Conservatives organizing march against Antifa after Portland violence
The fallout continues after the vicious attacks on conservative journalist Andy Ngo; William La Jeuneese reports.
Media Research Center founder Brent Bozell is calling for Facebook to de-platform Antifa on the heels of conservative writer Andy Ngo being attacked by members of the group in Portland, Ore. on Saturday.
“The Department of Homeland Security has formally classified their activities as domestic terrorist violence. It is an amazing thing, to me, that Facebook thinks it is perfectly fine to have domestic terrorists on their site and not remove them,” Bozell told Fox News. “Antifa needs to be de-platformed. This is a mistake and I hope Facebook rethinks it ”
“Antifa needs to be de-platformed. This is a mistake and I hope Facebook rethinks it.”
Antifa has a Facebook group with over 4,500 members. The group was created in 2008 and bills itself as “an international community of anti-fascists for easily communicating and sharing info.” Another Facebook page, Antifa United, is followed by over 18,000 people.
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“Antifa sits there in all of its domestic terrorism glory on Facebook, which has been coming out with all these commitments to have a clean, honest, honorable site and it certainly doesn’t,” Bozell said. “At the same time it is punishing conservatives for nothing.”
Facebook did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Portland Police Bureau said several assaults happened Saturday as members of Antifa and other leftist groups were seen on video beating, berating and hurling objects at members of the rightwing Proud Boys group and other conservative protesters in downtown Portland. A total of eight people were treated by medics, including three police officers, and three people were hospitalized, officials said.
Ngo – who was injured during the attack -- works for the website Quillette and writes regularly about Antifa. Following the incident, he posted a photo of himself from a hospital, with bruises, cuts, and scratches on his face.
“He’s beaten up, in public, treated for a brain hemorrhage and it’s just the most recent example of Antifa violence,” Bozell said. ”These are violent domestic terrorists.”
Bozell said some conservative groups have been de-platformed for hateful rhetoric but Antifa doesn’t just spout rhetoric that leads to violence, it actually commits the violence itself.
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“Facebook is going to have to face the music,” Bozell said. “Everyday there is new evidence that the leftists at Facebook are out of control.”
“Everyday there is new evidence that the leftists at Facebook are out of control.”
Meanwhile, CNN’s Chris Cuomo has been criticized for rhetoric that appears to defend Antifa. Back in April the host of “Cuomo Prime Time” argued that what he called the group's "good cause" was not equivalent to the positions espoused by neo-Nazis and white supremacists. After panelists pushed back he claimed he did not want to "espouse Antifa.”
In 2018, Cuomo also argued that Antifa's violence against police was "not equal" to violence carried out by white supremacists and neo-Nazis.
Fox News’ Travis Fedschun and Joseph A. Wulfsohn contributed to this report.
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