Megyn Kelly was heard yelling “that’s a blatant lie,” at a college student, who suggested that Donald Trump’s rhetoric contributed to political violence, at a debate yesterday.
The conservative commentator has started speaking at college campuses under the Turning Point USA banner, after the assassination of the brand’s founder, Charlie Kirk.
The student argued that Trump’s admission that he “hates” his enemies is just one example of the president heightening tensions across the country.
“70% of political violence is committed by Republicans. Look it up.
“DOJ just pulled it. The DOJ just pulled it from their website,” the student adds.
Kelly replied by branding the student’s argument as “defamatory” and “inappropriate.”
“First of all, let me take on the first premise of your question, that it was President Trump’s rhetoric that led to an assassin killing our friend Charlie Kirk. That’s a blatant lie,” Kelly says.
Kirk was assassinated on September 10, with a 22-year-old named Tyler Robinson being arrested in connection with the crime.
When the student argued, “No, I said he contributed to the political atmosphere, the tension.”
Kelly shot back, “Well, then you have no point. Then your point is utterly empty. Contributing to the atmosphere? No, let’s just make clear. Let’s just make clear. This guy was motivated by leftist ideology. We know it from the bullet casings, we know it from the Utah governor, we know it from his own mother. Yes, we do! Let’s really be clear on that.”
The student retored: “Let’s say this guy’s a leftist, even if that’s true, does that make it okay for the sitting president of the United States to incite violence against liberals?”
“The president of the United States has not incited violence against liberals. The president of the United States made a joke at the Charlie Kirk memorial which was funny and self-deprecating. It was on the heels of Erika Kirk saying she, in an extraordinary moment, forgave her husband’s killer. Let me finish.”
“And then President Trump got up and, making a joke, playing off what Erika said, he said, ‘We disagree. I need to do better, Erika’s going to try to convince me, but I’m in a different place,’ and that’s completely normal for a politician to be thinking about his political fights. And by the way, Trump has every right to loathe his enemies. They tried to put him in jail for the rest of his life,” Kelly ranted.
“Rightfully so! He’s a criminal!’ the student yelled.
When Kelly asked the student to continue, he said, “Thank you for your time,” and left the microphone.
Prominent Republicans, including President Trump, blamed the “radical left” for the shooting at Utah Valley University.
However, sources linked to a federal investigation into the assassination told NBC News that there is “no evidence” of a link between left-wing politics and the assassination.
“Every indication so far is that this was one guy who did one really bad thing because he found Kirk’s ideology personally offensive,” the source said.
Meanwhile, Kelly says she was left “genuinely rattled” by an article published by Jezebel, which followed a journalist who paid a witch to curse Charlie Kirk. The tongue-in-cheek piece was published two days before Kirk’s death.
Preempting criticism, the article’s author had been clear that she was “not calling on dark forces to cause him harm.”
Jezebel has since taken the article down and emphasized that it does not support political violence.
“You’re playing with fire, messing with this stuff. There actually are demons in this world,” Kelly said, speaking about the article on her show.
A recent poll by YouGov found that younger Americans are more likely to say that political violence is sometimes justifiable than older people.
The study found that 20 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds said it was sometimes justified. However, only 3 percent of people aged 65 and older shared the same opinion.
Lucas Walsh, professor of youth politics at Monash University, told Newsweek that the shift was caused by the “climate crisis, cost-of-living pressures, geopolitical conflict, and the divisive platforms of social media.”
