{"id":13807,"date":"2026-07-17T18:45:33","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T18:45:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/range\/the-trump-administrations-global-campaign-against-radical-left-terrorism-is-built-on-a-national-security-memo\/"},"modified":"2026-07-17T18:45:33","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T18:45:33","slug":"the-trump-administrations-global-campaign-against-radical-left-terrorism-is-built-on-a-national-security-memo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/range\/the-trump-administrations-global-campaign-against-radical-left-terrorism-is-built-on-a-national-security-memo\/","title":{"rendered":"The Trump administration\u2019s global campaign against \u2018radical left terrorism\u2019 is built on a national security memo"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A little-noticed presidential national security directive is now the legal engine behind a wave of terrorism prosecutions against left-wing protesters.\u00a0<\/p>\n

That domestic campaign now has an international dimension, one that American officials had been\u00a0planning for months, culminating on July 16, 2026, when Secretary of State Marco Rubio\u2019s Ministerial on the Resurgence of Political Terrorism drew\u00a0representatives\u00a0from more than 65 countries\u00a0to Washington. The gathering was informally called the \u201cAntifa summit.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Rubio described antifa-aligned networks as sharing infrastructure across borders and accused Iran and Cuba of helping bankroll the movement,\u00a0without offering evidence. The White House declared the summit the start of an \u201cunprecedented global offensive\u201d against what it calls \u201cradical left terrorism.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

This offensive is built on the same domestic legal architecture that has now sent American activists to prison for decades.\u00a0<\/p>\n

That architecture is\u00a0National Security Presidential Memorandum\/NSPM-7, issued on Sept. 25, 2025, which for the first time appeared to authorize preemptive law-enforcement measures against Americans based not on whether they are planning to commit violence but for their political or ideological beliefs.<\/p>\n

Nearly a year later, that blueprint has moved from paper into practice.<\/p>\n

The Justice Department has built task forces staffed by counterterrorism prosecutors. The FBI has set up its own\u00a0NSPM-7 mission center\u00a0to oversee investigations into left-wing movements, including a\u00a0joint effort with the IRS\u00a0to investigate nonprofit groups.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Justice Department has\u00a0used this machinery\u00a0to convict activists and send some of them to prison for decades.<\/p>\n

NSPM-7 was not passed by Congress. It\u2019s a lesser-known tool of executive power: a presidential memorandum.\u00a0<\/p>\n

As an\u00a0international relations scholar\u00a0who has studied\u00a0U.S. foreign policy decision-making\u00a0and\u00a0national security legislation, I recognize that presidents can take several types of\u00a0executive actions\u00a0without legislative involvement:\u00a0executive orders,\u00a0memoranda and proclamations.<\/p>\n

This structure allows the president to direct law enforcement and national security agencies, with little opportunity for congressional oversight.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Presidential national security powers<\/h2>\n

Executive memorandums\u00a0direct agencies to prepare reports, implement policies, or align programs with the administration\u2019s priorities. Unlike executive orders, they aren\u2019t required to be published. When they relate to national security, like NSPM-7, they\u2019re called\u00a0national security directives\u00a0\u2013 many of which stay classified and\u00a0may not be declassified\u00a0for years or decades.<\/p>\n

The stated purpose of NSPM-7 is to counter domestic terrorism and organized political violence, focusing mainly on perceived threats from the political left. The memorandum identifies \u201canti-Christian,\u201d \u201canti-capitalism\u201d or \u201canti-American\u201d views as potential indicators that a group or person will commit domestic terrorism.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The memorandum claims that political violence originates with \u201canti-fascist\u201d groups that hold the following views: \u201csupport for the overthrow of the United States Government; extremism on migration, race, and gender; and hostility towards those who hold traditional American views on family, religion, and morality.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The strategy includes\u00a0preemptive measures\u00a0to disrupt groups before they engage in violent political acts, empowering multiagency task forces to investigate potential federal crimes related to radicalization and the groups\u2019 funders. Former Attorney General Pam Bondi\u2019s\u00a0December 2025 implementation memo\u00a0went further, ordering a five-year review of agency files on antifa.\u00a0A task force\u00a0staffed with counterterrorism and organized-crime prosecutors is carrying out these investigations.<\/p>\n

\u2018Domestic terrorist organizations\u2019<\/h2>\n

The memorandum directs the Department of Justice to focus FBI resources from approximately 200\u00a0Joint Terrorism Task Forces\u00a0on investigating \u201cacts of recruiting or radicalizing persons\u201d for the purpose of \u201cpolitical violence, terrorism, or conspiracy against rights; and the violent deprivation of any citizen\u2019s rights.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

NSPM-7 also allows the attorney general to propose groups for designation as \u201cdomestic terrorist organizations.\u201d That includes groups that engage in \u201corganized doxxing campaigns, swatting, rioting, looting, trespass, assault, destruction of property, threats of violence, and civil disorder.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Existing laws allow the\u00a0secretary of state\u00a0to designate groups as \u201cforeign terrorist organizations\u201d that are then subject to financial sanctions.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But these laws do not permit\u00a0the president to label domestic groups this way.\u00a0<\/p>\n

That gap hasn\u2019t stopped prosecutions. In Texas, eight defendants tied to a \u201cNorth Texas Antifa Cell\u201d were sentenced in June 2026 for a 2025 armed confrontation at the Prairieland immigration detention center. One man received 100 years, and\u00a0others who never fired a weapon\u00a0still drew decades in prison under terrorism sentencing guidelines.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In Minnesota,\u00a015 members and associates\u00a0of a group called Direct Action Minnesota were indicted in June 2026 on conspiracy and assault charges. A\u00a094-page indictment\u00a0cited behavior such as wearing an \u201cI\u2019m Antifa!\u201d sweatshirt, possessing a bullhorn or including a devil emoji in a Signal message.<\/p>\n

NSPM-7 marks a major conceptual shift in U.S. counterterrorism policy, departing from approaches that primarily targeted foreign threats.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Earlier directives,\u00a0dating to Ronald Reagan\u2019s presidency, treated terrorism as a global menace countered through military power and diplomacy. In the 1990s, the Clinton administration reframed it as a domestic challenge after the\u00a01993 World Trade Center bombing\u00a0and\u00a01995 Oklahoma City bombing.<\/p>\n

After 9\/11, the Bush administration fused counterterrorism with national defense through the\u00a0global war on terrorism. The Obama administration later tried to narrow those powers, asking whether targeted individuals \u201cpose a continuing, imminent threat to U.S. persons\u201d \u2014 a standard focused on tactics and capture feasibility, not ideology.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The first Trump administration used a \u201ctravel ban\u201d against several\u00a0\u201cterror-prone\u201dcountries, while President Joe Biden redirected focus toward weapons of mass destruction.<\/p>\n

Notably, the \u201cdomestic terrorist\u201d label itself has rarely produced actual charges. The State Department designated\u00a0four antifa-aligned groups\u00a0as foreign terrorist organizations. But antifa is a\u00a0decentralized movement, not a formal group with a roster.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This designation lacks any real legal weight because\u00a0U.S. law has no formal domestic terrorist organization category. Creating one risks infringing on First Amendment protected speech. Domestic terrorism itself is not a chargeable offense.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Prosecutors have instead leaned on older statutes such as\u00a0material support for terrorism\u00a0and\u00a0conspiracy laws, tools originally built for cases like the ones above, not protest movements.<\/p>\n

First Amendment rights at risk<\/h2>\n

There is no single official definition of terrorism in U.S. law; definitions vary by purpose \u2013 criminal law, intelligence collection, civil liability.<\/p>\n

Definitions in all those areas typically focus on identifying\u00a0violent or dangerous acts\u00a0done with the intent to intimidate or coerce civilians or influence government policy.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But more than redefining terrorism, NSPM-7 reorients the machinery of national security toward the policing of belief.<\/p>\n

The First Amendment generally\u00a0prevents\u00a0the government from punishing people for unpopular opinions. It also protects the\u00a0ability for people to associate\u00a0to advance public and private ideas\u00a0in pursuit of political, economic, religious or cultural goals.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The directive\u2019s emphasis on ideological orientations \u2013 \u201canti-Christianity,\u201d \u201canti-capitalism\u201d and \u201canti-American\u201d views \u2013 as indicators of domestic terrorism potentially jeopardizes\u00a0First Amendment rights.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Thirty-one members of Congress\u00a0sent a letter to Trump in October 2025expressing \u201cserious concerns\u201d about NSPM-7, warning that it poses \u201cserious constitutional, statutory and civil liberties risks, especially if used to target political dissent, protest or ideological speech.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

As\u00a0the ACLU warns, any definition of terrorism that includes ideological components risks criminalizing people or groups based on belief rather than based on violence or other criminal conduct.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Congress has declined\u00a0to create a domestic complement to the foreign terrorist designation in large part because of the potential for impinging on First Amendment\u2013protected association and speech.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But I fear that chilling speech may be the point.<\/p>\n

Silencing dissent<\/h2>\n

NSPM-7 does not criminalize previously legal conduct.<\/p>\n

Rather, it states that the Trump administration will focus investigations around the\u00a0identity and ideology of supposed perpetrators.\u00a0Prioritizing investigations\u00a0into this broad swath of ideologies serves to instill fear, silencing\u00a0anti-fascist and other messages in opposition to the Trump administration.<\/p>\n

Law professor\u00a0Steve Vladeck\u00a0frames this chill as \u201cobeying in advance,\u201d in which organizations self-censor rather than risk investigation, prosecution or defending against the \u201cdomestic terrorist\u201d label. Federal judges in the\u00a0Prairieland case\u00a0have shown little sympathy for that distinction: One judge described the protest itself as \u201can assault on democracy,\u201d even for defendants who never touched a weapon.<\/p>\n

Although left-wing violence has risen in the past decade,\u00a0empirical evidenceshows it remains far below historical levels of right-wing or jihadist violence.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Most domestic terrorists in the U.S.\u00a0are politically on the right, accounting for the vast majority of domestic terrorism fatalities.<\/p>\n

Yet NSPM-7 focuses disproportionately on left-wing ideologies. NSPM-7 departs from prior U.S. counterterrorism frameworks by prioritizing the suppression of ideologically motivated dissent, even where, as in Minnesota,\u00a0judges have already dismissed\u00a0roughly half of similar federal cases for lack of evidence.<\/p>\n

This is an updated version of\u00a0a story originally published\u00a0December 3, 2025.<\/em>\n\n<\/svg><\/p>\n<\/div>\n