Overview

• Following Charlie Kirk’s Sept. 10 assassination, President Trump escalated rhetoric against the left and signaled he would label Antifa a “major terrorist organization,” an unprecedented step for a domestic group.
• Independent reviews highlight findings from the Cato Institute and the DOJ’s National Institute of Justice showing right-wing extremists account for the vast majority of ideologically motivated fatalities over recent decades and in the past five years.
• The Justice Department removed an NIJ webpage summarizing its findings, saying it is reviewing content under recent executive orders, which has intensified concerns about data transparency.
• Polling summarized by CNN reports Republicans have been more likely than Democrats to endorse political violence in certain contexts, though one NCRI survey captured higher left-leaning tolerance in a specific post-election, post–assassination-attempt moment and cautioned against overgeneralizing.
• Analysts note that differing definitions and datasets complicate comparisons, even as conservative commentary points to past Democratic rhetoric to argue left-wing incitement.