The White House’s newly released national counterterrorism strategy identifies the “left-wing,” “anti-fascists,” “anarchists” and “radically pro-transgender ideologies” as terrorist threats equivalent to al Qaeda and the Islamic State. 

This follows in the footsteps of the September 25 national security presidential memorandum NSPM-7 on “countering domestic terrorism and organized political violence,” which investigative journalist and author Will Potter says demonstrates that “the administration isn’t just targeting a movement,” “it’s building a case against dissent itself.” 

In his September memorandum, Trump details what he calls “a pattern of violent and terroristic activities under the umbrella of self-described ‘anti-fascism.’” According to Trump, the goal of anti-fascists is to “prevent the functioning of a democratic society.” 

In the White House’s formal 2026 anti-terrorism strategy, Trump expounds on the memorandum, promising to use “all the tools” to “map [leftists] at home, identify their membership, map their ties to international organizations like Antifa, and use law enforcement tools to cripple them operationally before they can maim or kill the innocent.” 

Similar language is used to describe the federal government’s efforts to counteract international drug cartels and “the five Jihadist groups deemed by the CIA as the most dangerous and capable.”

As documented by Unicorn Riot, this counterterrorism strategy has already been leveraged to convict activists protesting Trump’s policies — in an unprecedented case of what the National Lawyers Guild called “unchecked state repression.”

On July 4, 2025, “left-wing” activists gathered outside an ICE facility in Dallas-Forth Worth for a fireworks display and noise demonstration; immediately labeled an “Antifa cell,” nine defendants — ‘the Prairieland 9’ — were convicted March 13, 2026, of “providing support to terrorists” for activities like wearing black, owning zines, carrying a first aid kit, and using the Signal app for carpooling.

This didn’t surprise the autonomous anarchist collective Crimethinc. “The Trump administration specifically identifies anarchists and anti-fascists as one of the three major types of terror groups because they know there is no greater threat to tyranny than autonomous, decentralized, horizontally organized direct action,” the group told us.

And it won’t stop there, said Eric King, an anarchist activist formerly imprisoned on terrorism charges. “The government is openly in favor of white supremacy, and that should be a concern to all of us who view the world differently,” he told us. “Today anti-fascists, tomorrow progressives, and then Democrat liberals. Fascism doesn’t stop having enemies.”

For Shane Burley, author of the book, “Fascism Today: What It Is and How to End It,” Trump’s counterterrorism strategy is less “a statement of policy” and more “a permission structure for law enforcement to use excessive force in the field and for DAs to add sentencing enhancements,” as occurred in the Prairieland case.

Indeed, though Trump’s strategy claims “real threats were ignored or underplayed” under Joe Biden and past administrations,” and “Americans have witnessed the politically motivated killings of Christians and conservatives committed by violent left-wing extremists,” as Nora Benavidez points out:

“This new so-called strategy to protect the US from terrorism flies in the face of our own Department of Justice’s findings that it scrubbed from public record: most ideologically motivated homicides since 1990 have been committed by far-right extremists, not far-left or foreign actors.”

Nora Benavidez

Benavidez, senior counsel and director of digital justice and civil rights at Free Press, called the latest action by the Trump administration merely “one of hundreds of censorial attempts ​by the administration to muzzle free speech ​and dissent over the last year and a half.” But, she added, “the new Trump counterterrorism agenda ​is a dictator’s shakedown, created to intimidate, harass and ​legitimize penalties against those who dare to disagree with the administration​.”

Burley agreed, adding that though “there is no domestic terrorist legal category,” the 2026 counterterrorism strategy won’t stop “the repression that the left and queer folks will face.”

And this, Crimethinc told us, “should prompt ordinary Americans who do not wish to live under autocracy” to learn about alternative models for social change and community defense.

About the author: Phil Mandelbaum is an award-winning journalist, a co-creator of the content services division of The Associated Press, a nonprofit and political strategist, and an organizer and artist, also known as awkword.

Cover image contains text from the White House Counterterrorism Strategy document over a screenshot of a video recorded by L. Cam Anderson on Jan. 10, 2026, in front of the Whipple Federal Building during the deadly Operation Metro Surge, edited by Niko Georgiades for Unicorn Riot.

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