White nationalist group posing as antifa called for violence on Twitter

June 1, 2020, 7:03 PM EDT / Updated June 1, 2020, 8:57 PM EDT
By Ben Collins, Brandy Zadrozny and Emmanuelle Saliba


A Twitter account claiming to belong to a national “antifa” organization and pushing violent rhetoric related to ongoing protests has been linked to the white nationalist group Identity Evropa, according to a Twitter spokesperson.

The spokesperson said the account violated the company's platform manipulation and spam policy, specifically the creation of fake accounts. Twitter suspended the account after a tweet that incited violence.

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The antifa movement — a network of loosely organized radical groups who use direct action to fight the far-right and fascism — has been targeted by President Donald Trump as the force behind some of the violence and property destruction seen at some protests, though little evidence has been provided for such claims.

Other misinformation and misleading claims spread across Twitter on Sunday night and into Monday related to the protests.

Two hashtags that trended worldwide on Twitter falsely claimed that there was a "cover-up" or a "blackout" of protests in Washington, D.C., overnight. Both appeared to insinuate that protesters have been silenced in some way, perhaps by a secret internet blackout.

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NetBlocks, a nonprofit group monitoring worldwide internet access, found no indication of a mass-scale internet disruption in the Washington area overnight or in the last 48 hours.

Journalists covering the protests also took to Twitter to disprove the hoax.

"A lot of people are asking me about a possible #dcblackout. I've been out near the White House since 4 am and haven't experienced any outage," tweeted Victoria Sanchez, a reporter for WJLA, the local ABC affiliate, adding that her colleagues had posted multiple updates throughout the night.

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