Matthew Dowd's Firing Over Comments on Charlie Kirk's Assassination

Showing 19 Matthew Dowd videos from Charlie Kirk's video collection.

Matthew Dowd became one of the most consequential media casualties of the reaction to Charlie Kirk's assassination, fired from MSNBC after remarks widely interpreted as suggesting Kirk's own rhetoric contributed to his death and speculating the shooting could justify government action against political speech. Author and commentator Douglas Murray, interviewed hours after the assassination, directly rebutted the framing Dowd had used, arguing bluntly that words are not violence but that shooting someone in the throat unambiguously is, and crediting Kirk's lifelong insistence on open debate as a safeguard against exactly the kind of political violence that had just killed him. Jesse Watters devoted a segment specifically to calling out Dowd's comments, pairing that criticism with a tribute to Kirk's career from a Chicago-suburb college dropout to a close ally of Donald Trump and JD Vance. MSNBC's decision to part ways with Dowd was grouped in broader coverage alongside TMZ's separate on-air apology for cheering caught during its own live coverage of the story, part of a wider wave of firings and suspensions across industries, from airline pilots to teachers, that followed public comments perceived as celebrating or excusing the assassination.