Conservative commentator and former Secret Service agent Dan Bongino urged President Trump and Attorney General William Barr to “legally decapitate” antifa.
During an interview on Fox News, Bongino reacted to protests in Washington, D.C., that have given way to violent riots, including on Sunday, when a fire spread to the basement of St. John’s Episcopal Church, a historic religious site visited by every president since James Madison.
“Bill Barr and the president need to legally decapitate antifa today. We need a high-profile, FBI arrest right now,” Bongino said on Monday’s episode of Fox & Friends. “We need full mobilization of our national guards in every state. This isn’t the time to say, ‘Well, we don’t have riots here.’ I don’t care if you’re in Wyoming or downtown Miami. We have to shut this down now.”
Bongino also suggested that mayors and municipalities could call upon retired law enforcement officers to support police in containing violent protests that have spread across the nation for nearly a week.
Co-host Brian Kilmeade emphasized the need for Trump to give presidential remarks from the Oval Office to address the protests, which began after George Floyd, a black man, died after a white Minneapolis police officer pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes during an arrest.
“The president will regret the rest of his presidency, whether it be five more years or five more months, if he does not get together with his best tactical minds, his best legal minds, and his best speechwriters and give an address tonight,” Kilmeade said Monday, prompting agreement from Bongino.
“I think the president understands what’s going on right now. I agree with you. I think if there was ever a time in the history of the U.S. presidency for an Oval Office address to bring the country together, it’s unquestionably right now,” Bongino said, citing violent actions taken by protesters.
White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany indicated on the show that Trump would not deliver an Oval Office address to the nation. “A national Oval Office address is not going to stop antifa. What’s going to stop antifa is action, and this president has committed to acting on this,” she said.
Trump has blamed the left-wing antifa movement for violence across the country in several cities, including looting, arson, and major clashes between protesters and law enforcement. The president said Sunday the United States would designate antifa as a domestic terrorist organization.
Attorney General Wiliam Barr said on Saturday that “anarchic” and “far-left extremist groups” could potentially be those responsible for the growing violence. On Sunday, Barr declared that the violence being “instigated and carried out” by “antifa and other similar groups” in connection to nationwide protesting is “domestic terrorism and will be treated accordingly.”
