We’re not saying the excellent result is because the Defence Fund helped to make sure that the defendants had quality legal representation buuut we’re not saying that it’s not because of that, either!
In any event, the ordeal isn’t over yet for three dozen or so who haven’t had their day in court yet. If you’d like to help defray their legal costs, you can do that right here. Likewise, if you want to make sure the Defence Fund is ready to go the next time anti-fascists get done up on bogus charges, you can make a contribution here!
It is in this context that one particular asylum seeker attended an anti-racist counter-protest in his town. The counter-protest stopped a marauding gang of bigots in their tracks, only to be pelted with rocks and cans. Attempting to dissuade the attackers, our man picked up one of the projectiles and threw it back at them, which was the excuse the police were looking for to arrest someone!
For defending his community, our friend was sentenced to several months in prison. The Defence Fund was called upon by his supporters to help cover his rent so he isn’t doesn’t find himself homeless upon his release. We were happy to be able to help.
May 2024: the good people of Peckham using their bodies to physically prevent a busload of asylum seekers from being transported to a prison barge.
No reasonable person would characterize another person’s desperate attempt to flee dangerous conditions and find safe refuge a crime. Logically then, UK authorities can’t be considered to be reasonable. Because this past spring they decided to round up a busload of asylum seekers in Peckham, south London to cart them off to a prison barge!
Luckily, the asylum seekers’ friends and neighbours were not having it and as soon as the bus was full and ready to head to prison, dozens of them physically surrounded the bus, preventing it from going anywhere. This led to a tense stand-off with police but in the end, the asylum seekers were released and able to return to their homes and the bus drove off empty.
Leave it to the Met, however, to add a sour note to what should have been a good-news story by fabricating charges and arresting 44 of the people who defended their friends and neighbours. The Defence Fund stepped in to help pay for legal defence of our comrades, and so far the results have been excellent! The first five defendants had all charges dropped against them minutes after their trial began, when prosecutors failed to submit any evidence to support the charges they were arrested on!
First five free, 39 to go…
This comes as no surprise to us. Time & time & time again, when the Defence Fund has intervened to ensure that that anti-fascists have the competent legal representation they need, they win in the courts and in the streets!
Unfortunately, the little we were able to pitch in for our friends in Peckham isn’t nearly enough to cover the legal bills for 44 people, 39 of whom still face trials. If you’d like to show your solidarity with them, you should contribute to their crowdfunder here. Or, if you’re in London, please come out to the Stratford magistrates court (E15 4SB) to support the people on trial that day.
Also, if you think a standing emergency fund available to send immediate help for the legal defence of anti-fascists is a good idea, you should contribute here.
Something that is hard to understand unless you’ve experienced it is how long and far-reaching the ramifications of violence can be. Oleg, a Russian antifascist presently living in another country, knows this all too well. In 2004, Oleg was attacked by an armed group of Russian nazis and suffered a severe brain injury in the attack. Not satisfied with permanently injuring him, the nazis and their friends in the police got warnings to him that he and his family would be killed if they stayed in Russia. Oleg did what any of us would do, and fled to a safe country.
Twenty years on and the injuries he sustained in the attack still affect him greatly and require regular treatment and medicine – the costs of some of which isn’t covered by his adopted country’s medical system. So the Defence Fund has again stepped in to make sure he can afford his medicine and treatment.
This isn’t the first, or the second, or even the third time we’ve helped Oleg. But that’s okay. Sometimes the ramifications of surviving an attack by fascists can last for years. So does our solidarity.
We can’t get into too much detail here for reasons that will become readily apparent in a minute, but this summer yet another family-friendly drag show was attacked by a violent mob of transphobes, this time in Indiana. Fortunately, anti-fascists were there and were able to effectively repel the attackers, allowing the drag show to continue without interruption. Unfortunately and as you probably already predicted, the police spared no expense and launched a six-week investigation, culminating in felony charges against one of the anti-fascists!
Making matters worse, the single mom they selected for prosecution was then subjected to an unrelenting campaign of abuse and death threats against herself and her family from well-known far-right extremists in the area.
The least we could do was help her out with her legal defense costs so she has one less thing to worry about and other people see that anti-fascists stand together and won’t be intimidated by the cops or by death threats from fascist chuds. We hope that she’s able to beat the bogus charges laid against her!
The last few days have seen big developments in two cases The International Anti-Fascist Defence Fund got involved in – here are the updates:
You may recall back in 2023 when the Elm Fork John Brown Gun Club got into some trouble. Apparently, standing in opposition to a mob of armed transphobes who publicly declared their intent to murder the particpants at a drag brunch is a criminal offense in Texas. Or maybe it just is when you show that you’re unwilling to be slaughtered by turned up armed as well.
If these arrests on bullshit charges wasn’t enough, the nazis who had been there to murder people sued the arrestees for “violating their civil rights!” Now, the arrestees needed to hire more lawyers to fight the lawsuit. Again, the Defence Fund stepped up to help.
Now for the good news: the first EFJBGC member to stand trial was found not guilty. Here’s a statement from our friend:
Cops lie.
On April 23, 2023 the Fort Worth Police attacked me and beat me for standing on a corner and preventing Nazis from filming people entering a drag show. Hours after my arrest the police in partnership with the elected district attorney spuriously developed a claim that I assaulted them, a claim they did not mention across 24 reports and supplemental reports. The chief integrity officer of the county took a case that spanned 2.5 seconds of my life, to invent the largest of conspiracies: that I am a terrorist, the leader of a criminal street gang, that I paid people to engage in unlicensed security, that cleaning water off my umbrella was a “secret antifa signal”, you name it. She tried to cloud 2.5 seconds with two years of lies and the jury saw through it from the start.
I don’t want to mince words here. We watched for days as cops took the stand to lie, consistently contradicting each other and more wildly often misrepresenting and lying about the very things we were all watching together on screen. We watched as the accusations that Christian-fascists have long levied against me were methodically broken down to the lies they were.
After four full days of enormous tension the state sealed their fate when they marched a wall of cops into the courtroom to stare down the jury while they read my charge. After less than 45 minutes, I heard those beautiful words: Not Guilty.
I am eternally grateful to my legal team who saw this blatant political persecution for what it was from the start and their ferocious commitment to justice while helping me feel like a person who mattered throughout. I will never forget their righteous rage and commitment to the truth. I am so grateful to my wife and family both blood and chosen, whose unending well of hope and strength pulled me through the darkest days. I am so grateful to the journalist who spent every moment of those long four days in the courtroom so my story could be told. And I am so grateful to the Quakers for standing along my side from beginning to end and keeping me level and centered.
I never wanted this to be about me, never wanted the attention or the soapbox, but I’m grateful for all that listened.
We wish we could say this is a happy ending, but it’s not over yet. Two other anti-fascists still have to go on trial. The lawsuit against them is outstanding. And the legal bills are piling up. Aeshna’s trial starts on September 26th and she still needs help paying her lawyer – you can pitch in to help with that here!
Speaking of not-happy endings, let us now take you to Oregon City, OR., where anti-fascist and independent journalist/videographer Alissa Azar was attacked by a mob of Proud Boys, who bear-maced her, tackled her to the ground, and beat her unconscious. Of course, the police decided to charge HER in the attack and the Defence Fund again stepped up to contribute to her legal defense.
Unfortunately, her trial concluded last week with two felony guilty verdicts against Azar. Sentencing happens next month and an appeal is highly likely – stay tuned for that!
The International Anti-Fascist Defence Fund was established in June of 2015, when members of the Antifa International collective saw the need for a standing fund to be used to provide emergency support to antifascists when, as a result of their anti-fascist work, they were in trouble and needed immediate assistance.
Nine years on and the Defence Fund has provided emergency support to antifascists the world over, whenever they’ve faced dire circumstances resulting from their work thwarting bigotry and fascism. It remains the only international anti-fascist solidarity project of its kind (that we’re aware of). To-date we have provided nearly $250,000USD in emergency aid to more than 760 antifascists in 26 different countries.Since last June, we’ve intervened eighteen times to provide game-changing levels of support and material aid to 66 antifascists in Belarus, Canada, Colombia, Denmark, France, Greece, Poland, and the US. This amounted to roughly $39,000USD in emergency aid that’s been provided over the last twelve months.
85% of the funds disbursed since June 2023 went towards legal defence, court costs, and fines; 8% of contributions went to assist former anti-fascist prisoners after their release. Providing support to the families of incarcerated anti-fascist prisoners accounted for the remaining 7%.
This was money well-spent; our interventions helped save antifascists from life-altering circumstances they were facing, solely because of their public opposition to fascism. Over the last twelve months, we’ve helped antifascists in dire situations stay healthy, get to safety, and stay free. You can read about the people we’ve helpedon our blog with two exceptions – an antifascist whose circumstance require us to not publicly reveal any details of their case, for security reasons; and one whose upcoming trial might be harmed by revealing any details.
The Defence Fund is operated by the Decisions Crew – a body of antifascists from around the world who have made contributions of at least $20USD to the Defence Fund. Decisions about how the Defence Fund operates are made via consensus wherever possible and by majority vote in circumstances where consensus is not forthcoming. In our first year, there were all of 45 Decisions Crew members. As of today, more than 1500 antifascists from 25 different countries have been invited to join the Decisions Crew.
On average, the Defence Fund receives an emergency request for help from an anti-fascists somewhere in the world every three weeks. When that call somes, we need to have as much money as possible ready to go to handle whatever the situation is. That money comes exclusively from contributions made by individuals who recognize the danger that anti-fascists voluntarily take on to protect their communities from bigotry and hatred and want to provide support when it matters most. You can join them by making a contribution to the Defence Fund today.
If you’ve been following what The International Anti-Fascist Defence Fund for any length of time, this is going to sound all-too familiar to you. This time, anti-fascists in Copenhagen planned and ran a peaceful and well-organized May 1st demonstration in solidarity with the colonized people of Palestine and around the world. Trouble-seeking cops decided to ruin the positive atmosphere by randomly selecting a participant to beat up and arrest. Now poor anti-fascist they targeted is not only facing pending charges, the assault also triggered mental health issues from previous violent encounters with the police.
His family approached the Defence Fund to ask for some help. Help we did! We hope our Danish friend beats his charges and makes a full recovery.
Krystsina “Kita” Charankova | Kristina Cherenkova was probably one of the best-known anti-fascist prisoners in the world. In 2022, she was convicted in Belarus for the heinous “crimes” of advocating against the Ukraine invasion, being against the Belrussian police, sharing links and videos from anarchist groups, and (of course) criticizing Lukashenko’s brutal regime. Back then, the Defence Fund provided support for her and her comrades as they faced their trials. Unfortunately, there was no amount of support we could provide to prevent the inevitable outcome of a political trial in a country described as “Europe’s last dictatorship.” At the end of her trial, Kita was imprisoned.
Until now! We were ecstatic to find out that she was released earlier this month and sent her a bit of additional support to help her get back on her feet and become adjusted to being back in the world. Glad to see she’s wasting no time getting back into the swing of things, as evidenced by her backup vocals for oi! legends Los Fastidos.
Elm Fork John Brown Gun Club ensuring that the armed transphobes threatening to murder attendees at a drag event keep their distance.
You might recall a certain degree of hysteria and pearl-clutching among right-wing media pundits when they found out that their cherished 2nd Amendment rights also applied to anti-fascists. This became abundantly clear to them when pistol-packing transphobes intent on disrupting a drag show in Texas and possibly making good on their threats to murder the attendees were stopped in their tracks by the presence of the Elm Fork John Brown Gun Club.
Of course, transphobes & their police pals couldn’t allow for such a thing. Attack #1 against the EFJBGC came in the form of bullshit arrests by the cops of three EFJBGC members (of course, the Defence Fund helped pay for their legal defense costs). Now, attack #2 has come in the form of a lawsuit filed by the “New Columbia Movement” (a self-described “Christian fascist fraternity” that seeks to forcibly convert everyone to Christianity, among other things), against two of the arrestees on the basis that their rights were violated when they were unable to physically attack attendees at the drag show! So now our friends have to deal with the costs and hassle of unjustified criminal charges and a vexatious lawsuit.
Our friends have set up crowdfunders to help them with this expenses here and also here. They also reached out to us directly for support, which we were more than happy to provide, because we believe that drag shows are a form of free expression that shouldn’t be shut down by death threats from bigots, just as we believe that the believe we need to have the backs of those who put themselves on the line to prevent those threats from being carried out. If you believe the same, hit those crowdfunding links! If you believe there’s a need for a standing fund to provide emergency support to anti-fascists in situations like what’s been described here, make a contribution to the Defence Fund today!
The International Anti-Fascist Defence Fund 
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