Imagining the Invisible Antifa In the Black Lives Matter Protest Cycle

Framing contests often ensue around levels of protest violence and who the perpetrators are, and such frames can be out of step with the actual violent or peaceful nature of protests. During the 2020 racial justice protests, many capitalized on dramatic images of violence and property damage to frame the protests as violent with the left-wing group Antifa as the culprit. Drawing on event data and news reports covering the 2020 racial justice protests and comparing to historical U.S. protest data, we examine the central claims of this framing contest. We find that this wave of racial justice protests was more peaceful than Civil Rights protests of the 1960’s and that Antifa was present at only a handful of events which turned violent. We also find that media attention to Antifa corresponded with declining support for BLM, suggesting that scapegoating Antifa led to a decline in support of the movement.