After Turning Point USA's Charlie Kirk was fatally shot in Utah, countless Democrats forcefully condemned the murder — from former President Joe Biden to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York) to California Gov. Gavin Newsom. AOC made it abundantly clear that while she had strong political disagreements with Kirk, such violence has no place in U.S. politics.
Yet President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance and many other MAGA Republicans are claiming that Democrats were celebrating Kirk's death in huge numbers. And Americans are being fired from their jobs for offering even mild criticism of Kirk's far-right political views — no matter how vehemently they condemned the shooting.
In an article published on September 27, The Guardian's Ed Pilkington details the ways in which Trump has been able to "turn the horrific killing of Charlie Kirk to his political advantage" by "unleashing an unprecedented peacetime assault on free speech and a free press on the back of the assassination."
"Since Kirk's death," Pilkington observes, "the president and his top team have: forced a private media company to suspend late-night TV star Jimmy Kimmel for inaccurate comments he made about Kirk's suspected shooter; threatened other TV networks with losing their licenses should they say things Trump doesn't like; vowed to prosecute 'hate speech' that is fully protected under the First Amendment; declared Antifa a terrorist organization in an indiscriminate attack on political ideology; and told journalists covering the Pentagon that they will have their access revoked unless they agree to restrictions on their reporting."
The Guardian reporter laments that the Trump Administration's "rush to censorship as a result of Kirk's killing" has received little pushback from the Republican Party and the MAGA movement. Nonetheless, Pilkington notes that "a few brave souls" have "spoken out against Trump from within the Republican Party."
"Collectively, they articulate a conservative and libertarian critique of Trump's second presidency that, given that it comes nominally from his own side, may carry some weight with the president as he proceeds to pulverize constitutional norms," Pilkington argues. "Their presence — lonely though at times it may seem — underlines that Trump and his MAGA army have not yet secured an absolute monopoly of thought on the right."
Pilkington continues, "As guardians of free speech trying to hold back an increasingly authoritarian tide, they can also offer tentative clues as to how American conservatism might one day claw its way back from MAGA's iron grip. But for now, they remain engaged in a long, uphill battle."
Read Ed Pilkington's full article for The Guardian at this link.