When a leftist turns violent, Democratic politicians and their media allies offer a familiar response: yes, this is terrible, but right-wing violence is the greater threat. They have made that claim for decades, and it has always rested on a dubious premise.
The premise depends on statistics compiled by advocacy groups that exclude a vast catalog of left-wing violence—from the George Floyd riots to murders committed by pro-Palestinian activists and attacks on synagogues, Catholic churches, Tesla dealerships, and ICE facilities. Meanwhile, conservatives are routinely held responsible for the actions of violent loners, drug dealers, and conspiracy theorists with no coherent political program. Deranged anti-Semites, racists, incels, and antigovernment extremists get classified as right-wing, even when their targets span both parties.
These statistical games obscure a fundamental distinction. Mentally disturbed lone wolves appear on the fringes of both sides, but organized violence in pursuit of political goals is not a right-wing specialty; it is a left-wing one. Since the French Revolution, it has been a recurring strategy for movements seeking to gain and wield power. Yet the Left’s influence over legacy media and cultural institutions continues to sustain the myth that right-wing violence poses the greater public danger.
Of course, political violence occurs on the Right, too—most obviously in the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021, an appalling spectacle that jibed with the myth. The event was cast not as a mere riot but as the opening act of an “insurrection” that put “democracy at risk.” After the FBI warned that armed protests were planned in all 50 state capitals and Washington the weekend before the inauguration, authorities barricaded government buildings across the country, while 25,000 National Guard troops were deployed to establish a secure “Green Zone” in Washington.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member