Fox Used a Blowtorch of Conspiracy Theorists to Put Out a Fire

A condensed overview of 22 hours of Fox News for the week ending 9/21/25

Last week on Fox News Jesse Watters invited a cavalcade of conspiracy theorists who enthusiastically demonized the transgender community and blamed them for the murder of Charlie Kirk. Never mind that the suspect in Kirk’s murder, Tyler Robinson, is a cis-gender young man who was raised in a deeply religious and politically conservative gun-loving family.

So far there is no evidence that Robinson worked with an accomplice or coordinated with a larger political organization. According to the series of text messages released by authorities even Robinson’s romantic partner, who happens to be transgender, had no advance notice of his plans to allegedly shoot Charlie Kirk.

Watters could have invited former law enforcement officials, a criminal profiler, or a ballistic expert to talk about the horrific crime. The Fox News host could have spoken with people Charlie Kirk worked with at his foundation Turning Point USA or a student who was inspired by Kirk’s advocacy for his faith or political causes.

Instead, Watters gave a platform to conspiracy theorists who have peddled false stories about sex trafficking, racist immigration schemes and lies about the 2020 presidential election.

Chris Rufo, Jack Posobiec, and Andy Ngo are not serious academics, experts or journalists they are propagandists who profit from disinformation, fantastical fabrications, racist and bigoted tropes and the illogical fear of an impending communist takeover of the largest free market economy in the world.

The Fox News host wasn’t turning the temperature down in terms of heated political rhetoric he was throwing jet fuel on a raging bonfire of hate and division.

Other major stories of the week included President Trump’s trip to the UK, ABC’s decision to suspend Jimmy Kimmel from his late night talk show and Trump’s plan to send National Guard troops into Memphis Tennessee.

Shows I analyzed on Fox News last week:

• Fox & Friends - extra hours on Monday

• The Five

• Jesse Watters Primetime

• The Story - Thursday only (Trump interview)

• Charlie Kirk Memorial - five hour commercial-free broadcast

• Several Trump press conferences

Jesse Watters Asked a Blowtorch to Put out a Fire

Jack Posobiec is a popular far right influencer and conspiracy theorist best known for promoting Pizzagate - a false story that claimed that Hillary Clinton and other high ranking members of the Democratic Party were part of a child sex-trafficking ring.

Posobiec and others claimed that emails hacked from the DNC in 2016 contained coded messages about the sexual torture and abuse of children. One of the main locations for this abuse was the basement of Comet Ping Pong a Washington D.C. based pizzeria.

One believer in the theory, Edgar Maddison Welch, 28, was so disturbed by the thought of children chained to the walls of Comet Ping Pong that he drove from North Carolina with an AR-15 style rifle only to find that the restaurant didn’t even have a basement, much less one filled with hapless children.

Welch fired three shots into the building but luckily no one was injured. He later surrendered to police without incident. A few days later another man, Yusif Lee Jones, 52, was arrested after making threatening phone calls to Besta Pizza, another pizzeria that was part of the false story promoted by Posobiec and others.

Posobiec was also part of the Alt-Right a white supremacist movement he later disavowed after the murder of Heather Heyer at the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. He has also promoted other conspiracies surrounding false stories about the 2020 presidential election (Stop the Steal) and a scheme to replace white Americans with more docile non-white immigrants (The Great Replacement).

Five days after Charlie Kirk’s murder Watters thought Posobiec would be an appropriate guest to discuss mending political divisions.

From Monday night’s episode of “Jesse Watters Primetime,”

“Can we come together, Jack? Are these people capable of coming together with?” asked Watters.

“Jesse. We had one guy, a good friend of mine, who tried to talk to them, who tried to get them to listen to reason, and they killed him. They killed him in cold blood. Charlie tried sitting down and having conversations, and many people came. Thousands of people came. But there are a group of people in this country. Jesse. There is a a social cancer, a cancerous ideology that is spread throughout this country. And I’m not just talking about the talking heads. And yeah, there’s there’s plenty of those as well. But we’ve seen it with the average people. It’s gone mainstream in so many ways to act as if they are completely dissociated with humanity. And what you said about shunning family members and canceling and censorship, that’s where it started. And it ended with my friend shot on campus,” said Posobiec.

Posobiec used the plural pronoun of ‘they’ when he referred to the alleged murderer of Kirk - a single gunman acting alone.

Posobiec also spoke at Charlie Kirk’s memorial which aired on Fox News on Sunday September 21st. His speech was the most reckless and disturbing call to action in the entire event.

“Are you ready to fight back? And are you ready to put on the full armor of God and face the evil in high places? And the spiritual warfare before us that put on the full armor of God. Do it now. Now is the time. This is the place. This is the turning point for Charlie,” said Posobiec in a full scream to 90,000 people in an auditorium.

Chris Rufo Invented - Transgender Militant Ideology

In the same program Watters included Chris Rufo, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. Rufo has also worked with the Claremont Institute, The Discovery Institute, The Heritage Foundation and the Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism.

Rufo built his career on hyping up the fear of critical race theory in American schools and government agencies. He was largely successful at influencing President Donald J. Trump and other prominent Republicans against DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) programs.

In 2023 the Southern Poverty Law Center reported that Rufo had a contract with a Hungarian government-funded organization to give two lectures on the “topics of critical race theory and LGBTQ propaganda.”

He has also spread disinformation and promoted conspiracy theories. In September 2024 J.D. Vance retweeted a video by Rufo that promoted the false story that migrants were eating pet dogs and cats in Dayton, Ohio.

Rufo has also advocated for the removal of any discussions of the LGBTQ+ community in schools. According to reporting by The New York Times he appeared alongside Florida Governor Ron DeSantis as he signed Florida House Bill 1557 which prohibits teachers from discussing anything related to LGBTQ+ related topics from kindergarten through the third grade.

On “Jesse Watters Primetime,” Rufo appeared to invent a new moral scourge while discussing Kirk’s murder.

“Transgender militant ideology is the most dangerous ideology in the United States at this moment. It’s something that we need to take very seriously,” said Rufo.

Rufo offered nothing to back up his outrageous claim. He offered no study, no data, or research to fortify his declaration that ‘transgender militant ideology’ even existed.

Andy Ngo - Another Non-expert with a Political Agenda

Watters included Andy Ngo in the same program. Ngo is a propagandist who markets himself as an expert on antifa.

Ngo is the editor-at-large for The Post Millennial a Canadian far right propagandist website. Ngo’s work has been widely criticized as inaccurate and politically biased by countless journalists including multiple articles in the Columbia Journalism Review (CJR).

He has also been called out for creating and promoting deceptively edited videos.

Even though Ngo portrays himself as unbiased and objective his sympathies frequently align with violent far-right groups such as the Proud Boys and Patriot Prayer. He has also been criticized for promoting hatred towards Muslims.

In 2018, Alex Lockie of Business Insider, described Ngo in the following quote.

“Andy Ngo, an editor at Quillette, wrote an opinion column in the Wall Street Journal about “Islamic England” that plays fast and loose with facts and context in a cowardly attempt to fear monger around England’s Muslim population,” said Lockie.

In 2019 Ngo was hit in the face with a milkshake by protesters at a far fight rally and counterprotest in Portland, Oregon. Ngo tried to claim the milkshake was actually wet concrete, which was later completely debunked.

The milkshake incident made Ngo a star on the far right overnight. He raised large sums of money through crowdfunding after the incident. After the assault Ngo seemed to shift the entire focus of his career to criticizing antifa and similar groups.

Ngo wrote a best-selling book about antifa that critics say is full of inaccuracies and downplays the violence of far-right militias and organizations.

This is an excerpt from Shane Burley’s extensive review of Ngo’s book. Burley is a Portland based journalist and author who specializes in extremist groups.

“The entire structure of Ngo’s book rests on confused, inconsistent, and internally contradictory treatments of the word antifa. He uses it as a catchall for movements that are remotely left-wing—but even that is putting it charitably. He spends a great deal of time talking about organizations, events, and protests that are not associated with “antifa” by any commonly accepted definition. He collapses Black Lives Matter protests (which are even more organizationally diffuse than antifa) into the same movement, often using “BLM-antifa,” wholly inaccurately. These are distinct movements with separate organizers, and supporters,” said Burley.

Ngo has appeared on Fox News semi-frequently always as an ‘expert’ on antifa. There is no evidence that the suspect in Kirk’s murder was associated with any organization or political movement much less antifa.

Watters tried to connect antifa to transgender activists.

“The trans movement, that movement, some of it has gone underground and has become fiercely militaristic. What needs to be done there? What can you tell us about that?” asked Watters.

“So, I saw this five years ago in Portland, when a disproportionate number of the Antifa riot arrestees were somehow so-called gender diverse, trans or non-binary, something like that. And they don’t hide their extremism. If you go to any of their rallies, you look at the activist groups and the type of placards and signs and chants that they say they threaten to kill people if their agenda is not followed through. And they have this perception, and they say it that there’s a trans-genocide going on. So when you have this lie that’s been mainstreamed by trans activists, coupled with the fact that there is a disproportionate amount of mental health comorbidities and many of them are sociopathic, you have this explosive situation potentially of like what happened here and unfortunately has happened other times in recent years,” said Ngo.

Ngo offered no images to back up his claims of protest signs that would include anything about a ‘trans genocide.” He is also not a psychiatrist or medical professional and shouldn’t be diagnosing strangers based on their behavior at a protest.

Watters didn’t push back on anything Ngo claimed.

“Yeah, probably not a good idea to tell isolated and mentally ill people. That a genocide is on the horizon. Probably not a safe move to make,” said Watters.

The Folks on Fox & Friends Made a Few Wild Accusations.

On Tuesday Ainsley Earhardt and Brian Kilmeade discussed Charlie Kirk’s murder.

“They’re also looking at the guy who asked the last question to Charlie to see if he was connected. Did that person know about the plot? We’re not suggesting that he did. But Dan Bongino said they are looking into that. They’re looking into these online groups that the shooter was connected with, like a pro-trans online group, a sexualized, animal obsessed furry group. Communities on the online gaming platform called Steam, as well as Armed Queens SLC, which took down its Instagram page after Charlie Kirk was murdered,” said Earhardt.

So far no one but the suspect in Kirk’s murder has been implicated in the crime. The Armed Queens SLC group could have shutdown the Instagram page due to fear of harassment.

Greg Gutfeld Doesn’t Care if Politicians are Murdered

On Monday Jessica Tarlov brought up details about the alleged political motivations of the suspect in Kirk’s murder.

“From what we know, that’s far, and it’s an ongoing investigation that seems deeply complicated. But everybody from the president to Governor Cox to FBI Director Patel all seem to agree that he was radicalized online and seems to be part of this kind of internet nihilist group of kids, right, who spend all their time in Discord, chat to play video games. And that makes sense because of what we saw on the bullet casings, right? The furry meme, which is old, by the way, I was reading about it. It’s over ten years old, so, you know, he’s grown up on that has been seeing it for a long time. The hell divers to the game. Then the ‘Ciao Bella,’ which has been used by both the left and the right, this anti-fascist call to action. If there is evidence that he was a leftist and talked this morning about this note, that doesn’t exist anymore. But through our aggressive interview posture, we know exactly what it said. They’re going to have to do better than that for people to take it from the president and people who are supporting him in this, that this is a very problem that the left came out and they took out Charlie Kirk.”

Tarlov then broke down a claim Kari Lake, senior advisor for the U.S. Agency for Global Media, made about the shooter.

“Now, it may absolutely be the case, but we know that Tyler Robinson was raised in a close knit conservative family. We know it was a big gun culture family. The grandma said something like, we don’t even know any liberals. It wasn’t school indoctrination. Kari Lake went off on that. He was in an online apprenticeship program at Dixie Technical College,” said Tarlov.

Kayleigh McEnany cut her off and tried to insist the family wasn’t sure when Robinson’s politics changed. Greg Gutfeld then bellowed over both women.

“We don’t need more information. Yes. We don’t need it. What is interesting here is why is only this happening on the left and not the right? That’s all we need to know about,” said Gutfeld.

“What about Melissa Hortman?” said Tarlov

“You want to talk about Hortman. Did you know her name before it happened? None of us did. None of us were spending every single day talking about Mrs. Hortman. I never heard of her until after she died. Didn’t matter. Don’t play that bullshit with me. You know what I’m. What I’m saying. Is there was no demonization amplification about that woman before she died. It was a specific crime against her by somebody who knew her. The same thing. Now, you could bring up Josh Shapiro, but then you will not bring up, for example, that that was a pro-Palestine person. So don’t use your what about this? The fact, the fact of the matter is the both sides argument not only doesn’t fly, we don’t care,” said Gutfeld.

Hortman and her husband were killed by Vance Boelter, a mentally disturbed man with rightwing political beliefs who had a written hit list of Democratic lawmakers. Boelter also shot injured another Minnesota State Sen. John Hoffman and his wife.

Boelter did not know Hortman or her husband. It was a politically motivated killing.

Gutfeld also misrepresented the politics of Cody A. Balmer, the man who committed an act of arson at the Pennsylvania Governor’s Residence. According to reporting by The Associated Press Balmer held deeply anti-government views and considered himself politically independent.

Balmer’s social media posts included criticism of Joe Biden and both the Democratic and Republican Parties. His brother, was quoted as saying Cody Balmer tried to encourage his relatives to vote for Donald J. Trump in 2024.

According to family members Balmer was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and had a long history of struggling with mental illness.

Stephen Miller Goes Full Joseph Goebbels

This is an excerpt of Stephen Miller’s speech at the television memorial for Charlie Kirk which aired on Fox News on September 21, 2025.

During his speech Miller appeared ignorant of his own Jewish heritage.

In most European countries Jewish people were excluded from learning or participating in most trades, in some cases they could not own land, they were driven out of communities, blamed for plagues, and murdered for not converting to Christianity.

During World War II the Nazis attempted to kill as many Jews as possible resulting in at least six million deaths.

At the start of the 20th century Miller’s family fled Belarus and sought refuge in the United States due to punishing anti-Jewish pogroms and forced military conscription.

Miller appeared oblivious to his heritage as his words echoed fascist and white supremacist ideology. In his speech Miller used themes of good vs evil, us vs them, and an advanced civilization fighting against primitive dark forces.

“Our lineage and our legacy hails back to Athens, to Rome, to Philadelphia, to Monticello. Our ancestors built the cities. They produced the art and architecture. They built the industry. Erika stands on the shoulders of thousands of years, of warriors, of woman who raised up families, raised up city, raised up, industry, raised up civilization, who pulled us out of the caves and the darkness into the light. The light will defeat the dark. We will prevail over the forces of wickedness and evil. They cannot imagine what they have awakened. They cannot conceive of the army that they have arisen in all of us, because we stand for what is good, what is virtuous, what is noble. And to those trying to incite violence against us, those trying to foment hatred against us,” said Miller.

He established the supremacy of what he would probably refer to as Western civilization. Next he degrades other cultures as primitive, backward and wicked.

“What do you have? You have nothing. You are nothing. You are wickedness. You are jealousy. You are envy. You are hatred. You are nothing. You can build nothing. You can produce nothing. You can create nothing. We are the ones who build. We are the ones who create. We are the ones who lift up humanity. You thought you could kill Charlie Kirk,” said Miller.

Similar things were said about Jewish people in Europe by the Nazis. He then made Kirk into a Godlike figure. His repetition of the word ‘strong’ to describe multiple generations of ‘good people’ also echoed Nazi propaganda.

“You have made him immortal. You have immortalized Charlie Kirk. You have no idea. The dragon you have awakened. You have no idea how determined we will be to save this civilization, to save the West, to save this republic. Because our children are strong and our grandchildren will be strong. And our children’s children’s children will be strong. And what will you leave behind? Nothing. Nothing to our enemies. You have nothing to give. You have nothing to offer. You have nothing to share but bitterness. We have beauty. We have light. We have goodness. We have determination. We have vision. We have strength. We built the world that we inhabit now. Generation by generation. And we will defend this world. We will defend goodness,” said Miller as he repeated the same theme of us vs. them, civilized vs. primitive.

Then he shifted to a call to action.

“We will defend light. We will defend virtue. You cannot terrify us. You cannot frighten us. You cannot threaten us because we are on the side of goodness. We are on the side of God. We will defeat the forces of darkness and evil, and we will stand every day for what is true, what is beautiful, what is good. And we will achieve victory for our children, for our families, for our civilization. And for every patriot who stands with us,” said Miller.

Stories Fox News Ignored

Every week I compare the hours I’ve watched on Fox News to five hours of the PBS News Hour. The following list are stories that PBS covered that Fox News did not. Source - PBS News Hour transcripts.

• Updates in the Israel-Hamas War

  • On Tuesday Israeli forces unleashed a long-threatened ground assault to seize the center of Gaza City. Hospital officials say at least 69 people were killed, including 22 children. Thousands are attempting to flee the city, but hundreds of thousands more remain behind, wondering where to go. (PBS News Hour)

  • Israel’s offensive comes as the U.N.’s Human Rights Council accused Israel of committing genocide in Gaza. In a report, a team of independent experts commissioned by the council called on the international community to fulfill their legal obligations under international law to end the genocide and punish those responsible for it. Israel rejected the report, calling it distorted and false. (PBS News Hour)

  • On Thursday the Israeli military said four of its soldiers were killed in Southern Gaza. They’re the first troop losses since Israel launched a major offensive in Gaza City this week in the territories north. As explosions dotted the horizon, residents reported that Internet and phone lines have been cut off across the Strip. Hundreds of thousands of Gazans have already fled Gaza City in a desperate search for safety in the south, but some refused to leave. (PBS News Hour)

• Maurene Comey is suing the Trump administration over her dismissal. Comey says her firing in July was unconstitutional and came without “legitimate explanation.” In her lawsuit, she says her firing was due at least in part to her father being James Comey, the former FBI director who President Trump fired in 2017. James Comey has since written a memoir criticizing the Trump administration. (PBS News Hour)

• The White House is redirecting nearly half-a-billion dollars in federal funds to historically Black colleges and universities as well as tribal schools. The Education Department says the one-time investment amounts to a 48% increase in funding for HBCUs. The department is also redirecting about $60 million towards charter schools and $137 million to American history and civic grants. But the funds come only after the department slashed $350 million from other grants, mostly involving programs that benefit Hispanic students, among others. (PBS News Hour)

• The rise of edutainment, the integration of entertainment with educational content, has become a billion-dollar industry. The conservative PragerU has positioned itself as a major player in this space by producing videos on a range of topics that are now showing up in more classrooms. Stephanie Sy examined what it could mean for school districts going forward and why critics are alarmed. (PBS News Hour)

• Last month, the Trump administration abruptly halted construction on a nearly completed $6 billion, 65-turbine wind farm off the coast of New England, known as Revolution Wind. The holdup has put thousands out of work and raises big questions about not just the future of this project, but similar efforts across the eastern seaboard. (PBS News Hour)

• The widow of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny says that new evidence proves her husband was poisoned shortly before his sudden death in an Arctic penal colony last year. In a video posted to social media, his wife and political successor, Yulia Navalnaya, points to incident reports and photos suggesting Navalny vomited and convulsed in his final moments. She also says that samples from Navalny’s body had been smuggled out of Russia to be tested at two independent labs and that the results prove he was poisoned. (PBS News Hour)

• In his second day of contentious hearings on Capitol Hill, Kash Patel faced bipartisan criticism for not releasing all Epstein information in the FBI’s possession. Patel also told lawmakers he’s never spoken to President Trump about the Epstein files. And he once again said there’s no credible information to suggest that Epstein trafficked women to anyone other than himself. Patel agreed to look into the sexually suggested letter that President Trump allegedly sent Epstein as part of a birthday book in 2003. Trump has denied writing it, saying it’s fake. (PBS News Hour)

• Estonia said three Russian fighter jets violated its airspace last Friday. It marks the third attempt by Moscow to test NATO’s Eastern flank this month alone. The Russian MiG-31 jets breached Estonian airspace near a small island in the Gulf of Finland, staying there for about 12 minutes. NATO jets from Italy scrambled to respond. Estonia’s foreign minister called the incursion unprecedentedly brazen. This all comes just one week after NATO planes shot down Russian drones over Poland. (PBS News Hour)

• The U.N. is set to reimpose tough sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program after the Security Council opted not to give Iran any relief. The vote paved the way for so-called snapback sanctions to take effect at the end of the month. That’s a return to sanctions that were lifted under the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. Iran called the action pressure and intimidation, but said it was still open to diplomacy. Tehran still has eight days to try and reach a deal to delay those sanctions. (PBS News Hour)

• A federal judge tossed out President Trump’s $15 billion defamation lawsuit against The New York Times. In a scathing ruling, Judge Steven Merryday wrote: “A complaint is not a public forum for vituperation and invective or a protected platform to rage against an adversary.” He noted the lawsuit didn’t even get to the first defamation count against The Times until page 80. The president’s team has been given a month to refile its suit. (PBS News Hour)

• The Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to halt a judge’s order that let transgender and nonbinary people pick their preferred gender on their own passports. It’s been the Trump administration’s policy to require stating a person’s sex at birth on passports. (PBS News Hour)

By the Numbers

The Murder of Charlie Kirk - Fox Called for Calm Yet Blamed the Vicious Left

A condensed overview of 20 hours of Fox News for the week ending 9/14/25

Last Wednesday Charlie Kirk, co-founder of Turning Point USA, was killed by a single gunshot to the neck while he was speaking on the campus of Utah Valley University.

The scene was haunting as the contentious speaker seemingly had no idea what happened to him as blood exploded from his neck before he collapsed. The sounds of panicked students’ screams followed the crack of the lone bullet.

Chaos erupted as young people scrambled for safety in every direction all at once. It was another nightmare unfolding in a country filled with angry people armed to the teeth.

Fox News responded by airing commercial-free coverage of the assassination and its aftermath well into the night. Sean Hannity extended his program for an additional hour as countless supporters of Kirk shared stories about their friend and law enforcement experts discussed the tragic event.

Kirk built his career promoting Christianity while disparaging Black Americans and immigrants, Muslims and the LGBTQ+ community while telling women they’d be better off in the traditional roles of wife and mother. He seemed to especially criticize accomplished Black women.

The Turning Point USA co-founder was a divisive person who spread hatred and bigotry, but he didn’t deserve to die the way he did. One of the founding principles of the United States is the notion that anyone can freely express themselves even if their ideas are unpopular or hateful to many.

Fox News hosts and guests blamed Kirk’s murder on leftwing extremism even though most political violence in the United States is committed by rightwing individuals and groups. In Colorado a young man radicalized in white supremacy committed a mass shooting at a school on the same day Kirk was killed.

While the folks at Fox News called for an end to the violence and heated rhetoric they also demonized and trashed anyone left of center by making them collectively responsible for Kirk’s death as well a slew of other assassination attempts.

The message was clear - liberals, progressives and leftists are evil extremists who hate the country. If they don’t stop criticizing the right the Trump administration would hunt them down, destroy their lives and silence their voices.

Jesse Watters even said that Charlie Kirk’s murder needed to be avenged which was hardly a message of unity.

Shows I analyzed last week:

• Fox & Friends - Extra hours on Wednesday and Friday

• The Five

• The Ingraham Angle

• Hannity - Wednesday (2 hour special) Friday

• Jesse Watters Primetime - Wednesday

St. Charlie Kirk

On the day of Kirk’s death Fox News unsurprisingly praised him as a voice of a generation.

The Five

“He's like Socrates. He asks questions and he does it with a smile,” said Jesse Watters.

“So yeah, I'm going to go back to Socrates, who did the very same thing and, challenge the bureaucrats and the status quo and those in power . . . And who was shocked into a career in philosophy to continue the fight. Plato. So there are there's an entire generation of people who have heard Charlie Kirk's message, and Charlie Kirk found that philosophy unacceptable. And that's why he is a great American inventor. Because, this is how the Industrial Revolution went forth, was because of tinkerers and inventors who saw problems and chose to solve them themselves,” said Kennedy.

Jeanine Pirro called into the show.

“An incredible legacy. A movement that will only become stronger because of this young man who made the decision to take a different course,” said Pirro.

Retired NYPD inspector, Paul Mauro also called in to say a few words about Kirk.

“You know, Maya Angelou said, courage is the virtue that's required for all others. And when I see something like this, it's all I can think of in terms of what he was made of.”

The Ingraham Angle

Benny Johnson, a rightwing pundit who unwittingly worked for a Russian propaganda company, said Kirk could have been president.

“Laura, I believe that Charlie Kirk would have been president one day. I believe that in my heart of hearts.”

Laura Ingraham’s sidekick of sorts, Raymond Arroyo, compared Kirk to a civil rights leader and a former president.

“And that for them, this is an RFK, an MLK moment. He is a generational leader taken down in his prime. But the message has been magnified in a way that these young men and women feel empowered, and they're following his example.”

Frequently on the network hosts referred to Charlie Kirk as the sole founder of Turning Point USA, some even saying he started the organization by himself when he was only 18.

Kirk was recruited to join Turning Point USA by Bill Montgomery, a wealthy retired businessman and right-wing activist. Montgomery met Kirk when he was only 18 and convinced him to forgo college for a chance to build the nonprofit Turning Point USA with him.

The two men were equal partners in the organization until Montgomery’s death in 2020 from complications of COVID-19. Montgomery was 80 years old at the time of his death. The organization grew rapidly mostly funded by large rightwing foundations and mega-donors.

During the many tributes to Kirk on Fox News last week Montgomery was not mentioned by anyone on the network. Kirk also rarely mentioned him when he spoke about TPUSA.

Everyone Left of Center is Guilty of Killing Charlie Kirk

Normally the folks on Fox News mock anyone who uses they/them pronouns to refer to an individual. The network had no problem blaming the collective ‘they” for the death of Charlie Kirk and several other violent attacks.

According to investigators, Tyler Robinson, the suspect charged with killing Charlie Kirk, acted alone. Robinson was not part of a political organization, and he did not receive planning or support for his alleged crime.

Multiple Fox News hosts used the pronoun ‘they’ to describe an alleged killer that was simply a he.

“They came after Kavanaugh with a rifle through his neighborhood. They went after Musk's cars. They just shot two Jews outside the embassy. They are at war with us, whether we want to accept it or not. They are at war with us. What are we going to do about it? How much political violence are we going to tolerate? And that's the question we're just going to have to ask ourselves . . .They took out a lieutenant with a bullet,” said Watters on “The Five” on night of Kirk’s death.

In every case Watters mentioned, the exception of vandalism to Tesla dealerships, all of the shooters, or in the case of Bret Kavanaugh, a would be shooter who surrendered to police, acted alone.

Watters also lumped in nonviolent protests at Tesla dealerships with violent attacks. In early 2025 protests at some Tesla dealership locations caused extensive property damage but there were no major injuries reported.

Multiple people were arrested for their role in damaging Tesla vehicles and other property so Watters use of the pronoun ‘they’ was appropriate.

Laura Ingraham also used the pronoun ‘they’ when she referred to Kirk’s assassination.

“They took out one of the most effective conservative, orators and advocates of the last 25 years. . .Yeah, they want to. They want to shut. They wanted to shut him down because he was so effective. But they also want to stop political or even cultural speakers from going to campus. And they decided to take it,” said Ingraham.

Later that night on “Jesse Watters Primetime,” Watters repeated the same messaging.

“They killed Charlie for asking questions. Charlie spoke the truth. He said, what he felt, and they killed him for it. They shot Trump. He went to Kavanaugh's house with a rifle. They're firebombing Elon's car. Rioting in LA. Trans shooters are killing our kids. They just plugged two Jews outside the embassy. They're telling us we're at war. I mean, they took Charlie, and they took him.”

Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL), a guest on “Jesse Watters Primetime” also used the plural form of “they” to describe a lone shooter.

“I can tell you is a reason why they shot him. They murdered him.”

Watters repeated it again.

“They shoot happy warriors. They shot Charlie, they shot Trump, they shot Reagan.”

Eric Trump appeared on “Hannity” where he also used ‘they’ to imply a collective group.

“I'm sick and tired of seeing the bullets. They're only going one way again. First, it was my father. They saw what they tried to do to Kavanaugh. Then you see what they did to Steve Scalise, and now they just killed Charlie Kirk. They tried to shoot him. They tried to shoot him twice. Right? And I said this. And we saw them almost kill my father and miss him by a millimeter. If you had a gust of wind, it would have been a different day. Then they tried it again. And thank God for the secret Service agent that saw that maniac hiding in a bush.”

Clay Travis, founder of Outback, also implied Kirk was killed by a group of people.

“And he was winning, so they killed him.”

The next morning on “Fox & Friends,” Brian Kilmeade used the pronoun ‘they.”

“The way to stop him was to kill him. And that's what they did. They killed him.”

The Vicious Left

All of these quotes are from the night Kirk was killed.

“But we're in an era. We're in a season now of leftist violence, and I'm not going to sugarcoat it,” said Paul Mauro on “The Five.”

“Will there be a moment now for the country where the vicious left and there were vicious leftists out there today?” said Laura Ingraham

“But, Laura, we can't retreat from the crazy left,” said Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL)

“The viciousness of the left,” said Ingraham.

“The left is poisoning the country with this hate. It is time to turn the page on this attempt to divide the country, which is what the left is doing here with this poisonous, poisonous hate,” said Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO)

“And I think that's what the evil left, if you will. They want this. Evil. They want, they want, they want to shut it down,” said Jason E. Chaffetz.

“Republicans and conservatives are being hunted right now. Let's just look at this. This is a political assassination. This was a lunatic hunted because of his views, because of his willingness to share his opinions, which is what the left fears more than anything else because they have no opinions,” said Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-OH)

“And to that point, they're being hunted. People are to watch what they say today,” said Ingraham.

“You know, kind of normalizing of political violence out there from the left,” said Lara Trump.

“Some of the things that have been said on the left is, you know, networks is just incredible outrage, as I hope they regret some of the things they were saying on live television,” said Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA).

“There's just this energy on the left that's poisonous right now,” said Jesse Watters.

“Jesse, it's not the right killing the left. It's the left killing the right,” said Dana Loesch

“And all the rage, all the madness, all the insanity, the never ending vitriol of the left. But the left has given us ten nonstop years of rage and hatred and and vile language to everyone on the left spewing this never-ending rage, hatred, vitriol. We show it to you all the time. Night after night. You know. You know. Shame on all of you. Every single one of you needs a good, long, hard look in a mirror,” said Hanity.

“The crazy left that accuses us of making them feel unsafe. Those are the same people that are out assassinating people that disagree with them, and shooting up schools and churches,” said Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK).

According to Cato Institute, most politically motivated murders are committed by right-wing extremists.

Source: Time Magazine 9/16/25 “Trump Called for a Crackdown on the ‘Radical Left.’ But Right-Wing Extremists Are Responsible for More Political Violence”

Stephen Miller Threatened to Destroy the Left

On Friday Stephen Miller went on an unhinged rant on “Hannity.”

“What do you think they're trying to do? They are trying to inspire someone to murder them. That is their objective. That is their intent. And when you see online, Sean, as we've seen for the last few days. Tape after tape after tape of federal workers, bureaucrats, staffers in the Pentagon, educators, professors, health care workers, nursery nurses celebrating the assassination of Charlie Kirk. These are radicalized people. There is a domestic terrorism movement in this country. And let me tell you something I did not share with anybody. But the last message that Charlie Kirk gave to me before he joined his creator in heaven was, he said that we have to dismantle and take on the radical left organizations in this country that are fomenting violence. That was the last message that he sent me before that assassins stole him from all of us. And we are going to do that under President Trump's leadership. I don't care how. It could be a RICO charge, a conspiracy charge, conspiracy against the United States insurrection. But we are going to do what it takes to dismantle the organizations and the entities that are fomenting riots, that are doxing, that are trying to inspire terrorism, that are committing acts of wanton violence. It has to stop. And my message is to all of the domestic terrorists in this country spreading this evil hate. You want us to live in fear. We will not live in fear, but you will live in exile because the power of law enforcement under President Trump's leadership will be used to find you will use it, take away your money, take away your power. And if you've broken the law to take away your freedom.”

Lawrence Jones Claimed that Only the Left Used Terms like “Evil”

The morning after Kirk’s death Lawrence Jones insisted that folks on the right side of the political spectrum would never describe their political opponents as evil.

“There's one side, and I'm not trying to be divisive I'm just calling it like I see it, that says the other side is wrong. But there's another side that says the other side is hateful and a racist, and Hitler, you can't do that. It's only going to escalate deranged people to do this. When you say people are evil, I disagree with Zohran Mamdani and all these other progressive right there, but I don't say that I want them dead. I don't say that they're evil people. I say that their policies are wrong to the core, that that is political debate. But when you escalated talking about the character of people and who they are and calling them hateful names, that only escalates this,” said Jones.

I found plenty of examples of folks on Fox News using the term ‘evil’ to describe people they disagreed with. I purposefully avoided any examples where evil was used to describe the suspect in Kirk’s shooting.

On Wednesday night, Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-TX) called Democratic lawmakers evil.

“I saw them today on the floor, it is absolutely evil. And I know that I'm not going to characterize or generalize the entire Democrat Party. There's some there's some good Democrats in that conference that a lot of people in that conference are evil, evil people,” said Jackson.

On “Hannity” the night of Kirk’s death.

“They are Evil, soulless ghouls,” said Riley Gaines of Outkick.

“Do not let these evil people win. This is a battle between good and evil,” said Nicole Parker, former FBI agent.

On “The Ingraham Angle”

To defeat the blackened evil that is overcoming our culture right now,” said Benny Johnson.

“And people to understand there's true evil that needs to be rooted out . . . and unfortunately, in today's world of where there's evil, there is evil,” said Jason Chaffetz

“That is that is that is what they want. That is what the evil side wants is,” said Graham Allen, Former TPUSA contributor.

Fire Dowd! Keep Kilmeade!

Soon after Charlie Kirk was shot and killed, Matthew Dowd, then of MSNBC, said,

“Hateful thoughts lead to hateful words, which then lead to hateful actions. You can’t stop with these sort of awful thoughts you have and then saying these awful words and then not expect awful actions to take place.”

The network issued an apology and announced Dowd’s dismissal from the company. The folks at Fox smelled blood.

“MSNBC's already apologized, but Dowd should be fired immediately,” said Jesse Watters.

Laura Ingraham also demanded Dowd lose his job.

“I'm sorry for that. He should be. He should be an advocate for people to be fired. He should be fired for that.

After MSNBC fired Dowd, the folks at Fox continued to condemn him.

“Look at Matthew Dowd. There are reports now that he has been fired. He won't be back on the air. He shouldn't be back on television in general. Good. That's a good first start,” said Joe Concha.

“I know that Dowd, like Dowd, got fired, but you have to remember that MSNBC, in places like CNN, they create a comfort zone for this kind of thinking,” said Greg Gutfeld.

Martha MacCallum agreed.

“And, you know, they fired Matthew Dowd because Matthew Dowd said hateful words lead to hateful actions.”

Even President Trump weighed in during an extended. interview on “Fox & Friends.”

“They fired this guy Dowd from MSDNC (MSNBC) Who is a terrible guy, terrible human being. But they fired him,” said Trump.

Brian Kilmeade Said all Homeless People should Be Murdered - Wasn’t Fired

On Wednesday morning on “Fox & Friends,” hours before Charlie Kirk’s death, Brian Kilmeade, Lawrence Jones and Ainsley Earhardt were discussing the brutal murder of Iryna Zarutska, a 23-year-old Ukrainian woman on a light rail system in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Zarutska was fatally stabbed by a homeless man with a long criminal history who had struggled with severe mental illness for years.

Their discussion soon turned to the general homeless population, not the suspect in Zarutska’s murder.

Jones: Billion of dollars for mental health and the homeless population. A lot of them don't want to take the programs. A lot of them don't want to get the help that is necessary. You can't give them a choice. Either you take the resources that we're going to give you and or you decide that you got to be locked up in jail. That's the way it has to be now.

Kilmeade: Or, involuntary lethal injection or something, just kill him.

Four days later, after public outcry, Kilmeade issued an apology of sorts on “Fox & Friends Weekend.”

Kilmeade: And it actually happened. We were together on Wednesday Lawrence. In the morning, we were discussing the murder of Iryna Zarutska in Charlotte, North Carolina, and how to stop these kinds of attacks by homeless, mentally ill assailants, including institutionalizing or jailing such people so they cannot attack again. Now, during that discussion, I wrongly said they should get lethal injections. I apologize for that extremely callous remark. I'm obviously aware that not all mentally ill homeless people act as the perpetrator did in North Carolina, and that so many homeless people deserve our empathy and compassion. Lawrence, back to you.

Jones: Thanks, Brian. I'll see you tomorrow.

Trump Delivers a Message of Division

On Friday President Trump appeared on “Fox & Friends” for a commercial-free hour long interview. Ainsley Earhardt brought up the rise in political violence.

Earhardt: How do we fix this country? How do we come back together?

Trump: I'll tell you something that's going to get me in trouble, but I couldn't care less.

(That phrase caused a lot of controversy as many heard it as Trump saying he couldn’t care less about the country. Others thought he was misquoted as it meant he couldn’t care less if he ‘got into trouble’ or not.)

Trump: The radicals on the right. Often times a radical because they don't want to see crime. They don't want to see crime. Worried about the border. They're saying we don't want these people coming in. We don't want you burning our shopping centers. We don't want you shooting our people in the middle of the street. The radicals on the left are the problem, and they're vicious and they're horrible and they're politically savvy, although they want men and women sports. They want transgender for everyone. They want open borders. The worst thing that happened to this country.

Joe Biden Went Out for Ice Cream Again - The Horrors!

On Monday Laura Ingraham criticized former President Joe Biden for buying ice cream.

“He's been out of office for almost eight months now, but every now and again, Joe Biden wanders out into public view,” said Ingraham.

Her producers included a short media clip of Joe Biden holding two ice cream cones at a local ice cream shop in Delaware.

“And that ice cream moment only reminds us that his entire presidency was built on lies,” said Ingraham. She went on to trash Biden at length but never tied her rants back to ice cream.

Stories Fox News Ignored

Every week I compare the hours I’ve watched on Fox News to five hours of the PBS News Hour. The following list are stories PBS covered that Fox News did not. Source - PBS News Hour transcripts. This list has been slightly truncated due to space.

• Updates in the Israel-Hamas War

  • Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signed a controversial agreement to expand settlements across land in the West Bank that Palestinians want for a future independent state. At the signing, Netanyahu said "There will not be a Palestinian state. This place is ours." (PBS News Hour) Fox actually reported on some of the violence in Gaza last week and the bombing of Hamas negotiators in Qatar.

• On Monday House Democrats released a letter that Donald Trump allegedly sent to Jeffrey Epstein for a 2003 birthday book for the late convicted sex offender. The Epstein estate provided the letter to lawmakers, which they posted online. It depicts a woman's body with the name "Donald" signed at the bottom. Deputy White House Chief of Staff Taylor Budowich responded online that that is not the president's signature. Trump himself has previously denied writing any such letter and filed a $10 billion lawsuit against The Wall Street Journal for defamation, saying the letter is fake. (PBS News Hour)

• A federal appeals court upheld a ruling that ordered President Trump to pay $83 million to writer E. Jean Carroll for defaming her. The three-judge panel in New York was unanimous in rejecting Trump's argument that he deserved presidential immunity from Carroll's lawsuit. The case stems from Trump's repeated social media attacks against Carroll after she accused him of sexual assault in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room back in 1996. The president has also been found liable for sexually abusing Carroll in a separate trial that was also upheld on appeal late last year. (PBS News Hour)

• Nepal has a new interim prime minister following that country's worst upheaval in years. Former Supreme Court Justice Sushila Karki took her oath on live television. She's the first woman ever to head that nation's government. Karki takes the helm after violent protests over a short-lived social media ban forced her predecessor to resign. Protesters torched government buildings and clashed with police. Officials now say at least 51 people were killed. (PBS News Hour)

• The family of media mogul Rupert Murdoch has settled a long-running dispute over control of his empire. Murdoch's son Lachlan will take over assets, including FOX News, The Wall Street Journal, and others, for years to come. Under the terms of the deal, as first reported by The New York Times, Lachlan's three eldest siblings will each get $1.1 billion. The deal puts to rest years of legal wrangling over the financial and political future of the media company, which has long espoused conservative viewpoints. (PBS News Hour)

• In Michigan, a judge dismissed the cases against 15 people who had been accused of trying to falsely certify Donald Trump as the winner of the 2020 election in that state. Each of the accused faced forgery charges that carry a maximum of 14 years in prison. The judge said she did not believe the defendants were intending to commit fraud, but were executing their constitutional right to seek redress.

  The defendants included some high-profile members of the Michigan Republican Party. The outcome is a major blow to prosecutors in four other states who were pursuing similar fake elector cases. (PBS News Hour)

• In France, protesters clashed with police in the latest challenge to President Emmanuel Macron's government. Across that nation, authorities arrested more than 400 people at hundreds of protests related to the so-called Block Everything movement. It started online this summer and called for a day of action against government budget cuts, among other grievances. Protesters outside of an Amazon warehouse said they were rallying in support of workers there and called on President Macron to resign. (PBS News Hour)

• Three former FBI officials are suing the bureau over their terminations, saying they were part of a campaign of retribution. Brian Driscoll, Steve Jensen, and Spencer Evans allege the FBI director, Kash Patel, indicated directly to one of them that he knew firing them was "likely illegal," but he did so anyway to fulfill President Trump's desire to remove all agents who helped investigate him. (PBS News Hour)

• The British ambassador to the United States, Peter Mandelson, was fired over his connections to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. E-mails published in The Sun newspaper this week showed Mandelson voicing his support for Epstein in 2008 as the disgraced financier was about to start a prison term for soliciting prostitution from a minor. Mandelson also appeared in a 2003 birthday book for Epstein, the same one that purportedly includes a note from Donald Trump. Mandelson's firing comes as Trump is due to visit the U.K.. Mandelson maintains that he knew nothing about Epstein's sex crimes. (PBS News Hour)

• Missouri's Senate passed a redistricting plan that could help Republicans pick up an additional seat in Congress. Once signed by the governor, it would make Missouri the third state to change its maps ahead of next year's midterm elections. Opponents of Missouri's measure are trying to push back, though. They have launched a petition effort to try to force a statewide referendum on the new map. (PBS News Hour)

• The Environmental Protection Agency moved to stop the collection of emissions data from some 8,000 U.S. facilities. The proposal, which still needs to be finalized, would end a program that requires coal-burning power plants and other industrial facilities to report their greenhouse gas emissions. Since 2010, the government has used this data to assess the environmental impact of those sites. (PBS News Hour)

• Many of the nation's universities were on heightened alert heading after a series of fake threats led schools to cancel classes and even send students home. At least six historically Black colleges and universities have been the targets of such threats. A similar incident happened at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. (PBS News Hour)

By the Numbers