Scenes from a Slow Civil War

09/26/2025

The news cycle yesterday was still spinning around Kimmel, and tomorrow it’ll be busy with Comey. But in between came bigger news: the “memo” named in my subtitle. A “Terror Memo.” I don’t like sending traffic to this White House, but you should read it. In its expansive definition of “terror,” “Countering Domestic Terrorism and Organized Political Violence” may prove to be as much of an acceleration in this slow civil war as the assassination of Charlie Kirk.

The real enemy, according to the memo, is “organized”:

This political violence is not a series of isolated incidents and does not emerge organically. Instead, it is a culmination of sophisticated, organized campaigns of targeted intimidation, radicalization, threats, and violence designed to silence opposing speech, limit political activity, change or direct policy outcomes, and prevent the functioning of a democratic society. A new law enforcement strategy that investigates all participants in these criminal and terroristic conspiracies — including the organized structures, networks, entities, organizations, funding sources, and predicate actions behind them — is required.

It’s critical to name this bait-&-switch: Using real acts of violence by a handful of unaffiliated individuals to launch an attack on the much greater strength of liberal / left “organized structures, networks, entities, organizations, [and] funding sources.” This isn’t about a manhunt to stop the next murderer before he can shoot; it’s a “new… strategy,” the deconstruction by state power of far less dramatic efforts to build the very step-by-step systemic rule-of-law resistance that is the opposite of violence.

Note the last item on the list: “predicate actions.” What might be the dark “predicate actions” for the donations of liberal billionaires George Soros and Reid Hoffman—both name-checked by Trump Thursday—to efforts such as MoveOn, America Votes, Media Matters, and and peer-to-peer microlending? Capital Research Center, the far right think tank whose “research” the White House is leaning on for the Terror Memo, cites in particular Soros’ support for the Sunrise Movement. Put that next to Trump’s insistence that climate change is a “con job,” and you begin to see how simply naming the facts of fire and flood and heat deaths could come to be construed as “terrorism” subject to investigation.

Have you ever donated to a left organization with a credit card? Get ready. This doesn’t mean they’re coming for you. It means that if for some reason they want to come for you, you’re already cooked. That little rectangle of plastic in your wallet’s been turned into a weapon to be used against you.

So much of the Terror Memo follows the money:

The Commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service (Commissioner) shall take action to ensure that no tax-exempt entities are directly or indirectly financing political violence or domestic terrorism. In addition, where applicable, the Commissioner shall ensure that the Internal Revenue Service refers such organizations, and the employees and officers of such organizations, to the Department of Justice for investigation and possible prosecution.

The plan isn’t so much to kick down doors as to bleed nonprofits dry, a double whammy effect: as the big organizations dwindle, everyday people doubt the potential of organization. Wonks will realize how it works; others will conclude that maybe such efforts to build democracy just aren’t popular. Some will retreat into alienation; others will persuade themselves to get with the new program.

And for those who carry on the fight?

All Federal law enforcement agencies with investigative authority shall question and interrogate, within all lawful authorities, individuals engaged in political violence or lawlessness regarding the entity or individual organizing such actions and any related financial sponsorship of those actions prior to adjudication or initiation of a plea agreement.

Interrogation, for the purpose of naming names, before any adjudication. How long before the post 9/11 War on Terror’s “enhanced interrogation techniques” get their own new presidential memo?

Investigations should prioritize crimes such as the following: assaulting Federal officers or employees or otherwise engaging in conduct proscribed by 18 U.S.C. 111; conspiracy against rights under 18 U.S.C. 241; conspiracy to commit offense under 18 U.S.C. 371; solicitation to commit a crime of violence under 18 U.S.C. 373; money laundering under 18 U.S.C. 1956; funding of terrorist acts or otherwise facilitating terrorism under 18 U.S.C. 2339, 2339A, 2339B, 2339C, and 2339D; arson offenses under 18 U.S.C. 844; violations of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (18 U.S.C. 1961 et seq.); and major fraud against the United States under 18 U.S.C. 1031.

Slow civil war is just that, slow; and then fascism hiccups, and it jolts ahead. Read the whole terror memo. Read about the indictment of Comey. Consider the generals, summoned by our Secretary of War for what purpose we don’t know. Read this passage. Note what’s now called “terror,” trespass, civil disorder, predicate action. And what “funding” it means.

In the course of and as a result of the investigations directed by section 2 of this memorandum, the Attorney General may recommend that any group or entity whose members are engaged in activities meeting the definition of “domestic terrorism” in 18 U.S.C. 2331(5) merits designation as a “domestic terrorist organization.”