“We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them, and doing everything they can to score political points from it.””

Jimmy Kimmel

WASHINGTON, DC - “We can do this the easy way or the hard way,” Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Brendan Carr said.

He was referring to using his position to force legacy media companies, namely Comcast and Disney, into capitulation with President Donald J. Trump’s demands to censor free speech.

The order came just after television host Jimmy Kimmel said in his monologue that Tyler Robinson—the Utah native who shot influencer and political commentator Charlie Kirk—was right-wing.

“We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them, and doing everything they can to score political points from it,” Kimmel said. 

Kimmel has a long, somewhat bumpy history with political correctness, having cut his teeth donning blackface and introducing “girls on trampolines” on the ’90s hit The Man Show.

But in recent years, as the host of ABC property Jimmy Kimmel Live!, Kimmel has followed in the footsteps of former late show hosts by sprinkling his monologue with jokes about the current administration, a tradition going as far back as 1954.

The very first host of The Tonight Show, Steve Allen, was quoted to have joked, “In a rational society we would want our presidents to be teachers. In our actual society we insist they be cheerleaders.”

Allen also said, “if the Old Testament were a reliable guide in the matter of capital punishment, half the people in the United States would have to be killed tomorrow.” 

That last quote represents in many ways the opposite of Charlie Kirk’s beliefs as an Evangelical Christian, and the opposite of his words as a mouthpiece for the Trump Administration. 

“Death penalties should be public, should be quick, should be televised,” Kirk has been quoted to have said about capital punishment. “I think at a certain age, it's an initiation....What age should you start to see public executions?”

Kirk spoke those words on a 2024 episode of THOUGHTCRIME, a panel discussion segment on his podcast. However, finding that source material has become difficult, since all episodes of The Charlie Kirk Show prior to July 17, 2025, have been removed from major carriers, including Apple and Spotify.     

The question of Robinson’s political affiliation was immediately a factor after he was implicated and his identity was released to the public. Raised in Utah by a Republican family, and comfortable with firearms, seen dressed in the uniform of a far-right “groyper” for Halloween, he was presumed to be Republican as well. 

Robinson, 22, was registered as “unaffiliated” and did not vote in the last two general elections. Utah prosecutors wrote that during their investigation, Robinson’s mother claimed that he had become more left-leaning, “pro-gay, and pro-trans” over the last year.

Republican Governor Spencer Cox of Utah stated to The Wall Street Journal that Robinson was “deeply indoctrinated with leftist ideology.”

Images of Robinson wearing political shirts promoting Kamala Harris or the Democratic Socialists of America began circulating online. Prosecutors released snippets of a text conversation supposedly between Robinson and his roommate, who has been implicated by far-right Trump loyalist Laura Loomer as an alleged member of a “trans terror cell.” 

Many of the circulated images have since been proven to be fake, and the authenticity of the text conversation has also been greatly disputed. 

The State of Utah is currently seeking the death penalty for Robinson and, citing aggravating circumstances, may pursue death by firing squad. Utah is one of five states—including Idaho, Mississippi, Oklahoma, and South Carolina—where death by firing squad is still legal, with the last firing squad execution in Utah taking place only 15 years ago. 

Despite many Republicans decrying political violence as coming from the left, all five states that support capital punishment run Republican, and historic data shows that capital punishment is a known tool of political violence. 

In a 2012 Case Study against the death penalty, the American Civil Liberties Union wrote: “Governments worldwide have often attempted to justify their lethal fury by extolling the purported benefits that such killing would bring to the rest of society. The benefits of capital punishment are illusory, but the bloodshed and the resulting destruction of community decency are real.”

The silencing of Kimmel, and shifting the narrative to blame rising political violence throughout the country onto left-leaning “enemies of the state,” has political opponents of the Trump Administration voicing concerns and calling the matter an outright attack on free speech.  

Kimmel’s removal from ABC is directly related to ABC’s parent company, Disney, and their upcoming deal set to go before the FCC for approval. The $3 billion deal involves ESPN acquiring the National Football League’s NFL Network, RedZone, and fantasy football assets.

Nexstar Media Group, owner of a vast number of local TV stations, joined in chastising the late-night comedian for his remarks, stating that their affiliates would no longer be airing Jimmy Kimmel Live! 

“Mr. Kimmel’s comments about the death of Mr. Kirk are offensive and insensitive at a critical time in our national political discourse, and we do not believe they reflect the spectrum of opinions, views, or values of the local communities in which we are located,” said Andrew Alford, President of Nexstar’s broadcasting division.

Alford continued to say that preempting the broadcast of Jimmy Kimmel Live! was a move toward “respectful, constructive dialogue,” essentially canceling any discourse that is against the party line under the guise of human decency. 

Nexstar also has a major merger facing FCC approval, which involves acquiring TEGNA for $6.2 billion This would consolidate 64 local television stations and launch Nexstar into controlling the media consumed by 80% of U.S. households.

Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc., another media company with a deal to come before the FCC, also criticized Kimmel, demanding he apologize to Kirk’s family and donate to Kirk’s Turning Point USA nonprofit organization, which brings right-wing messaging to high school and college campuses. 

A Charlie Kirk memorial special was to be televised through all of Sinclair’s local affiliates in place of Friday night’s Jimmy Kimmel Live! time slot, but Sinclair instead aired a Celebrity Family Feud rerun and posted the Kirk special on The National News Desk’s YouTube channel.  

Representatives for ABC and Disney announced on Monday, September 22, that Kimmel and Jimmy Kimmel Live! would return to television on Tuesday, September 23. 

While these conglomerates protect their bottom lines, as episodes of South Park start disappearing from streaming platforms, as Kirk is immortalized with nationwide candlelight vigils and televised memorials, and an official Day is declared on our calendars, the true harm of inciting political violence across the country is being hidden in plain sight.

Though Vice President JD Vance, while hosting The Charlie Kirk Show on Monday, September 15, said that “people on the left are much likelier to defend and celebrate political violence,” there is a lot of data indicating otherwise, despite the Trump Administration’s attempts to discredit, or even delete, that data.

The right-wing’s ridicule of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and husband Paul—who suffered a home invasion and a violent attack by a far-right conspiracy theorist—was well documented, as was the lack of concern regarding the shooting of Democratic Senator John Hoffman and of Representative Melissa Hortman of Minnesota, who died by the hands of a Trump supporter. 

"I think the governor of Minnesota is so whacked out. I'm not calling him," President Trump said, when asked if he would be sending a message of condolences to Tim Walz. You may remember, he ran in the Kamala Harris campaign against Trump/Vance 2024.

"Why would I call him? The guy doesn't have a clue. He's a mess. I could be nice and call, but why waste time?"

A 2023 report by the Public Religion Research Institute and the Brookings Institution highlighted that 41% of Trump supporters felt that resorting to political violence was the mark of a “true American,” with only 7% of Democrats indicating that they felt that way. 

The Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, reported in 2025 that of the 79 murders resulting from domestic terrorist attacks that have occurred since January 1, 2020, right-wing terrorists account for over half of those murders. That surpasses Islamist terrorists by over 30%. 

The University of Maryland reported in 2022: “across both datasets, we find that radical acts perpetrated by individuals associated with left-wing causes are less likely to be violent. In the United States, we find no difference between the level of violence perpetrated by right-wing and Islamist extremists.”

A 2022 report from The Anti-Defamation League found that all 25 extremist-related murders that occurred that year were committed by right-wing extremists of some variety, with white supremacists being linked to 21 of those 25 murders. 

A recent study by Trump’s Department of Justice (DOJ), which stated that “since 1990, far-right extremists have committed far more ideologically motivated homicides than far-left or radical Islamist extremists,” was removed from the department’s website shortly following Kirk’s death. 

Much of this was brought to light at a recent House Judiciary Committee hearing, during which FBI Director Kash Patel was grilled amid the aftermath of Kirk’s death on matters regarding a rise of white supremicist and far-right violence. 

Patel’s entire history in the role of FBI Director came under scrutiny, as did his actions surrounding the investigation to catch Kirk’s killer, and his ability to protect the nation from ongoing attacks by domestic terrorists. 

Immediately following Kirk’s death, there were reports of Patel being seen at an exclusive New York City eatery, Rao’s, where he allegedly posted updates regarding the hunt for the shooter on the social media platform X. First Patel posted that a subject had been placed into custody; then, an hour and a half later, Patel posted that the subject had been released.

During the hearing, Representative Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-California) listed recent events of political violence, asking Patel to indicate if any were false. Kamlager-Dove mentioned Dylann Roof, a white supremacist who in 2015 shot and killed nine black members of Charleston’s Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in South Carolina. 

Patel, who was the DOJ prosecutor at the time of the killings, claimed to the hearing that he did not know who Roof was, nor the story of those nine victims slain during Bible study. 

“I don’t know who feels safe in this country except for the white supremacists, because I, specifically as a Black woman, definitely don’t feel safe,” Representative Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) said to Patel during the hearing.

Crockett also highlighted how, in the wake of Kirk’s murder, Historically Black Colleges and Universities were being violently targeted, including Hampton University, Virginia State University, Bethune Cookman University (BCU), Southern University, and Alabama State University, all which had to suspend classes, and even go into lockdown, as a result of threats. 

There is no clear connection between Kirk’s murder and the Black community; however, political commenters have been highlighting studied and proven connections between far-right ideology and white supremacy, and are alleging that the words spread by the Trump Administration, and by activists like Kirk, only serve to strengthen that connection and to perpetuate violence against Black and Brown communities. 

One week ago, in Mississippi, 21-year-old Trey Reed of Grenada was found hanging from a tree on the Delta State University campus in Cleveland. During his last conversation with his family, Reed stated how excited he was to be attending classes; the investigators and authorities involved with the case have classified Reed’s death as a suicide. 

According to the Suicide Prevention Resource Center, though suicide rates among Black or African American populations increased from 5.5 to 7.7 per 100,000 persons between 2011 and 2020, the suicide death rate in the overall U.S. population was “approximately double that of the rate in Black or African American populations among both males and females.”

The Office of Minority Health reported that the “overall suicide rate for Black or African Americans was 50% lower than that of the non-Hispanic white population, in 2021.” Many reports, as recent as 2022, indicate that “hanging, strangulation, or suffocation” is the second leading method of suicide among young Black or African Americans.

In September of this year, a 28-year-old Black man was found hanging from an overpass on the New York State Thruway in Dewitt; on June 11 of this year a 58-year-old Black man was found hanging from a tree in Albany.

Recently, the body of a Black college student was found in a Texas bayou; over the ensuing days another four bodies have been discovered. 

A report by non-profit civic initiative USAFacts indicates that reported hate crimes have increased from 5,843 to 11,679 from 2015 to 2024, with 79% of those crimes being against an individual, 40% against property, and 2% against society as a whole.

Intimidation was the most common form of hate crime in 2024, accounting for 38% of all hate crimes that year, with over half of the total hate crimes being motivated specifically by “race, ethnicity, or ancestry.” 

The report also highlighted that anti-Black hate crimes have risen 81% since 2015, and anti-Jewish crimes have tripled since then.