Virality, and vengeance
The Trump administration ramps up threats to clamp down on perceived critics in the wake of the assassination of Charlie Kirk.
A few weeks ago, I returned to Washington after visiting family in the Midwest, and was trying to catch up with some of the news I had blissfully missed when away.
Trump’s weekend schedule, distributed to the press by the White House, arrived in my in-box. I noticed that he did not have a single public appearance for the upcoming long Labor Day weekend, which seemed a bit odd—and a departure from his usual modus operandi.
Trump this term has used most any pretext – signing an executive order, cabinet meetings, world leader visits – to let the TV cameras in to show him presidenting; and he likes to be seen as a champion of American workers, which Labor Day would seemingly be an ideal opportunity to mark in some fashion. But he had nothing.
Then I noticed that the White House pool reports for that day, August 29th, a Friday, had not mentioned a sighting of Trump. And indeed the last pool report of the day said they had not lain eyes on the president all day.
It turned out that Trump had not made a public appearance since his epic over three-hour long televised cabinet meeting on Tuesday (Aug. 26), three days earlier. That clearly was a departure from Trump’s usual MO.
I posted a screen shot of Trump’s public weekend schedule to Twitter, noting he had no public appearances.
In the morning, when I woke up, the post had over 30 million views. And several of the responses and comments on it were to the effect of speculating, or joking, that maybe he had expired.
It was a bit frightening. It had never occurred to me that anyone would think Trump was not alive. I had wondered to myself if perhaps he had had a medical issue, or perhaps it was nothing. I thought the post would be a marker and in the future we might get more information—or quite possibly, not.
What accounted for the virality of the tweet? I don’t know. Another person had posted it in a Tik tok video. Bots? Algorithms?
I am not a newbie to Twitter, now X, much degraded since its purchase by Elon Musk. I have built a following there of people like me mostly interested in news, especially on foreign policy and the Middle East. But that kind of insane, seemingly juiced-up virality, is not something I had ever experienced, certainly not for something I posted as bland as a public schedule distributed to the entire press corps.
I thought of that insane virality, and of how it promotes dark distortions in the current age of Elon Musk and social media services like Tik Tok and ones I am even less familiar with like Discord, in the aftermath of the horrible assassination of Charlie Kirk last week.
The social media algorithms tend to amplify the most toxic and outrage-generating content and turn people against each other. But human agency matters too.
In the aftermath of the tragedy, it felt like both the algorithms and several public figures and influencers, particularly some on the right, were using it to incite even more social division in the U.S., and to go after political rivals and people with whom they disagreed, for payback and for their own benefit.
Utah Governor Spencer Cox being a notable exception.
Vice President JD Vance, guest hosting for Kirk’s podcast last Friday, urged followers to get fired anyone they deemed to be supposedly celebrating Kirk’s murder.
“Call them out, and hell, call their employer," Vance said.
The Washington Post fired Global Opinion editor and columnist Karen Attiah, an 11 year veteran of the paper and the opinion section’s last full-time Black employee, allegedly over social media posts that “condemned America’s acceptance of political violence,” she wrote.
“On Bluesky, in the aftermath of the horrific shootings in Utah and Colorado, I condemned America’s acceptance of political violence and criticized its ritualized responses…while nothing is done to curb deaths,” Attiah wrote at her new Substack.
“I pointed to the familiar pattern of America shrugging off gun deaths, and giving compassion for white men who commit and espouse political violence,” she continued. “This cycle has been documented for years. Nothing I said was new or false or disparaging— it is descriptive, and supported by data.”
Meantime, the Trump administration has increased threats to use the tragedy to bully, intimidate and criminalize corporations, organizations, Democrats, comedians, entertainers and media who annoy the president.
On Wednesday, ABC said it was taking comedian Jimmy Kimmel off the air, amid threats by Trump’s Federal Communications Commission chairman Brendan Cox to revoke the licenses of ABC affiliates that aired Kimmel’s show.
“This is a very, very serious issue right now for Disney,” Carr told Benny Johnson on his podcast. “We can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to take action on Kimmel or there is going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.”
On his show Monday night, Kimmel had incorrectly implied that Kirk’s suspected killer, Tyler Robinson, might have been MAGA, and added that: “Many in MAGA land are working very hard to capitalize on the murder of Charlie Kirk,” provoking right-wing ire.
But a key issue for ABC and corporate affiliates seems to be that Nexstar, which operates over 20 ABC local affiliates, “is seeking Trump administration approval to acquire another big US station group, Tegna,” CNN reported. “The deal requires the FCC to loosen the government’s limits on broadcast state ownership.”
“It’s hard to grasp the magnitude of the emerging threat to free speech in the United States,” conservative columnist David French wrote at the New York Times today. “The Trump administration is using Kirk’s death as a pretext to threaten a sweeping crackdown on President Trump’s political and cultural opponents.”
Trump, flying home from his state visit to England today, told reporters on Air Force One that networks that host late night comedians who criticize him should have their broadcasting licenses pulled.
“When you have a network and you have evening shows, and all they do is hit Trump….they’re not allowed to do that,” Trump said.
“I would think maybe their license should be taken away,” Trump said.
He also responded to a question from a reporter from NPR who asked about his announced intention to designate Antifa a terrorist group, if Antifa funds NPR. “Do they have anything to do with your network?” Trump asked the reporter, after inquiring if NPR was still around.
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