In 2019, local news media, including this paper, extolled the heroism of an uncle of mine, Pvt. James I. Trick, who met his death fighting fascists in the Hurtgen Forest of Germany in 1944, garnering him a Silver Star for bravery under fire. DNA testing conclusively identified his remains, and they returned home for military interment 75 years after his death.

Now, President Trump has designated “antifa,” simply a shortened form of antifascist, as a domestic terrorist organization despite the fact that no such entity exists: no headquarters, no governing body, no staff, no membership list. Antifa as a subversive organization exists only in the fevered imagination of an old man quickly losing his grip on reality.

I have been antifascist all my adult life, and I shall die so. To abdicate would be to mock Uncle Jim’s supreme sacrifice.

JAMES TRICK

Williamsport

Submitted by email