Another Take: How Antifa hysteria took over the US
The Take
Al Jazeera
4.7 • 748 Ratings
🗓️ 20 September 2025
⏱️ 25 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Every Saturday, we revisit a story from the archives. This originally aired on September 30, 2020. None of the dates, titles, or other references from that time have been changed.
During the 2020 United States elections, President Donald Trump has focused much of his campaign rhetoric on mask-wearing, window-breaking Antifa as a new American enemy. But as long as fascism has existed, so too has the anti-fascist movement. So where did this misconception of Antifa as a shadowy cabal of leftists come from, and what is Antifa in reality?
Episode credits:
This episode was updated by Haleema Shah. The original production team was Negin Owliaei and Alexandra Locke with Abigail Ony Nwaohuocha, Dina Kesbeh, Priyanka Tilve, Amy Walters, Ney Alvarez, Stacey Samuel, Graelyn Brashear, and Malika Bilal.
Our sound designer is Alex Roldan. Our lead of audience development and engagement is Aya Elmileik and Adam Abou-Gad is our engagement producer.
Alexandra Locke is The Take’s executive producer. Ney Alvarez is Al Jazeera's head of audio.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Al Jazeera Podcasts. |
| 0:07.0 | Hi, I'm Halima Shaw, a producer with the take, and you're listening to another take, where we look back at stories from the archives. |
| 0:19.8 | U.S. President Donald Trump is taking aim at Antifa. |
| 0:23.8 | Again, it's shorthand for anti-fascist, |
| 0:27.2 | a loose-knit political ideology that tries to counter the far right |
| 0:31.1 | through militant tactics. |
| 0:33.7 | In a truth social post, |
| 0:35.5 | Trump said he wanted to designate Antifa a terrorist organization. |
| 0:40.0 | But he'll likely face legal and practical challenges if he wants to do that. |
| 0:44.7 | That hasn't stopped Trump from promising he will, though, several times. |
| 0:49.6 | Five years ago, we looked at Trump's fixation with Antifa. |
| 0:53.3 | This episode aired on September 30th, |
| 0:55.5 | 2020. All dates and references are from that time. |
| 0:59.0 | I don't think we can ever talk about something turning violent. We are already always in a |
| 1:19.2 | violent state of affairs if we still need to cry out, Black Lives Matter. If fascists are allowed to |
| 1:24.7 | march while chanting Jews will not replace us, like don't talk to me about turning violent. |
| 1:31.1 | The violence is there in the DNA of the situation. |
| 1:37.3 | Journalist Natasha Leonard is no stranger to protests, including the Black Lives Matter uprisings that have taken off this summer across |
| 1:44.8 | the U.S. Those protests had become a backdrop to the 2020 election, as President Donald Trump |
| 1:50.7 | runs as a law and order candidate literally. He's tweeted out, law and order in all capital |
| 1:57.5 | letters multiple times since the protests began. |
| 2:04.4 | And to make his case, he's returning to a familiar foe. |
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