America's Horror: The Rise Of Political Violence

The killing of far-right media figure Charlie Kirk is yet another chapter in the increasing political violence in the US over the past decade.Kirk, the 31-year-old head of the right-wing youth group Turning Point USA, was shot by an unknown gunman on the campus of Utah Valley University on Wednesday. He was pronounced dead later in hospital. In just the past year-and-change, there were two attemptedassassinations against President Donald Trump, then a candidate, the shootings of two Minnesota state legislators and their family members, the arson attack on Pennsylvania Democratic Governor Josh Shapiro’s home and the shooting of the Centers for Disease Control headquarters — and now, what appears to be the assassination of a famous far-right figure with close ties to President Donald Trump and the Republican Party.Other recent episodes included the shooting of Republican congressmen in 2017, the Unite the Right rally at Charlottesville that left one protester dead in 2017, the attempted mail bombing of Democratic congressmen and other political figures in 2018, the attack on Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s husband Paul Pelosi in 2022, the 2020 plot to kidnap Democratic Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and, of course, the insurrection at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.The motives for all of these varying threats or acts of violence are not always clear or straightforward. But what they share in common is that they are all targeted at elected or other political figures.Research on political violence indicates that it has been steadily increasing over the past decade. Threats against members of Congress have nearly doubled since 2017, according to the Capitol Police. Threats against local officials have similarly nearly doubled since 2022, with such threats in 2025 already exceeding all threats for 2022 and 2023, according to Princeton’s Bridging Divides Initiative.Conservative political activist Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA, was killed in a shooting at Utah Valley University on Sept. 10, 2025.The majority of threats and political violence in recent years have come from the right in the US, according to a study from the National Institute of Justice Journal.That study found that politically motivated murders committed by right-wing actors far outstripped those committed by either left-wing actors or Islamist extremists in the US.This has been fomented by rising activity among militia groups, far-right street gangs and political figures, perhaps most notably Trump. That isn’t to say that left-wing political violence does not occur. It is just less of a feature of the political landscape than it was in the 1970s — the high point for political violence in the US over the past 50 years.Trump’s entrance onto the political stage coincides with the steady rise in political violence in the country. His rhetoric casts his political opponents as evil, as he calls for “retribution” against those who have wronged him. His top political advisor, Stephen Miller, has called Democrats a “domestic, extremist organisation.” Violent rhetoric was a frequent feature at his rallies in 2016, which he egged on, and became a tool to try to steal the 2020 election on Jan. 6.Political violence has even become a laughing matter for Trump and his allies. After a crazed attacker fuelled by online conspiracy theories beat Paul Pelosi with a hammer, Trump mocked it.“Nancy Pelosi has a big wall wrapped around her house. Of course, it didn’t help too much with the problem she had, did it?” Trump said in 2024.Many Republican figures piled on. That included Kirk, who, in 2022, called for “some amazing patriot out there in San Francisco or the Bay Area wants to really be a midterm hero, someone should go and bail [the attacker] out.”Political figures from both parties condemned Kirk’s killing on Monday.“The attack on Charlie Kirk is disgusting, vile, and reprehensible,” California Governor Gavin Newsom said on social media. “In the United States of America, we must reject political violence in EVERY form.”“Political violence has become all too common in American society,” Speaker Mike Johnson said. “This is not who we are. It violates the core principles of our country.”“The scourge of gun violence and political violence must end,” Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said on social media. “The shooting of Charlie Kirk is the latest incident of this chaos and it must stop. We cannot go down this road.”“We don’t yet know what motivated the person who shot and killed Charlie Kirk, but this kind of despicable violence has no place in our democracy,” former President Barack Obama said on social media.Political violence isn’t just a rhetorical tool. It turns in all directions, engulfing society as a whole — as seen in the late-1960s and 1970s wave of political violence. Toying with it only turns up the heat in the cauldron. Now, it appears to be boiling over.

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