By Raphael Satter
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -After the fatal shooting of right-wing influencer Charlie Kirk, U.S. Republicans have a warning for Americans: Mourn him respectfully or suffer the consequences.
Over the past several days, Democratic and Republican leaders have widely condemned the murder of Kirk, a 31-year-old activist and Trump world celebrity known for his hard-right views and pugnacious debating style.
A smattering of commentators – including ordinary people joking about and sometimes celebrating Kirk’s death to lawmakers and pundits dwelling on his history of bigoted rhetoric – has also surfaced, only to be targeted in organized campaigns.
At least 13 people have been fired or suspended from their jobs after discussing the killing online, according to a Reuters tally based on interviews, public statements and local press reports. The total includes journalists, academic workers and teachers.
Others have been subjected to torrents of online abuse or seen their offices flooded with calls demanding they be fired, part of a surge in right-wing rage that has followed the killing.
Some Republicans want to go further still and have proposed deporting Kirk’s critics from the United States, suing them into penury or banning them from social media for life.
“Prepare to have your whole future professional aspirations ruined if you are sick enough to celebrate his death,” said conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer, a prominent ally of President Donald Trump and one of several far-right figures who are organizing digital campaigns on X, the social media site, to ferret out and publicly shame Kirk’s critics.
U.S. lawmaker Clay Higgins said in a post on X that anyone who “ran their mouth with their smartass hatred celebrating the heinous murder of that beautiful young man” needed to be “banned from ALL PLATFORMS FOREVER.” The U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau said on the same site that he had been disgusted to “see some on social media praising, rationalizing, or making light of the event, and have directed our consular officials to undertake appropriate action.”
Republicans’ anger at those disrespecting Kirk’s legacy contrasts with the mockery some of the same figures – including Kirk – directed at past victims of political violence.
For example, when former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband Paul was clubbed over the head by a hammer-wielding conspiracy theorist during a break-in at their San Francisco home shortly before the 2022 midterm elections, Higgins posted a photo making fun of the attack. He later deleted the post.
Loomer falsely suggested that Paul Pelosi and his assailant were lovers, calling the brutal assault on the octogenarian a “booty call gone wrong.” Speaking to a television audience a few days after the attack, a grinning Kirk called for the intruder to be sprung from jail.
“If some amazing patriot out there in San Francisco or the Bay Area wants to really be a midterm hero, someone should go and bail this guy out,” he said.
Loomer and Higgins did not return messages seeking comment.
WEBSITE “EXPOSE CHARLIE’S MURDERERS” REGISTERED
The campaign to fire Kirk’s critics has not slowed. Calls to run people out of jobs have flooded across X. A newly registered site, “Expose Charlie’s Murderers,” has 41 names of people it alleged were “supporting political violence online” and claims to be working on a backlog of more than 20,000 submissions.
A Reuters review of the screenshots and comments posted to the site show that some of those featured joked about or celebrated Kirk’s death. One was quoted as saying, “He got what he deserved” and others were quoted providing variations on “karma’s a bitch.” Others, however, were critical of the far-right figure while explicitly denouncing violence.
Still others appear to have done little more than point out that a longtime gun control foe had been shot to death. At least three accurately quoted Kirk’s 2023 comments in which he told a crowd that some gun deaths were “worth it,” saying that the annual drumbeat of firearms-related killings in the United States was “a prudent deal” in exchange for the Constitution’s Second Amendment.
One person who was featured on the site said their employer had been bombarded by phone calls, with callers threatening not to let up until they were fired or disciplined. The person said they plan to avoid the office in the coming days.
“To be very, very clear, I don’t condone the murder of Charlie Kirk,” the person told Reuters in a phone call, speaking on condition of anonymity to avoid further harassment. “But I do, at the same time, have to appreciate the irony of this situation,” they said, referring to Kirk being shot through the neck with a rifle following years of vociferous opposition to gun control.
Reuters could not establish who is running the website. The site did not respond to questions about its ownership, methodology, or why quoting Kirk accurately could be seen as “supporting political violence.” Squarespace, the site’s host, did not return messages seeking comment.
Jay Childers, an associate professor of communications at Kansas University, said there was a long history of government officials and political elites attempting to control rhetoric and suppress dissent.
“I do not think this moment is really new in that sense,” he said, although he noted that “the ability for anyone to post their thoughts on the internet certainly makes far more people potential targets of any attempts to control political speech.”
(Reporting by Raphael Satter; Editing by Paul Thomasch and Mark Porter)
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