FACT FOCUS: Heritage Foundation leader wrong to say most political violence is committed by the left

WASHINGTON -- The leader of a conservative think tank on Thursday misrepresented partisan differences in political violence in the United States, wrongly suggesting that people associated with left-wing causes commit more violence than those on the right.

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HERITAGE FOUNDATION PRESIDENT KEVIN ROBERTS: “Most political violence in the last 25 years has been initiated by the left."

THE FACTS: Roberts' remarks came in response to questions about comments earlier this month in which he said the country was in the midst of "the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.”

He told reporters Thursday that he considers himself a historian of the American Revolution and that his comments about a second revolution were a reference to “ambitious policy plans” that Republicans have should former President Donald Trump win the 2024 election. Roberts' organization has proposed a sweeping overhaul of the federal government known as Project 2025.

Roberts said his comments about political violence were meant to be seen in the historical context.

A deeper look at the available evidence, however, shows that right-wing groups have committed more acts of political violence in recent U.S. history.

Two years ago a team of researchers from four universities examined court records and other data relating to 3,500 extremists active in the U.S. between 1948 and 2022. The individuals were split into three groups — left wing, right wing and relating to Islamic extremism. While some in the database had committed violent acts, others had raised money for extremist groups, volunteered or spoken out in favor of them.

Right-wing extremists were just as likely to commit violent acts as those motivated by Islamic extremism, the researchers found. Left-wing extremists were a distant third.

Gary LaFree, a University of Maryland professor and one of the co-authors of the research, said violent acts by left-wing groups have been diminishing for decades following violence by radical groups like the Weather Underground, a far-left militant organization founded in 1969.

In recent years, violence by right-wing groups has far outpaced violence by left-wing groups, said LaFree, the founding director of the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism, which studies extremism and political violence.

“There are very few left-wing cases these days,” LaFree said.

Increasingly, he said, many of those responsible for political violence espouse “muddled ideologies” combining a rejection of authority with conservative views, for instance, or supposed anarchists who say they also support authoritarianism. “Or they don’t have a strong ideological commitment at all,” LaFree added.

Questions about political violence and its place in American democracy are getting renewed attention following Saturday's attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump, a Republican. Some Trump supporters, including Trump running mate JD Vance, have blamed Democratic rhetoric for the shooting.

The attempt on Trump's life, however, is just the latest in several cases of violence committed against elected officials over more than a decade.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Gabby Giffords, who was gravely wounded in a 2011 shooting outside an Arizona grocery store, had been threatened and windows of her congressional offices in Tucson knocked out after she voted in favor of President Barack Obama's healthcare reform. Although a motive for the shooting was never determined.

Republican U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise, now House majority leader, was shot in 2017 while practicing for a charity baseball game. His assailant was described as having grievances against President Donald Trump and the GOP. Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan was the target of a foiled kidnapping plot uncovered in 2020.

In 2022, a man broke into the San Francisco home of then-U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and bludgeoned her husband, fracturing his skull. Last year, a man with a history of mental illness went to the Fairfax, Virginia, district office of Democratic U.S. Rep. Gerry Connolly, looking to kill him with a baseball bat. Connolly wasn’t there, so the man attacked two staffers.

The largest single act of political violence in recent years is the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, when a mob of Trump supporters fought with police, vandalized the Capitol and sought to block the certification of Joe Biden's presidential win.

Trump’s own incendiary words and his baseless lies about the 2020 election were blamed for encouraging the Jan. 6 attack, as well as other violent acts by supporters. Trump also mocked the hammer attack on Paul Pelosi, 80.

Years of surveys have consistently shown that Americans from both political parties strongly oppose political violence, according to Sean Westwood, a Dartmouth College political scientist who directs the Polarization Research Lab.

People typically overstate the violent intentions of those with different ideologies, too, Westwood said, with one party believing the other is far more willing to commit violence to further their political agenda. That's one reason why it's so important for leaders from both parties to come together to call for unity and peaceful discourse, Westwood said.

“Americans hate violence,” Westwood said. “Even the most polarized don’t support partisan violence.”

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