Which US extremist groups have been involved in violent incidents since 2020?
Executive summary
Since 2020 a broad set of U.S. extremist movements — primarily far‑right white supremacists and anti‑government “boogaloo” and militia networks, plus accelerationist neo‑Nazi cells (e.g., The Base) — are repeatedly linked to plots and violent incidents; white‑aligned extremists accounted for the plurality of plots and attacks in 2020 in several data sets (66% in one government summary; 90% of attacks and plots attributed to a particular sector in 2020 by one dataset) [1] [2]. Far‑left actors, including anarchist/antifa‑aligned individuals or small networks, also appear in 2020 incident tallies and in later reporting as a growing source of targeted violence, while jihadist‑inspired attackers (including the 2025 New Orleans vehicle attack) remain a persistent but smaller share of incidents [3] [4] [5].
1. Far‑right white supremacists: the dominant thread in 2020 violence
Government testimony and multiple research projects show white nationalist and like‑minded extremists were responsible for a large share of plots and attacks in 2020; one congressional summary said white nationalists conducted 66% of terrorist plots and attacks that year [1]. ADL and CSIS reports document sustained activity by white supremacist networks, prison gangs, outlaw bikers with neo‑Nazi links, and accelerationist groups such as The Base, whose members were arrested in multiple 2020 plots [4] [6].
2. Accelerationist neo‑Nazi cells and “The Base” — arrested and disrupted but influential
The Base is repeatedly cited as an accelerationist neo‑Nazi organization whose members were arrested for three separate terrorist plots in 2020, illustrating how small, networked cells attempted violent campaigns and drew significant law‑enforcement action [4]. Researchers note these groups often play an outsized role in plotting despite being numerically small, and law enforcement responses curtailed some growth after 2020 [4].
3. Anti‑government militias and the “boogaloo” phenomenon
The loosely organized “boogaloo” movement — an anti‑government, pro‑civil‑war subculture — is linked to arrests for conspiracies and IED possession in June 2020 and other violent plots that year; public deplatforming and prosecutions reportedly wound the movement’s growth after 2020 [7] [4]. CSIS and other analysts include anti‑government militias among the principal drivers of the 2020 surge in domestic terrorism [7].
4. Far‑left violence, anarchists and ‘antifa’: real incidents, disputed scale
CSIS counted a rise in anarchist/anti‑fascist‑aligned attacks in 2020 (20% of incidents in one CSIS sample, up from 8% in 2019), often linked to demonstrations and clashes with right‑wing actors and police [3]. ADL and other analysts also record high‑profile incidents involving an antifa‑aligned individual (the killing of Aaron Danielson in Portland, 2020), but the scale and organizational coherence of “antifa” remain contested in reporting and among experts [6] [3] [8].
5. Jihadist‑inspired attacks: rarer but lethal — New Orleans 2025 as an example
Jihadist‑inspired attacks are fewer in number but can be highly lethal; CSIS tallied 140 jihadist attacks or plots from 1994 to 2025 and highlighted the New Year’s Day 2025 Bourbon Street vehicle attack, inspired by the Islamic State, which killed 14 people [5] [9]. Analysts warn that such individuals often act alone after online radicalization, making them difficult to predict [5] [9].
6. Lone actors, small networks and the limits of “group” labels
Multiple sources emphasize that much U.S. domestic violence is carried out by lone actors or tiny networks rather than large hierarchies; CSIS notes many incidents are planned by a single individual or small group, complicating neat attribution to named organizations [3]. The FBI underscores that individuals often radicalize online and mobilize quickly with little formal group structure [10].
7. Trends after 2020: decline, shift, and contested interpretations
Research through 2024–25 shows a complicated evolution: some reports indicate right‑wing incidents declined after law‑enforcement actions and deplatforming, while CSIS and others report an uptick in left‑wing attacks by 2025 that in some datasets outnumber right‑wing incidents for the first time in decades [4] [11] [12]. Different datasets and definitions produce divergent pictures; FactCheck and NPR note debates over whether increases in left‑wing violence are structural or driven by a few high‑profile events and changes in categorization [13] [14].
8. What the sources agree and where they diverge
Sources consistently identify white supremacists, anti‑government militias (including boogaloo), accelerationist neo‑Nazi cells, anarchist/antifa‑aligned actors, and jihadist‑inspired attackers among groups tied to violent incidents since 2020 [4] [3] [5]. They diverge on scale and trajectory: some emphasize persistent dominance of far‑right violence (ADL, congressional testimony), others point to growing left‑wing incidents in 2025 and warn definitions and sampling choices shape conclusions [4] [11] [12].
Limitations: available sources do not mention every named local or state arrest beyond the cited examples; attribution of any later killings or arrests to organized groups may change as investigations proceed (not found in current reporting).