A college professor finds himself under vicious attack — including death threats — because he wrote a New York Times bestseller about the history of the anti-fascist movement …
On September 22, 2025, when Donald Trump announced a decree to categorize “antifa” — a generic term for anti-fascism — as a “terrorist organization,” Rutgers history professor, and New York Times bestselling author, Mark Bray little suspected that his life was about to change radically.
But, years earlier, Bray had written a history book called Antifa: The Antifascist Handbook, and soon after Trump’s decree, the right-wing student organization Turning Point USA petitioned for Bray’s dismissal from his job. This was quickly followed by a series of increasingly virulent social media attacks, culminating in online death threats that included his home address.
In the wake of the Charlie Kirk murder, Bray took the threats seriously and tried to flee the country with his wife and two small children — only to be stopped at the airport and interrogated by federal agents.
Eventually, amidst an explosion of international media attention, Bray and his family managed to escape to Spain. But the experience left him a wreck.
Unpunctuated Death Threats is an intimate journey to the heart of how this Trumpian moment and the new fascism it has birthed — a world of far-right influencers, social media soldiers, and networked violence that chased the author into hiding — has shockingly made the United States a place to flee from. With fascism resurgent and genocide raging in Gaza, Bray turns anew to his Jewish identity in search of answers.
Dispatched from formerly fascist Spain, Bray offers a crucial meditative roadmap of the tragedy of the fascist present in the United States, and hopeful visions of a post-fascist future.
On September 22, 2025, when Donald Trump announced a decree to categorize “antifa” — a generic term for anti-fascism — as a “terrorist organization,” Rutgers history professor, and New York Times bestselling author, Mark Bray little suspected that his life was about to change radically.
But, years earlier, Bray had written a history book called Antifa: The Antifascist Handbook, and soon after Trump’s decree, the right-wing student organization Turning Point USA petitioned for Bray’s dismissal from his job. This was quickly followed by a series of increasingly virulent social media attacks, culminating in online death threats that included his home address.
In the wake of the Charlie Kirk murder, Bray took the threats seriously and tried to flee the country with his wife and two small children — only to be stopped at the airport and interrogated by federal agents.
Eventually, amidst an explosion of international media attention, Bray and his family managed to escape to Spain. But the experience left him a wreck.
Unpunctuated Death Threats is an intimate journey to the heart of how this Trumpian moment and the new fascism it has birthed — a world of far-right influencers, social media soldiers, and networked violence that chased the author into hiding — has shockingly made the United States a place to flee from. With fascism resurgent and genocide raging in Gaza, Bray turns anew to his Jewish identity in search of answers.
Dispatched from formerly fascist Spain, Bray offers a crucial meditative roadmap of the tragedy of the fascist present in the United States, and hopeful visions of a post-fascist future.
Author
Mark Bray
Mark Bray is a historian of modern European history specializing in radicalism, political violence, and transnational history. He is the author of three books, including The Anarchist Inquisition: Assassins, Activists, and Martyrs in Spain and France; Translating Anarchy: The Anarchism of Occupy Wall Street; and the New York Times bestseller Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook, which is the first transnational history of postwar anti-fascism and has been translated into seven languages. Bray teaches at Rutgers University, but remotely from an undisclosed location in Spain.
Learn More about Mark Bray
