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The charges originated from a protest at the Prairieland Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility in Alvarado, Texas, where a police officer was shot.

In a superseding indictment filed in the U.S. District Court of Northern Texas on Nov. 13, prosecutors charged eight defendants with providing material support to terrorists, an increase from the two who had such charges levied against them in the initial indictment filed on Oct. 15.

“For the first time, Antifa-aligned anarchist extremists have been hit with federal terrorism charges after a July 4th attack on an ICE facility in Texas,” FBI Director Kash Patel posted on X on Oct. 17 following the initial indictment.

None of the arrested suspects have any connections to an organization named Antifa and only one was affiliated with a group that described itself as anti-fascist.

Since the beginning of the year, the federal government has been accelerating its war on the American left, targeting dissent with loose terminology and reaching for legislative and executive tools created at the turn of the century with the War on Terror. Whether this political strategy amounts to anything more than rhetoric could revolve around the outcome of the Prairieland case, which could set a precedent for bringing cases against individuals and organizations that the government labels as terrorists.

Much of the strategy was spelled out in National Security Presidential Memorandum (NSPM-7), a memorandum on countering domestic terrorism and organized political violence that was released on Sept. 25. The memorandum outlined “common threads” that animate a supposed rise in political violence: anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, anti-Christianity; “extremism” on migration, race and gender; and hostility towards individuals who “hold traditional American views on family, religion, and morality.”

The threat from such vague classifications is broad, especially as terrorism designations include financial connections.

“The same laws they create, precedent and strategies–they’ll just export it elsewhere very quickly,” said Xavier de Janon, the Director of Mass Defense at the National Lawyers Guild. “There’s no limit for the government on what Antifa is, clearly.”

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