Left-wing political commentator Hasan Piker was set to debate Charlie Kirk on September 25. He was streaming live when alleged murderer Tyler Robinson's bullet fatally pierced Kirk's neck.
The death of Kirk has led to an outpouring of grief and a maelstrom of outrage that a far-right advocate and activist could be shot dead while giving a speech at Utah Valley University.
There has been praise of Kirk from US President Donald Trump, while MAGA advocates have blamed the political left for creating the circumstances where Kirk, a young Conservative poster boy, could be assassinated.
Piker says rather than galvanise the US against violence, Kirk's death on September 10 has only made the situation worse.
"I was horrified because as a political commentator, this is something that's constantly in the back of your mind," Piker told 7.30.
"I get a lot of death threats and certainly they've escalated quite a bit since this happened.
"Watching that unfold to someone that you were supposed to sit next to publicly in a public setting only in a couple weeks, it made it even more real."
Despite the escalation of threats directed towards him, Piker told 7.30 he would remain vigilant but undeterred, while in a country where gun violence is a problem.
In 2023, the US Centers for Disease Control recorded more than 46,000 gun-related deaths; 17,927 were homicides.
The independently run Gun Violence Archive published its 2024 report on Tuesday. It said there had been more than 41,000 gun-related deaths; more than 19,000 were homicides or unintentional deaths.
"I have a policy of not letting fear dictate my life, and I'm going to continue abiding by that," Piker told 7.30.
"I also go to protests, protests where I get shot at by the American police, so I'm no stranger to putting myself in harm's way, and it's unfortunately something that I have to do in order to do my job properly.
"I'm most likely going to continue. I'm just waiting out this initial period of unrest and anger and resentment and taking extra precaution."
Is Trump capitalising on Kirk's death?
While Piker says Kirk's death was a horrifying event he believes it has further emboldened Mr Trump and others on America's political right to push agendas that silence political dissidents.
US Vice-President JD Vance referred to data from a YouGov poll taken after Kirk's killing that showed that although most Americans say it is unacceptable to be happy about the deaths of public figures, 34 per cent of liberally minded respondents said it was acceptable.
"The data is clear. People on the left are much likelier to defend and celebrate political violence," Mr Vance said before turning the killing into a factional war.
"This is not a both-sides problem. If both sides have a problem, one side has a much bigger and more malignant problem, and that is the truth we must be told."
His comments came after White House Deputy Chief of Staff Steven Miller said he was going to turn his anger to far-left groups.
"We are going to channel all the anger we have over the organised campaign [that] led to this assassination to uproot and dismantle these terrorist networks," Mr Miller said last week.
Piker says he knew the campaign would be coming immediately after Kirk was shot.
"Instantly I knew this was going to be something that the administration will use against those that they've declared political dissidents," he said
"My fears were realised shortly after when Donald Trump came out only a couple hours after announcing Charlie Kirk's untimely demise and made a statement about how they were basically going to start prosecuting and persecuting political dissonance. The left, as he said.
"This was before we knew the shooter's background or his motives.
"It was very clear from the start that the administration was going to use this as an opportunity to stamp out political opposition."
Piker, a US citizen, says he has already been detained by authorities once, when he was arriving back into Chicago from overseas.
"They're going after people's civil liberties, so who knows where they might take it," he said.
"I just hope that the broad American appetite for anger and vengeance will be soothed by how fast they get distracted elsewhere.
"Hopefully they'll focus on something else soon before it turns into serious repercussions [like] implementing authoritarian mechanisms of control, suppression of speech, suppression of dissent.
"I do truly worry that we're heading in that direction."
'Incitement to murder'
Part of that direction is the targeting of commentators like Piker.
Piker told 7.30 he believes it is part of a pattern from the political right and revealed some are trying to have him deplatformed.
"There are groups that are actively targeting myself and some other political dissidents right now with the hopes of deplatforming them in that process," he said.
"They openly revealed to this journalist [that I had just spoken to] that they actually couldn't find anything that I've ever said about Charlie Kirk, because they were trying to tie me back to this violence.
"And they openly admitted to the journalists in that moment that they don't actually care about Charlie Kirk at all. They just want to get me deplatformed."
Tesla CEO Elon Musk labelled comments taken from a previous Twitch stream of Piker's "incitement to murder".
The comments Mr Musk was referring to involved Piker saying, "you need to be shanking these motherf***ers" in reference to a debate about former Republican Senate candidate for Georgia Herschel Walker in 2022.
Asked if those comments contributed to the aggressive political climate in the US by 7.30 host Sarah Ferguson, Piker downplayed their effect.
"I think that's a perfect example of the insincere ways in which a lot of the political conversations take place in this country right now," Piker said.
"If you look at the broader context instead of the 30-second snippet that is being used, I'm saying Democrats need to be cutthroat. They need to be more vicious when they're debating.
"And it's a very cynical and insincere way to frame the utilisation of a very obvious metaphor to make it seem as though I'm advocating for violence."
A different Charlie Kirk
In 2023 Kirk said on gun violence: "I think it's worth it to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the second amendment to protect our other God-given rights. That is a prudent deal. It is rational."
Piker, while dismayed by Kirk's death, said the man had changed since they first met in 2017.
"He was very professional, he was very cordial and he wasn't shy about trying to develop a personal relationship with even someone like myself but I didn't really entertain that," Piker said.
"His opinions were much more moderate back in 2017 as opposed to what [they] became by 2020 and onwards but even then, I did not understand the productivity of hanging out in a cordial manner with someone who I opposed so vehemently because of their worldview.
"Having said that, reflecting on our private correspondence at the time, I realised his opinions definitely changed quite a bit."
Kirk had railed against further gun control, was critical of LGBTQ and transgender rights and at different times had vilified Muslims and racially diverse people in the US.
One thing Piker laments is that to some Kirk has seemingly been elevated to a higher status as an architect of free speech and that in death some of the more controversial views he espoused have been ignored as he was lauded for his openness to debate.
Asked about this praise for Kirk, Piker was blunt.
"To state that he was doing politics the right way without actually reflecting on his political output, I think is dishonest," Piker said.
"What I found to be distasteful was the lack of quotes or the lack of recognition for Charlie Kirk's ideology. It makes it seem as though the New York Times is outright endorsing Charlie Kirk's opinions and ideology by omitting it.
"It leaves the readers who may not be aware of Charlie Kirk's worldview with a totally different outlook on Charlie Kirk's political advocacy."
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