they they kind of show up every once in a while, but they came out to some Charlie Kirk stuff. Yeah, yeah with like sort of like mixed results. I think one of them ended up getting in a fight with some of the ah Charlie Kirk vigil goers like in Southern California.
00:32:44
Speaker
And they they beat the shit out. It's pretty sad. They beat the shit out of some right-wing people. So, um yeah, sort of mixed results like with that. I think by now, i was expecting to see sort of a so similar pattern as 2020 because, you know, the George Floyd uprising happened and then a couple months later you had people come out like back the blue type rallies. You know, I was expecting we would be seeing like support ice stuff.
00:33:11
Speaker
I mean, maybe that will happen. it It just seems like I think it's indicative of the moment we're in where the far right sort of like MAGA base is really deflated. I think there's a lot of cracks in that coalition.
00:33:22
Speaker
And i think more and more people are not liking what they're seeing. But also, I don't know, maybe we haven't seen the start of their cycle in terms of getting activated. i don't know.
00:33:34
Speaker
Yeah, no, i think I think that's right. And I think like, you know, we can talk about Minneapolis in a minute if you want, but like the kind of, I think, like brutal violence that's being documented by ICE and the like experience of maybe even Trump supporters seeing their neighbors like abducted and seeing how ICE behaving, like You know, i hadn't really thought about like where are the support ICE demonstrations, but that's like a really good question. i think there's there's and there's been like polls like, you know, ICE's popularity is just like cratering. And like you have slogans like abolish ICE reaching like record levels of support.
00:34:16
Speaker
i think I think I saw one poll that 20% of Republicans supported. i was just going to say 20%. I mean, like and also just among like you know younger, millennial, and below, support for Trump, especially among young men, has totally swung. So I think that begs the question for a lot of these, i mean, not to cut you off, but for a lot of these groups, you know how do they maneuver in that? Are they positioning themselves sort of like a like Marjorie Taylor Greene is, is that we want, yeah basically their slogan is, you know, true Trumpism has never been tried. Like, go for us and we'll actually do it, you know? Or are they saying, like, we need to go farther. We are the real deal. we want actual fascism. Because, I mean, so much of, like, the Fuentes wing is just sort of cheerleading
00:35:04
Speaker
For more authoritarianism, for Trump to basically take the plunge and just go all the way, go all 14. You know, and I think they're very good at that, you know, just trying to push him, which I mean, is ironic because the more that he.
00:35:20
Speaker
does that. And I mean, I think a lot of the people that are sort of in his orbit, you know, the Bannons and the Jack Posobics and all those people, I mean, theyre they're the ones that are helping to push the policies that are making him so underwater and so unpopular. I mean, if they were if they were smarter and they didn't listen to those people, they would get so much more of their stuff done and they would have so much more support. But because they're so internet rat fucked and they've got all these people running their shit, they just can't get out of this cycle. They've literally convinced themselves that this is the way the world works and it doesn't.
00:36:00
Speaker
Right. like They're like terminally online like brain worms. like Yeah, Stephen Miller, Posobiec, etc. That reminds me, by the way, did you did you see the White House round roundtable on Antifa?
00:36:14
Speaker
I mean, I saw clips of it. It was hard to watch. But yeah, like having them having them talk about like how dangerous mutual aid is and stuff like that. I mean, stuff like this, i I go back to this, but when Milo came back to UC Berkeley after there was that that initial demonstration, which shut it down, but he came back and it was funny because like, I think like a hundred people came out to like protest. Like it was a huge, thing I think I was, I was there for that one. Yeah. Right. Well, Mike Cernovich of Pizzagate fame came out sort of like as to stand in solidarity with, you know, Milo. And he did this really low energy, like defeated, sad interview with Tim pool in a hotel room. And it's, it's a great exchange, but,
00:36:58
Speaker
he I don't know if it was like a moment of clarity or you know he was just tired, but he he literally straight up told, and I'm speaking almost verbatim, he told Tim Pool and he said, look, I'm a nihilist. like If I want to attack the Democrats and get Republicans elected, I'm going to lie and make people believe what I want them to believe. And Tim said, Oh, that bums me out. But I yeah like i mean, it was it's such a good quote because it just exposes everything i'm about their project. And I really do think they really hate most working class ah MAGA supporters. Like they just have such a low opinion of them. Like they believe these people are just clay to be molded and They're just so stupid and they'll believe anything. I mean, I think the Epstein stuff is probably the epitome of that. I mean, the way that the Trump administration was able to basically make a couple calls and say, like, you've got to get on board with this. Like, this is the this is the regime's talking points. So either you switch or you're cut off.
00:38:02
Speaker
And people basically towed the line. So it's it's wild to see like Pizzagate, you know, Jack Posobiec in the mix, you know, basically made his bones on this conspiracy theory about pedophiles.
00:38:15
Speaker
and And now he's in the position of defending the Trump administration that is just all over the Epstein files. Yeah, it's it's crazy times. Yeah, I was going to ask this later, but I'll ask it now. I mean, I think kind of piggybacking on this thread, what do you make of, and of course we could have a whole conversation about their pushing to associate anti-fascism with domestic terrorism, this could be a whole podcast, but what do you make of The inverse of that, which is that a lot of the progressive, older, retired folks that are coming out to the No Kings demonstrations, and I've seen this myself, associating with the label of anti-fascist, even Antifa. I mean, I'm not just talking about you like boomers on Blue Sky posting World War II stuff saying the original Antifa, which is kind of like, okay. But I mean, people literally...
00:39:09
Speaker
taking on the label and running with it. I think that's pretty fascinating. I mean, what do you make of that? No, I mean, I think it's, um I think it's really fascinating too. And I think like, especially I've said this, ah you know, a few other places, but I, to me, and I'd love to hear what you think about this, like the parallels between what happened, like the uprising against ICE in Minneapolis, the parallels between that and kind of the anti-fascist response to the wave of alt-right street organizing in 2017, 2018, 2019 is like really fascinating. Like, you know, how is, how did the Minneapolis community rise up?
00:39:48
Speaker
They did all this stuff that we saw back then, right? They are practicing that axiom of we go where they go. They are monitoring ice they are following ice wherever they go they're blowing whistles they're posting about you know the locations of ice agents and ice raids they are doing research to unmask ice agents they are pressuring hotels and and venues and and restaurants not to do business with ice you know they are doing this type of like direct confrontation this type of like
00:40:22
Speaker
you know, no platform, no no collaboration with ICE. Like they're they're like working to create a social cost for being associated with ICE in much the same way that I think anti-fascists did back in 2017, 18, 19.
00:40:36
Speaker
And I think that is a real reflection on the fact that a lot of people in Minneapolis, including, you know you know, maybe these kind of like boomer libs, are realizing that like no one is coming to save them. No one is coming to protect their neighbors. like The Democratic Party, you know as an institution, isn't really anywhere to be found on the street.
00:40:59
Speaker
the Certainly, law enforcement, the police department, isn't going to help out. you know This is the same police department, of course, that killed George Floyd. And that, like you know I think there is this embrace, this like kind of mass embrace of what can be described as militant anti-fascist tactics because people are realizing that, you know, that other axiom of like that idea of we protect us, like, you know, like no one's coming to save us. Like we have to do it our our ourselves. So I think like it in that sense, know,
00:41:33
Speaker
you know, it's a pretty heartening development. I think it's like a radicalizing moment for a lot of people that is changing their perspective on their country, the the world, their politics. Yeah, I think it's huge. I mean, so much of the glue that holds ah Trumpism together and kind of binds it to the rest of the far right project huge.
00:41:55
Speaker
around immigration. you know it's It's sort of ah implicit white nationalism, although it's not explicit. And I think what made, and I say made, I don't know if it's still this way, but I think what made Trump and MAGA so powerful is that it presented sort of whiteness as a political project. It was saying, like, you can be part of this.
00:42:15
Speaker
Like, hey, maybe you're not white or whatever, but you can still, as long as you toe the line and you get involved and kind of like put on a red MAGA hat, you know it was ah It was a project that like tried to include people in it as long as you were towing the line. And I think now that it sort of enters more into explicit white nationalism, where actually it's about excluding whole groups of people, i think it becomes harder and harder for more working class people to swallow that. And you know they sort of, i think a lot of them...
00:42:49
Speaker
you know it took seriously the populism that Trump pushed and the fact that you know ai data centers are making their you know bills go up larger and stuff like that is and everything else. you know Tax cuts for billionaires, you know Elon Musk laying them off. like This is real stuff that has real impact. i mean The food stamps thing was huge. like I talk to people all the time that are impacted by that. so i mean All of these things have negative things for their coalition and for support for Trump.
00:43:19
Speaker
And I think out of the anger of ICE, people just coming together and organizing, like you were saying, in Minneapolis and beyond is such such a huge thing. And I think a lot of these kind of political labels and lines of delineation that, especially online, people think are so real are just mattering less and less. You know, it's just about like...
00:43:40
Speaker
Hey, are you going to, you know, can we have a meeting at your church? Cool. You know, are your kids going to walk out? Cool. Are you going to be here to make sure ICE doesn't mess with them when they get out of school? Awesome. Like, you know, yeah can we do mutual aid together? You know, like that's the real question I think of the time, like, and just the pressure cooker of what Trump is doing again, I think is just pushing so many people. I mean, like listening to,
00:44:04
Speaker
lots of interviews interviews with people on the ground, especially coming out of Cool Zone Media and stuff that they've done, going to Minneapolis. like One of the things that they're talking about is like you know a lot of the people you meet are people that maybe voted for Trump or could send themselves yeah Republicans, and they're still out there. They're you know this is having a No, sorry. did what Did you see that viral interview with the guy in South Jersey last week? Yeah, totally. yeah you know i like so i like like It like made me cry. it was like yeah i' I'm sure a lot of your listeners so like watched it, but it's basically you know this really like normal dude carrying an American flag.
00:44:40
Speaker
And someone asks him, like... Why are you out here? He's at some kind of demonstration against ICE. And he says, like, you know, I've never been to a protest before in my entire life.
00:44:51
Speaker
But, you know, yesterday I saw fourth and fifth graders running away from ICE agents. And he starts to cry. makes me want to cry talking about it. Like, it's it's just like, you know, I think...
00:45:03
Speaker
it just goes to exactly what you're talking about. Like it's, you know, I think people are, a lot of the stuff was, especially around immigration was like, like you said, kind of this implicit racism. And I think like Shane Burley is really smart about this. He like talks about fascism as kind of the act of like making implicit social dynamics of domination explicit, you know?
00:45:27
Speaker
And yeah, Now that people are seeing kind of the explicit version of all this, you know, seeing like this guy did, like fourth and fifth graders running away from their own government, it's going to like change people's hearts and and minds. Yeah. And I think didn't the Latinas for Trump founder come out against the deportations she said Yeah, totally. like and And I think some of that's political, too, because they're looking at the numbers and they're hearing from people. So I think some of that's not just even like what their own feelings are. They're just like, dude, we're going to get fucking creamed. like When you have like you have people in Texas losing to, I mean, like I don't know if I'm sure you saw that recent report.
00:46:13
Speaker
a sort of special election where they had like a Trump billionaire backed Republican that Trump was even stumping for truth socially. Get out and vote, get out and vote. This is for like the Texas state Senate, I believe.
00:46:23
Speaker
And then the person going up against him was like a younger, looks like, it looks like he could have been like a beefy identity Europa guy from like 2017. Like he has that kind of haircut kind of look, but he's like a, you know, a progressive former military union organizer. He's in the machinist union.
00:46:42
Speaker
And he won, and he won like by a 30-point shift. And I think, yeah you know, politically I'm an anarchist, I'm pessimistic about elections, I believe in mass movements, but that is indicative of a sea change that's not just, you know, people stayed home. It's, no, people are shifting, and you there are Republicans that actually pulled the lever for somebody else.
00:47:03
Speaker
And yeah, like you said, I mean, Again, I think that they've made themselves believe that everybody listens to these podcasts, everybody's in this world, and they don't. like They live in working class, real communities.
00:47:16
Speaker
They have to get up and go to work. And I mean, again, this is at the heart of like what made exposing these people so powerful is that it wasn't the force of the state or institutions that necessarily bent the knee and pushed them out. It was the fact that they had to wake up at the end of the day and face the people in their communities. Face their neighbors. Yeah. You know, there was like a social cost. Go ahead. No, no. Yeah, exactly. I think like you're, um you know, touching on, you know, that kind of animating question in my book, which is that like, you know, doxing, exposing, unmasking, like it leverages like explicit,
00:47:53
Speaker
like taboo, the the social taboo against like explicit white supremacy or fascism to like create a social cost. Like if you join one of these groups, we're going to find out and we're going to name and shame you and everyone in your life is going to know about it. And I think what we're seeing right now with ICE is, is that dynamic at play too. Like, you know, there's an understanding now that if you are in ICE, like like people are going to hate you. did you ah We could keep talking about viral videos right now, but did you see that the video of the high school kid punching the guy? Oh, it's been such a week for anti-ice content. It's just like an instant instant folk hero. like you know like It instantly memed where you know there's some douchebag walking through the through the hallway saying, I support ice. And this kid just comes up and says, I'm going to punch you.
00:48:43
Speaker
And it's just, it's just unbelievable. So I think like there is, i don't know. I mean, I'm feeling optimistic today. I feel like, I feel like there is a sea change. Like, you know, I think obviously everything is an emergency right now. And there was this narrative, I think in the mainstream press that like ISIS left Minneapolis and obviously that's not the case. And like, you know, they've, they're also targeting like smaller towns around the state. And, and you know, of course, know,
00:49:08
Speaker
These detention centers, these concentration camps are very much active and they are trying to you know buy up half a billion dollars worth of warehouses to make more. you know there's There's plenty to be despairing about, but like when you look at the sea change that is happening, I know can't help but feel a little hopeful. Yeah, totally. I mean, even in the Epstein stuff, I mean, I saw that there's been several school walkouts against people associated in the files. You know, there's people resigning. So I think that that pressure is going to continue to come from below. Yeah, I
Journalism vs. The Far-Right
00:49:43
Speaker
think it's good. I think people are...
00:49:45
Speaker
you know, finding the muscle memory to continue to engage in this way. And I think, like you said, I think it's only going to continue as scary as everything is. Well, just to um switch gears here, I wanted to ask. So, you know, one of the big, and this this is a question about journalism, which obviously you've written for a lot of publications.
00:50:04
Speaker
But you know one of the big things that's changed since Trump 1.0 is that so many journalists like yourself that were ri originally covering the far right beat are now just struggling to get their stuff out or they're just kind of like hustling on the independent circuit, either doing Substack or podcasts, which i mean isn't a bad thing, of course, but we're also seeing like mass layoffs at the Washington Post. There's you know obviously everything that's happening at the New York Times. and You have the situation with Barry Weiss you know coming under leadership of CBS. so you know What is your take on all this stuff? like how big of a deal How big of a deal is this? Because i mean we're definitely seeing ah consolidation of billionaire and corporate ownership of mass media and also just so many people pushed out. We're seeing the rise of ai slop.
00:50:56
Speaker
i mean what what are you What are your takes on just this whole thing? Oh, man. Yeah, I mean, there's no way to sugarcoat it. It's a pretty rough moment to be a journalist. it's It's been a rough era to be a journalist, but it's you know kind of remarkable to think about back to Charlottesville again.
00:51:13
Speaker
you know There was kind of, like like you mentioned, this kind of coterie of digital media reporters covering the far right. And you know when you look, think about the publications that were in Charlottesville doing that work. it was you know i was at HuffPost.
00:51:28
Speaker
There was BuzzFeed News, Vice, Daily Beast, you know doing like decent work. Vice is gone. BuzzFeed News is gone. Daily Beast is diminished. you know I took a buyout at HuffPost, which has had a lot of layoffs. And that whole kind of ecosystem is yeah greatly depleted. and and and And I'll say too, like not just for people on the far right beat. There are barely...
00:51:53
Speaker
Any journalism jobs out there. And like you said, there are all these trends where kind of our most, you know, quote, storied media institutions are are bending the knee to the Trump administration, you know, particularly CBS and and other places. And then, of course, Washington Post. You know, was just insane. So I, you know, I feel multiple ways about it. I i wish, you know, personally, selfishly, it'd be cool if I could get a full-time job somewhere right now and that there were more of them for like so many of the talented people I know.
00:52:26
Speaker
The flip side of that, though, is that there is kind of this burgeoning, independent, you know, nonprofit you know drive for for that type of media and like the proliferation of ah you know places like 404 Media defector and I'm blanking on other ones right now, but there are so many kind of independent sites that are free from kind of corporate pressure or that type of pressure.
00:52:52
Speaker
that are that is that are flourishing and and finding an audience and I think making a real impact. But yeah, I mean, it'ss it's really wild to consider how how much has changed over the last 10 years. and And you can't help but like,
00:53:07
Speaker
feel a little, you know, conspiratorial about it, that like the destruction of the media is a little deliberate, like, you know, Peter Thiel destroying Gawker and now Jeff Bezos basically destroying the Washington Post.
00:53:20
Speaker
And, you know, there are plenty of other examples of that, but, Yeah, crazy crazy time to be a journalist. With the continued sort of leaning in or you know amplification of white nationalist talking points and memes and stuff, I mean, and this is, again, something that isn't new. We saw Marjorie Taylor Greene attend ah conference that Nick Fuentes put on Paul Gosar's done the same.
00:53:44
Speaker
um Stephen Miller, obviously, has trafficked in white nationalist publications and ideas for a long time. i mean, he's sort of running the country right now. I think there's a bigger question, like, how do we present this information? Because it seems like people are almost always looking for some bombshell. You know, there's got to be a photo of somebody wearing a Klan robe doing a Hitler salute. I mean, although we saw that with Musk and people, you know, a lot of people couldn't wrap their heads around it.
00:54:13
Speaker
So I guess, like... what What are the roles of journalists and organizers and researchers in this moment? No, I think that's the million dollar question. And I think also, you know, there's, you know, to talk very briefly about the Musk salutes, I keep thinking about it. And it's wild how much...
00:54:31
Speaker
like deference and and credulity was, you know, granted to Musk that like, maybe they weren't Nazi salutes when of course they were fucking Nazi salutes. And I, and I think like, there's still this like pervading, I think a belief, especially in kind of liberal centrists, mainstream circles that things possibly can't be that bad that like things can't get as worse as they once were.
00:54:58
Speaker
And I think part of that, like baked into that kind of refusal is, you know, being a little scared of what that might mean. Like if, if this really is fascism, then like, what are you doing?
00:55:11
Speaker
Like, you know, like, how are you like it Because what what it ultimately means is that people are going to have to sacrifice and they're good. People are going to have to put their bodies on the line and people are going to have to like, you know, things are going to be rough.
00:55:25
Speaker
And I think, you know, more and more people are coming to that realization. But yeah, I mean, I think I went on on Saturday on to MSNOW, or, you know, formerly MSNBC, and basically, you know, was asked a similar question. We were talking about Jeremy Carl, who, you know, is that white supremacist of the Trump administration disappointed?
00:55:47
Speaker
And, you know, they asked me about that. They asked me about the DHS social media accounts, basically posting straight up Nazi propaganda. And I told them, I was like, you know, obviously this is a five alarm fire, but you know, to me, it also feels like a non news event. Like we, like we, we've had a million stories like this. We know that the people in the white house hold these beliefs.
00:56:10
Speaker
And, and also like, you know, I don't need to know that this dude in the White House, you know, was part of a Nazi chat group to know that the Trump administration is trying to build out kind of a network of concentration camps right now. You know, I don't need to know that it's a 21 year old that ah is posting re-migration from the DHS account, um you know, to know that there is a masked secret police force like abducting children and their parents from their homes, you know kind of invoking the you know worst memories of some of the worst you know kind of episodes of our history.
00:56:49
Speaker
So I think like what you're... getting at is really interesting. and And from like an anti-fascist research perspective, that is kind of, i think the dilemma, but I think like what we were talking about before is like you know Right now, I think there's so much attention on ICE and and immigration agents, and for good reason.
Accountability for ICE Abuses
00:57:11
Speaker
you know What they're doing is so uniquely horrifying, and there is opposition to it they can be that can be leveraged to create a consequence. And I think also, you know even when
00:57:23
Speaker
it feels like there are straight up Nazis in power, it's still really important to document it and to establish those connections and and show where these people come from, even if it like might not make an immediate impact. I think like down the line, ah it will be important and it will still, i think, you know, kind of open some people's eyes.
00:57:45
Speaker
So yeah, I don't know. It's a, it's an interesting dilemma, but I think the work is, you know, just as important as ever. Yeah, I think it also shows sort of like without the aspect of struggle.
00:57:57
Speaker
so much of the media just kind of goes to sleep on it. know, it's yeah's somehow not exciting, and unless there's somebody sort of like really pushing back against it in the streets, which I think begs the question is like, how, how do we do that? I mean, I think it's also incumbent upon movements to like really take this reality in and make that part of the organizing that we're doing. I mean, like this shit sucks because there's an ideology,
00:58:27
Speaker
animating it that's behind it pushing it. It's not just like they're really, yeah you know, they're Stephen Miller's really mean or they made a bunch of dumb choices and they like, you know, social media posts about people in chains. It's like, no, they want to like deport, you know, a third of the country because they have the wrong skin color and they are pretty clear about that, you know?
00:58:49
Speaker
I'll just ask one more question. You know, one of the more interesting things you've written outside of the book is talking about how people are exposing ice. So let's talk a little bit about that. i mean, I think we're, i think in the next couple of months, we're going to have a reality where one of these people gets unmasked and they, you know, marched in Charlottesville or something. I think that's coming. Oh, totally. Yeah, of course. Yeah.
00:59:09
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I think that will definitely happen. But that also, like, I think there's there's also a tendency, I think, um and you see this among kind of liberals on social media, where they get a little, they think that, like,
00:59:24
Speaker
you know there are Patriot Front members and in ICE or this or that. But the thing is, is like but what ICE is doing is so explicitly white supremacist that like, or so explicitly fascist that like the people in ICE don't have to be part of ah these fascist groups to be, you know, doing fascism. um But, you know, that said, I think absolutely um we will start to hear about, you know, members of these groups being in ICE. Absolutely. And, you know, and also goes towards, you know,
00:59:53
Speaker
you know, what we were talking about with like the ICE recruiting propaganda and DHS recruiting propaganda, like they're, you know, not even dog whistling, like at people that are familiar with that language and and that propaganda. But, you know, the story I wrote about Unmasking Ice was, you know, largely focused on a few groups that are starting to do that work. and It's still like a relatively small effort. There are some kind of like non, you know, Antifa efforts. But i think the kind of and anti-fascist research I've seen that's really good has focused on footage of ice agents involved in particularly egregious things. though You know, the the one story I talk about is a
01:00:36
Speaker
This ICE agent that goes up to a protester that's already detained and sprays pepper spray directly in his eye, like point blank range. And, you know, Antifa figured out who that guy was. incident I actually reached out to him for comment and texted him and the dude got back to me, which I couldn't believe. He texted me back and he just texted me back an Amelia meme, which I actually didn didn't know what that was before he sent it to me. But it was basically, it's like a UK far right meme about like this You know, young white British girl, you know, standing up for for Great Britain, which just showed, like, in this case, at least that, like, at least this ICE agent seen in a video doing brutality is very much immersed in this this kind of far right propaganda. um I couldn't believe he actually responded to me with that.
01:01:26
Speaker
and you know And then there's there's other examples too. I think um Antifa has unmasked one of the agents or two of the agents that was seen in a viral video you know abducting an elderly man who was shirtless and bringing him into like sub-zero temperatures in Minneapolis while his like grandchild looked on through the window.
01:01:45
Speaker
And I think you know that's a good tactic. like We're seeing this egregious stuff happen on camera and the people doing that egregious stuff should face consequences for it.
01:01:57
Speaker
So I feel like that's where the anti-fascist tactic is focused on now. But I feel like It will start to expand and we will have access to leaks and messages that will identify a lot more ice agents. The last question I want to ask you is that since you've put the book out and you've you know done a lot of media stuff, have you had people either that are journalists or other folks that you've talked to that are...
01:02:22
Speaker
that have changed their mind about things that have come around to a new position, either because of the book or just the state of the world. I'm i'm curious if if there's been that shift. Because, I mean, obviously this is coming out, you know, when there's a ramping up of repression. i think it's also interesting that this attempt to...
01:02:41
Speaker
assign the charge of terrorism to so many people right now, i mean, at least in some ways seems to be backfiring because it seems that that was going to be successful. You'd need the country really to just be at a total lull, nothing really happening. And they could just sort of like pick at certain people in that law and sort of pull that out.
01:03:02
Speaker
I think when so many people are activated and organized, it's a little hard to say like, everybody's a terrorist. Right. Totally. and And I think like that charge, like is going to lose a lot of its valence, you know, like, you know, obviously it's alarming to me that, you know,
01:03:19
Speaker
As like legally, you know, dubious as the designation was, you know, designating Antifa domestic terrorist group, there is no federal statute for that. We know why the Trump administration is doing that. Like that is a way of creating a pretext to target whomever they want, whoever is opposed to them with like state persecution, prosecution, or, you know, straight up violence or vigilante violence. You know, there's a reason that after Alex Petty and Renee Good were murdered, The Trump administration quickly labeled them domestic terrorists. There's a way of, you know, retroactively justifying their their murder. But, you know, as for whether the book I've seen anyone kind of changed their minds, you know, I think I wanted the book to simultaneously appeal to you know people like you that are like in the movement and, you know, know about this stuff. But I think I often thought of my audience as kind of, you know, maybe my boomer liberal parents, you know, like kind of, you know, maybe more centrist or liberal people that, you know, have a lot of misunderstandings about maybe more radical politics. Like I wanted to make it more palatable and understandable.
01:04:27
Speaker
I had a reading at a library in Brooklyn to launch the book. It was amazing. Nearly 200 people showed up, which was remarkable. And i you know i don't want to stereotype anyone, but like a lot of people in the audience looked like you're kind of middle of the road liberals. And they were really nodding along and and understanding. So, you know, I can't speak to too much more of the response or how it's maybe changing hearts. But, you know, maybe we can catch up again in a couple months and I'll give you a report.
01:04:59
Speaker
Awesome. Well, where can people follow your work besides, of course, buying the book to catch a fascist? Yeah, ah buy it wherever you buy books. It'd be very cool if a lot of people bought it.
01:05:10
Speaker
But, ah you know, outside that, you can find me at Let's Go Mathias on Blue Sky. Same on X or Twitter, but i don't really post there anymore. Otherwise, you know, occasionally I'll write pieces for the Guardian or Zateo MS Now. um Yeah, just look out for my byline.
01:05:27
Speaker
Well, you can draw straight lines straight as they come from the misery of millions to Brian Thompson. Under, under, under his leadership, profits rose, and all that it cost was a million gravestones.
01:05:43
Speaker
Now a very wise man, much smarter than me, once said this phrase that I really believe. Be kind to people and ruthless to the institutions that rule over me and you.
01:05:57
Speaker
Brian Thompson was a violent man, condemning people to death. For no other reason than a percentage point to profit.
01:06:08
Speaker
And violence begins violence begins violence on and on. Nobody else has to die this way. We can stop any time we want.
01:06:22
Speaker
Some acts of violence we excuse. Other acts of violence are headline news.
01:06:31
Speaker
But it's all just choices people make within a system we did not choose or create.
01:06:40
Speaker
I could choose not to pay my taxes, so I'm not complicit in a genocide, no. The cobalt in my computer was mined by slaves in the Congo.
01:06:55
Speaker
There's a spectrum of violence, and we are all on it.
01:07:01
Speaker
Unless you live in the woods, that you're some kind of hermit It's all just choices made by humans and sisters
01:07:30
Speaker
For no other reason than percentage point to profit.
01:07:43
Speaker
Nobody else has to die this way. We can stop anytime we want. Anytime we want. Anytime we want.
01:07:53
Speaker
Anytime we want.
01:08:08
Speaker
Thanks for listening to today's episode of The Beautiful Idea. News and analysis from the front lines of anarchist and autonomous struggles everywhere. Catch you next time.