Veteran Journalist Opposes Liberal Narrative Downplaying Antifa Violence

While liberal pundits and networks across the country downplay the rise in Antifa-led violence, a reporter who has covered the group designated as domestic terrorist largely pushed back against that narrative in an interview with Fox News Digital.

Social media has been littered with messages In recent weeks, elected officials and experts have dismissed concerns about Antifa’s violence as mere “ideology” rather than an organized effort, which Ngo says is a message driven by tacit support for the cause.

“It’s an ideology, but neo-Nazis organize around an ideology, jihadists organize around an ideology, so what is your real goal? The goal that you’re really trying to do, when people bring this up, is to cover up Antifa because these people on the left know that Antifa’s organized activist networks themselves and the individuals function as shock troops for their cause.

“They have the same enemies, they want the same results in terms of destroying institutions, and they want the political opposition to be intimidated, silenced and disengaged from the political process.”

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Fox News Digital spoke with journalist Andy Ngo following his meeting with President Trump about Antifa violence. (Fox News Digital/Getty)

Ngo went on to explain that people who doubt the existence of Antifa networks should look at the footage he and other independent journalists have published.

“I was showing them the video from June 2019 where people working in an organized manner were hitting me with my face covered, armed and running away,” Ngo said. “No one has ever been arrested for this. If that’s not convincing enough, I’d tell them to watch the video of the 2020 shooting of Aaron Danielson in Portland, a Trump supporter who was killed by someone who left behind a manifesto. If you don’t believe the video, you can read his manifesto. He describes himself, I’m 100% Antifa.”

President Trump, who last month issued an executive order declaring Antifa a domestic terrorist organization, organized a round table at the White House on Wednesday, where Ngo and other leading independent journalists spoke to the president about the violence they saw and experienced firsthand.

Antifa is a far-left activist movement that describes itself as anti-fascist. He has been accused of organizing or encouraging violent riots, including during 2020 protests to “defund the police” and, more recently, in attacks targeting federal immigration centers.

Ngo said the biggest takeaway from this event with Trump was recognition of the dangerous work journalists have done covering Antifa violence in recent years, with little to no support from mainstream media or elected officials.

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President Donald Trump designated Antifa a domestic terrorist organization in a September 2025 executive order. (Diego Diaz/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

“I’ve been reporting on Antifa for about nine years, and for part of that time I felt like I was talking about something that no one who could do anything would listen to,” Ngo told Fox News Digital. “And there was a lot of despair during that time. I saw a lot of violence, I saw death, and I experienced violence myself. I feel optimistic now. I think Antifa is a topic and a confusing topic, and I’m grateful that I have the expertise to be able to share that with the administration.”

Ngo told Fox News Digital that he has “great gratitude to the president” for hosting the event.

“They have a million things to do. There are a lot of important things on the world stage. Yet almost two hours are devoted to this topic. So, I’m not taking anything for granted, and I’m just grateful that I was able to be there.”

Ngo also told Fox News Digital that the event was “bittersweet” for him personally due to the loss of his father earlier this year.

“I wish he was here to see this,” Ngo said. “My parents were refugees from communism in Vietnam. I don’t know how they would take this if they knew the full extent of far-left activism in America and raised a son who took a lot of risks to try to expose it. So I wish my father had been there to share in this moment.”

The killing of Charlie Kirk highlights the rise of left-wing terror as a study shows violence is at its highest level in 30 years.

President Donald Trump speaks during a panel discussion on Antifa at the White House on Wednesday. (Evan Vucci/AP Photo)

Ngo’s family history living under communism is relevant to today’s conversation regarding Antifa, the Portland-born journalist told Fox Digital, given the underlying communist beliefs espoused by radical left movements in the United States today.

“For a century now, communists and anarchists, particularly in Europe, have engaged in acts of violence that sparked revolutions, and Antifa today is looking to these historical examples in the acts of violence they commit,” Ngo said, adding that many “normal” and mainstream liberals in the country are confused by “deception and misinformation” in the media regarding Antifa.

“If you read the mainstream, you might get the impression that these are people who only oppose fascism and racism. So why not embrace that, right?” Ngo explained. “When in reality the ideology is anarchist communism and violent anarchist communism. Many of them engage in violence for the sake of nihilistic violence. They want to see things burned down. Their own slogan has become ungovernable. So if you care about democracy, liberal democracy in institutions, civil rights… you shouldn’t, you can’t be on the side of defense or the cover of these so-called Antifa.”

Ngo went on to say that Antifa’s messages and ideology are becoming more and more “dominant,” evidenced by the “depraved worldview philosophy” that gave rise to those who celebrated the assassinations of Charlie Kirk, United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson, and those who “call for the assassination of myself and others.”

Kristi Noem, Secretary of Homeland Security criticized Antifa During Wednesday’s roundtable, he said the network was “just as sophisticated as MS-13, as TdA, as ISIS, as Hezbollah, as Hamas, as everyone else.”

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Portland, Oregon, was rocked by consecutive nights of rioting in 2020 following the death of George Floyd while in police custody that year. (Thomas Patterson/AFP/Getty Images)

She said authorities recently arrested the Antifa founder’s girlfriend in Portland and investigators are trying to get more information from her about the network of newly labeled “domestic terrorists” during their pursuit.

Noem said the administration’s explicit goal is to “eliminate (Antifa) from the existence of American society.”

“These individuals not only want to threaten our law enforcement officers, threaten our journalists and the citizens of this country. They want to kill them,” Noem said.

Peter D’Abrosca of Fox News Digital contributed to this report.