Vanity Fair smears Charlie Kirk — but race-hustling author just ends up attacking common sense



Ta-Nehisi Coates, the race obsessive who suggested in 2020 that rioting was a "natural reaction" among black Americans, has joined David Corn of Mother Jones and other radicals in smearing Charlie Kirk after his assassination, allegedly by a leftist homosexual.

In his desperation to demonize Kirk, Coates — who penned hagiographies for Breonna Taylor and Michael Brown — provided the public with a reminder both of his own radicalism and the left's intolerance of common sense.

The critical race theorist was apparently prickled when some of his fellow travelers — namely Ezra Klein of the New York Times, Sally Jenkins of the Atlantic, and California Democrat Governor Gavin Newsom — dared to say nice things about Charlie Kirk.

Coates evidently decided to compensate for his liberal peers' relatively decent remarks by penning an anti-Kirk polemic for Vanity Fair, thereby contributing further to the genre of conservative demonization that appears to have helped set the stage for the Turning Point USA founder's slaying.

In his Sept. 16 article, Coates, a Vanity Fair contributing editor, argued that Klein, Jenkins, Newsom, and other members of the "political class" were "sanitizing" Kirk's legacy by focusing on his numerous good-spirited campus engagements with people from different walks of life, instead of complaining about the murdered patriot's politics, which Coates claims "amounted to little more than a loathing of those whose mere existence provoked his ire."

Coates, who wrote in one of his books that the firefighters and police who died in the process of saving lives on 9/11 "were not human to me" but rather "menaces of nature," noted:

It is not just, for instance, that Kirk held disagreeable views — that he was pro-life, that he believed in public executions, or that he rejected the separation of church and state. It’s that Kirk reveled in open bigotry. Indeed, claims of Kirk’s "civility" are tough to square with his penchant for demeaning members of the LGBTQ+ community as "freaks" and referring to trans people with the slur "tranny."

Coates was clearly upset by Kirk's use of the term "freaks"; however, in context, it's clear that the TPUSA founder was being charitable, as more damning words may have been more appropriate.

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Photo by Trent Nelson/The Salt Lake Tribune/Getty Images

Kirk stated on a Dec. 9, 2022, episode of "The Charlie Kirk Show" that the Biden administration was "being run by freaks. That's not an exaggeration; that's not hyperbole. At the highest stakes imaginable, people that have very deep-seated mental problems are running some of the most consequential government programs conceivable."

Kirk specifically referred to Demetre Daskalakis and Samuel Brinton, a pair of individuals who fit the bill.

Daskalakis is the sex-obsessed homosexual "activist physician" who until recently served as director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases and previously served as Joe Biden's monkeypox adviser.

'I want to be able to get married, buy a home, have kids, allow them to ride their bike till the sun goes down, send them to a good school, have a low-crime neighborhood, not to have my kid be taught the lesbian, gay, transgender garbage in their school.'

Blaze News previously reported that Daskalakis, an LGBT activist with a track record of pushing drugs to facilitate promiscuous sexual behavior among homosexuals, had a history of denigrating straight Americans, sharing satanic imagery on social media, and showing up in public in bondage gear.

Brinton, a mustachioed nuclear engineer who ran a "Physics of Kink" class and made a habit of dressing in women's clothing, served as deputy assistant secretary for spent fuel and waste disposition in the Office of Nuclear Energy at the Energy Department. He pleaded guilty last year to petit larceny for stealing women's luggage.

Brinton's profile on CLAW Corp.'s website reportedly stated that he has "been active in the kink world since 2013, [hosted] monthly kink parties in their dungeon in Washington, DC, and estimate they have spanked over 2,000 cute butts."

In addition to suggesting Kirk was bigoted for calling sexual deviants "freaks," for criticizing racially motivated black-on-white crime, for expressing concern over Haiti's infestation by "demonic voodoo," and for suggesting the southern border was transformed under the previous administration into the "dumping ground of the planet," Coates faulted Kirk for another common-sense assertion, namely:

The American way of life is very simple. I want to be able to get married, buy a home, have kids, allow them to ride their bike till the sun goes down, send them to a good school, have a low-crime neighborhood, not to have my kid be taught the lesbian, gay, transgender garbage in their school while also not having them have to hear the Muslim call to prayer five times a day.

Just in case advocacy for homeownership and marriage didn't strike readers as bigoted, Coates — who reportedly likened the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks against Israel to the Nat Turner slave uprising in 1831 — insinuated that Kirk was anti-Semitic, even though days earlier, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the fallen patriot was a "lion-hearted friend of Israel" who "fought the lies and stood tall for Judeo-Christian civilization."

RELATED: Jimmy Kimmel claims Charlie Kirk shooter is 'MAGA' during wildly unfunny monologue

Photo by MELISSA MAJCHRZAK/AFP via Getty Images

After rattling off numerous mainstream American views Kirk espoused, Coates stated, "Kirk subscribed to some of the most disreputable and harmful beliefs that this country has ever known."

Coates, who is the Sterling Brown chair in the English department of the federally funded Howard University, continued his bitter rant, insinuating that Kirk got a taste of his own medicine — writing that "Kirk endorsed hurting people to advance his preferred policy outcomes" — calling Kirk an "unreconstructed white supremacist," and suggesting that his public life was cancerous.

The Vanity Fair piece concludes by hinting that Kirk, a man who worked diligently to improve his country and promote civic engagement among American youth, was like the "men who sought to raise an empire of slavery."

Blaze News has reached out to Vanity Fair for comment.

While Coates appears to have moved on from writing comic books, his hateful article demonstrates that he's not finished writing fiction.

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Southern Poverty Law Center attacks Turning Point USA with 'cheap smear' in latest hysterical 'extremism' report



Liberal activists and their fellow travelers in business, government, and media frequently cite the Southern Poverty Law Center as an authority on what qualifies as a hate group or an extremist organization.

That's despite — or because of — the SPLC's heavy left-wing bias, the frequency with which it smears law-abiding conservatives as "extremists," and its link to alleged domestic terrorism.

'First, they wanted you to affirm, and then they wanted you to celebrate, and then they wanted you to participate.'

Exuding liberal sanctimony with an air of legitimacy helps keep the SPLC — a nonprofit sued numerous times for defamation, accused by one former staffer of exaggerating hate to "bilk" donors, and given an F-rating by Charity Watch — awash in cash.

After all, what's not to like when the SPLC largely fundraises on the premise that it is "exposing hate and injustice"?

True to form, the SPLC smeared agential conservatives in its latest annual hate and extremism report.

This time around, the smear merchants focused their attack on Charlie Kirk's Turning Point USA, characterizing it as a pro-Christian extremist group with an "authoritarian vision for the country that threatens the foundation of our democracy."

But Kirk wasn't having it, responding in a statement that "the SPLC has added Turning Point to their ridiculous 'hate group' list, right next to the KKK and neo-Nazis, a cheap smear from a washed-up org that's been fleecing scared grandmas for decades."

"Their game plan? Scare financial institutions into debanking us, pressure schools to cancel us, and demonize us so some unhinged lunatic feels justified targeting us," continued Kirk. "But it's 2025, and nobody with a functioning brain buys their garbage anymore. The SPLC is a laughingstock, a hollowed-out husk of an organization that's been exposed as a grift time and time again."

According to the SPLC — whose recent top targets include Chaya Raichik of Libs of TikTok fame and the parental rights advocacy group Moms for Liberty — TPUSA is "emblematic" of the American political right's supposed embrace of "aggressive state and federal power to enforce a social order rooted in white supremacy" against a backdrop of "patriarchal Christian supremacy dedicated to eroding the value of inclusive democracy and public institutions."

RELATED: Own the hate: Why patriots should wear the 'hate group' smear with pride

RomoloTavani/iStock/Getty Images Plus

When trying to make the case that TPUSA somehow is an extremist outfit or at the very least extremist-adjacent, SPLC contributor Rachael Fugardi, aided by a pair of DEI-credentialed researchers, noted that Kirk:

  • dared to link the health of liberty in America to the religiosity of its people;
  • suggested that Democrats love what God hates;
  • championed motherhood and suggested women should get married and start having children at a younger age;
  • highlighted that in the case of non-straight activism, "First, they wanted you to affirm, and then they wanted you to celebrate, and then they wanted you to participate. And if you don't, they are willing to destroy your life";
  • suggested that Americans should buy weapons and ammunition; and
  • warned that "native born Americans are being replaced by foreigners."

The report also clutched pearls over TPUSA's supposed encouragement of "parents to be fearful the government was harming their children in schools" and its criticism of critical race theory and LGBT propaganda in the classroom.

'DEI narratives can engender a hostile attribution bias and heighten racial suspicion, prejudicial attitudes, authoritarian policing, and support for punitive behaviors.'

This desperate attempt on the part of the SPLC to paint Kirk and TPUSA as extreme might have less to do with the conservatives' views and more to do with their political effectiveness in changing minds and curbing the abuses of the left — as well as their alignment with President Donald Trump.

TPUSA videos notched billions of views in the lead-up to the 2024 election — and it was at this precise time that its members were engaging young Americans on college campuses across the country and promoting Trump. That momentum and engagement still have not tapered off.

Kirk stressed on X, "Being on their list is a badge of honor. It means they're terrified that we're so effective. Keep crying, SPLC — America’s done with your scam."

While evidently worried about TPUSA, the SPLC also warned of the "merging of anti-immigration and anti-LGBTQ+ activism with fear of demographic displacement" and framed efforts to dismantle the racist DEI regime as a campaign to "whitewash American society and protect white supremacy."

Yet, a study published late last year by the Network Contagion Research Institute and Rutgers University concluded that "DEI narratives can engender a hostile attribution bias and heighten racial suspicion, prejudicial attitudes, authoritarian policing, and support for punitive behaviors in the absence of evidence for a transgression deserving punishment."

RELATED: Damning study reveals what DEI does to people — and unsurprisingly, it's really bad

Race-obsessive activist Ibram Kendi, originally Ibram Henry Rogers. Photo by Tommaso Boddi/Getty Images for Netflix

Having evidently missed or ignored this damning insight into the divisive and dangerous nature of DEI, the SPLC claimed that DEI initiatives "are essential in ensuring pluralism, reducing inequities that spur division, and promoting democracy."

Working off the basis that DEI is necessary — and necessarily good — the leftist outfit attacked those attempting to eliminate it, including Moms for Liberty, normalcy advocate Robby Starbuck, Republican states and officials, and Manhattan Institute senior fellow Christopher Rufo.

The SPLC also conducted a number of drive-by hits in its annual report, deeming, for instance, the Christian legal advocacy group Alliance Defending Freedom a "hate group" and suggesting that reports indicating the Obama administration worked to debank conservative clients was somehow a "false narrative."

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Tucker Carlson delivers the 'perfect response' to NYT journo plotting a hit piece against conservative media



Tucker Carlson, Ben Shapiro, and Mike Davis of the Article III Project revealed Monday that a New York Times reporter reached out to them for comment regarding an upcoming hit piece about so-called "misinformation" — the likely objective of which is to get conservative commentators demonetized or possibly removed from YouTube.

Shapiro pre-emptively attacked the paper and its apparent collaborators at the leftist outfit Media Matters, while Carlson shared screenshots of his fiery textual exchange with Times reporter Nico Grant.

"Would I like to participate in your attempt to censor me?" Carlson wrote to Grant. "No thanks. But I do hope you'll quote what I wrote above and also note that I told you to f*** off, which I am now doing. Thanks."

Grant apparently opened with an introduction and the following note to Carlson on Monday: "I wanted to give you an opportunity to comment for an upcoming article that takes a look at how political commentators have discussed the upcoming election on YouTube. We rely on an analysis conducted by researchers at Media Matters for America."

Media Matters for America is a leftist organization founded by Democratic operative David Brock. It claims to document "conservative misinformation throughout the media" and to notify "activists, journalists, pundits, and the general public about instances of misinformation, providing them with the resources to rebut false claims and to take direct action against offending media institutions."

Media Matters, now led by Angelo Carusone — the former Democratic National Committee employee who fought to get Bill O'Reilly and Glenn Beck ousted from Fox News and was responsible for the "#DumpTrump" campaign in 2012 — now serves as an attack dog for the Democratic Party, characterizing dissenting views as "misinformation."

'So the New York Times is working with a left wing hate group to silence critics of the Democratic Party?'

Media Matters is presently in hot water, as Elon Musk's social platform X sued the leftist organization last year for alleged defamation. Judge Reed O'Connor of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas denied Media Matters' request to have that lawsuit dismissed in August.

Grant asked Carlson to comment on the following points, which will apparently be including in the planned Times piece:

  • "Media Matters identified 286 YouTube videos between May and August that contained election misinformation, including narratives that have been debunked or are not supported with credible evidence."
  • "Researchers identified videos posted by you in those four months that contain election misinformation."
  • "We feature a clip of you saying: '...All the sadness we've seen after the clearly stolen election. All these bad things happen, but people I know love each other more.'"

Shapiro and Davis appear to have been asked to comment on the same points but on different quotes.

'These outlets are beneath contempt.'

Grant gave away the plot with three follow-up questions, in all three cases, about the conservatives' membership in the YouTube Partner Program, their track records of demonetization, and history of notes from YouTube regarding "misinformation."

Carlson, wise to Grant's apparent scheme, responded, "So the New York Times is working with a left wing hate group to silence critics of the Democratic Party? Please ask yourself why you're participating in it. This is why you got into journalism? It's shameful."

"I hope you're filled with guilt and self-loathing for sending me a text like this," continued Carlson. "Please quote me."

BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales said of Carlson's reply to Grant, "Epic."

Elon Musk tweeted, "Perfect response."

Mike Needham's forward-looking conservative think tank America 2100 tweeted, "These outlets are beneath contempt. 1) Powerful activist groups (Media Matters) put out enemy hit lists. 2) The press (New York Times) publishes the names to send a signal to Big Tech. 3) Big Tech dutifully censors the enemies. They're the enforcement arm of the Left."

Conservative filmmaker Robby Starbuck wrote, "YouTube needs to be very careful how they respond to this story or risk a massive exodus from their site. Treating right wing content creators differently is going to become increasingly an offense that loses you a lot of business. People have alternatives now."

Chris Pavlovski, the CEO of the video platform Rumble, noted, "The corporate media is on their campaign to deplatform as many conservative voices as possible. This type of activist garbage is not possible on Rumble. @TuckerCarlson, we have your back."

Blaze News reached out to Grant and Media Matters for comment as well as for their definitions of "misinformation" but did not receive responses by deadline.

Grant has set his X page to private, so that his past tweets are now protected.

Shapiro referred to the anticipated Times-Media Matters hit piece as an "October surprise."

"What, precisely, is NYT doing?" wrote Shapiro. "It's perfectly obvious: using research from Media Matters, a radical Left-wing organization whose sole purpose is destroying conservative media ... in order to pressure YouTube to demonetize and penalize any and all conservatives ONE WEEK FROM THE ELECTION."

While noting that he supported the view that Biden won the 2020 election, Shapiro emphasized that the Constitution guarantees the right of Americans to suggest otherwise.

"This is totally scandalous. In 2020, the legacy media shut down dissemination of the Hunter Biden laptop story and laundered the claim that it was all Russian disinformation, all to get Joe Biden elected," continued Shapiro. "In 2024, they're even more brazen: they're openly trying to intimidate YouTube, one of the most dominant news platforms in America, into shutting down anyone who isn't pro-Kamala."

Shapiro worked his way up to echoing Carlson's sentiment, concluding, "The New York Times wants comment? Here's my comment: kindly, go f*** yourself."

U.S. Sen. Eric Schmitt responded by echoing the defiant, nearly assassinated Republican president, "Fight, fight, fight!"

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'He outright LIED': The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg is back with another 'dishonest' Trump smear — but it's quickly debunked



The Atlantic's editor in chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, is at it again, smearing former President Donald Trump with anonymous sources and providing ammunition for Democrat political attacks ahead of Election Day. Unfortunately for Goldberg and his anti-Trump narrative, people who were actually in the room at the time the remarks were supposedly made have indicated that nothing of the sort happened — that it's more fake news.

Army Private Vanessa Guillén — posthumously promoted to the rank of specialist — was murdered inside the armory at Fort Hood in April 2020 by a fellow soldier.

Goldberg claimed that Trump volunteered to help financially with Guillén's funeral but then raged upon learning the total cost. According to the hit piece, Trump said, "It doesn't cost 60,000 bucks to bury a f***ing Mexican!" and ordered his then-chief of staff, Mark Meadows, not to pay.

Meadows, a leading character in Goldberg's narrative, noted Tuesday, "I was in the discussions featured in the Atlantic's latest hit piece against President Trump. Let me say this. Any suggestion that President Trump disparaged Ms. Guillen or refused to pay for her funeral expenses is absolutely false."

'President Donald Trump absolutely did not say that.'

"He was nothing but kind, gracious, and wanted to make sure that the military and the U.S. government did right by Vanessa Guillen and her family," added Meadows.

Ben Williamson, a former senior communications adviser for the Trump White House and spokesman for Meadows, provided insight into the extent of Goldberg's dishonesty, highlighting the substantial disparity between Meadows' statement, as provided to the Atlantic, and what was ultimately printed in the final piece.

Williamson indicated that he shared the following statement from Meadows with the Atlantic via text:

President Donald Trump absolutely did not say that. He was nothing but kind, gracious, and wanting to make sure that the military and the U.S. government did right by Gloria Guillen and her daughter Vanessa Guillen. As for the allegation that he told me to refuse payment: That is not true.

Williamson noted that the "Atlantic translated that comment to 'didn't hear Trump say it.' Treat this dishonest piece accordingly."

'He used and exploited my clients, and Vanessa Guillen's murder ... for cheap political gain.'

Trump spokesman Alex Pfeiffer similarly relayed a narrative-killing statement to the Atlantic from then-acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller's chief of staff, Kash Patel, but it appears to have made it into the article unscathed:

As someone who was present in the room with President Trump, he strongly urged that Spc. Vanessa Guillen's grieving family should not have to bear the cost of any funeral arrangements, even offering to personally pay himself in order to honor her life and sacrifice. In addition, President Trump was able to have the Department of Defense designate her death as occurring "in the line of duty," which gave her full military honors and provided her family access to benefits, services, and complete financial assistance.

Natalie Khawam, the attorney for the Guillén family quoted in the Atlantic hit piece, characterized Goldberg as a liar.

"After having dealt with hundreds of reporters in my legal career, this is unfortunately the first time I have to go on record and call out Jeffrey Goldberg," wrote Khawam. "Not only did he misrepresent our conversation but he outright LIED in HIS sensational story. More importantly, he used and exploited my clients, and Vanessa Guillen's murder ... for cheap political gain."

Extra to noting the curious timing of the hit piece, Khawam tweeted, "Not only did Trump support our military, he also invited my clients to the Oval Office and supported the I Am Vanessa Guillen bill too."

Goldberg's smear was so unbelievable that even Guillén's sister, Mayra, put her foot down Tuesday, calling out the Atlantic for its dishonesty and ghoulish attempt to exploit the service member's death for political purposes.

"Wow. I don't appreciate how you are exploiting my sister's death for politics," wrote Mayra Guillén. "Hurtful & disrespectful to the important changes she made for service members. President Donald Trump did nothing but show respect to my family & Vanessa. In fact, I voted for President Trump today."

Even though Goldberg's report has significant credibility issues, the Democratic National Committee circulated it widely as though it were true — just as it circulated Goldberg's last election-time hit piece.

Weeks ahead of the 2020 election, Goldberg claimed that during a trip to Paris in 2018, Trump called fallen soldiers "suckers" and "losers."

Despite its liberal skew, even Snopes acknowledged there was "no evidence of an audio or video recording of the remarks in question, nor was there any documentation, such as transcripts or presidential notes, to independently confirm or deny the alleged quotes' authenticity."

Blaze News senior editor for politics Christopher Bedford noted shortly after Goldberg's 2020 hit piece debuted that Goldberg had centered his piece on "secondary-source rumor-mongering" even though it was contradicted by substantial primary sources, including both people and documents.

"That should have earned a swift no-publish call, but instead their qualms went completely unmentioned," wrote Bedford. "An unskeptical belief the president is a bad man who must be defeated has led to discarding an ever-growing number of essential journalistic practices. It's the reason more and more Americans don't trust their media — and it's a good one."

None of those problems stopped Democrats from running with a story they'd already known was coming. The 2020 hit piece was published on a Thursday night, but by Friday morning, MSNBC's "Morning Joe" had "the exclusive" on a polished Democrat attack ad featuring veterans attacking Trump over specific allegations in the article.

Laurene Powell Jobs — the president of Emerson Collective, which owns the Atlantic — just happens to be one of Kamala Harris' biggest financial backers and has been shoveling cash her way since 2003. Goldberg's article ostensibly serves as a different kind of campaign support.

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