Megyn Kelly Exposes Washington Post Columnist Karen Attiah Fired After Celebrating Charlie Kirk's Assassination
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Megyn Kelly Exposes Washington Post Columnist Karen Attiah Fired After Celebrating Charlie Kirk's Assassination
Megyn Kelly examines the firing of Washington Post columnist Karen Attiah, who posted callous remarks following Charlie Kirk's assassination. Kelly reveals her past interactions with Attiah, including a falling out after October 7th when Attiah liked a tweet saying "this is what decolonization looks like" as Israeli babies were being murdered. The discussion explores the widespread celebration of Kirk's death by professionals across America, the mainstream media's hypocritical response to cancel culture, and what this reveals about the current state of political discourse. Kelly and her panel dissect Attiah's misleading use of Kirk quotes, the troubling pattern of doctors, teachers, and pilots publicly celebrating political violence, and how the New York Times and Washington Post are now lamenting accountability culture after spending decades championing it.
Megyn Kelly opened a discussion about Washington Post columnist Karen Attiah, who was recently fired following her BlueSky posts about Charlie Kirk's assassination. Kelly revealed that she and Attiah had previously followed each other on X (formerly Twitter), despite their political differences - Attiah being a lefty black woman at the Washington Post and Kelly being a righty white woman in the digital media space. Kelly described how they would occasionally like each other's safe posts, like those featuring Attiah's cat, which Kelly felt restored her sense of humanity in being able to maintain a relationship with someone across the political divide.
However, that relationship came to an abrupt end after October 7th. Attiah liked a tweet that read "this is what decolonization looks like" as Israeli babies were being murdered during the Hamas attacks. Kelly was shocked by what she called a "mask off" moment and the two got into it via direct message. According to Kelly, Attiah first claimed it was a private like, then went off about Palestinians. Kelly responded sarcastically, noting how Attiah's excuse morphed from "all I did was like a tweet" to "I liked it but it was a private tweet" to "I liked it but only because I secretly didn't like it."
Attiah then accused Kelly of hoping that one of her followers would find her address and cause her harm because of the like. Kelly's response was simple: "Calm down and stop playing the victim." The two unfollowed each other, ending what Kelly called their "weird little fake friendship."
Attiah's Posts About Charlie Kirk
Following Charlie Kirk's assassination, Attiah posted on BlueSky criticizing what she saw as performative care for white men who espouse hatred and violence. According to reports, the Washington Post fired Attiah for her BlueSky posts following Kirk's death and also about Minnesota lawmaker Melissa Hortman. The Post accused her of gross misconduct, unacceptable behavior, and endangering colleague safety. Attiah rejected the charges as false, hasty, and a violation of journalistic fairness.
Her post read: "For everyone saying political violence has no place in this country, remember two Democratic legislators were shot in Minnesota just this year and America shrugged and moved on. Part of what keeps America so violent is the insistence that people perform care, empty goodness, and absolution for white men who espouse hatred and violence." She continued with criticism about America, especially white America, not doing what it needs to do to get rid of guns in the country.
Attiah then quoted Charlie Kirk out of context, citing statements like "Black women do not have the brain processing power to be taken seriously" and "You have to go steal a white person's slot." Kelly pointed out that these quotes were completely taken out of context, explaining that Kirk's comments were in response to Ketanji Brown Jackson being chosen for the U.S. Supreme Court, and that Sheila Jackson Lee had openly admitted she was a diversity hire and affirmative action candidate. Kirk was responding to those admissions, not making blanket statements about Black women.
The Panel's Reaction to the Firing
Kelly's panel weighed in on Attiah's firing. One panelist stated: "I don't like anyone being fired and I care about the First Amendment and it couldn't have happened to a nicer lady." He noted that Attiah is representative of people around the country who root for someone's death or are cavalier about it, which he found deeply shaking. Even if everything people were saying about Charlie were true, which in Attiah's case it wasn't, the mentality of someone who would celebrate such violence was difficult to comprehend.
The panelist observed that there's a reckoning happening, noting that the Washington Post would not have fired a liberal journalist for any reason three years ago. This represents a different environment at the Post, though he wasn't sure the same exists at the New York Times yet. He sees this pattern emerging everywhere, including in corporate America - there's a new mentality where such behavior is no longer acceptable. While he doesn't like anyone being fired, he thinks it's important that people cannot engage in this behavior with impunity.
The Widespread Professional Celebration of Violence
Kelly and her panel discussed the disturbing trend of professionals across various fields publicly celebrating Kirk's assassination. Kelly noted she doesn't pay much attention to "blue-haireds on Twitter or whatever," but the fact that someone in Attiah's role would post such things was significant. The October 7th incident was bad enough, but this represented another level.
There has been a rash of professionals celebrating the assassination, including corporate pilots and doctors. Kelly mentioned one nurse who complained about a doctor who celebrated Charlie's assassination and was subsequently laid off for outing the doctor. The joy at Kirk's assassination is so widespread that it's deeply unsettling.
Emily, another panelist, pointed out the performative nature of these celebrations - that people would record themselves into a camera and then post it on the internet. It's not just feeling a moment of private joy, which would still be reprehensible, but actually sharing it publicly. She wondered if the opportunity to share and get likes and retweets is actually what makes people think they should feel joy about such events. She emphasized that everyone needs to pause and think about why a teacher of children would think such behavior is okay.
Emily noted that dozens of professionals have engaged in this behavior, with people compiling databases to verify and confirm instances. While she's not a huge fan of what looks like crackdown-type responses, she believes there needs to be shame and a cultural pause to ask what in our cultural psychology is making so many people think it's rewarding to post celebrations of violence publicly. This goes beyond the reasonable spectrum of opinion on a newspaper's editorial board - it involves doctors, nurses, teachers, and other professionals who should know better.
Personal Safety Concerns
Kelly expressed genuine confusion about the phenomenon, stating she doesn't understand it. There are many people on the left she can't stand - a long list - but never in a million years would she celebrate something like this happening to them. The discussion raised practical concerns about how society can function when professionals hold such extreme views. How can a teacher who celebrates political assassination teach a class that may include kids from conservative families? How can a pilot who expresses such sentiments fly a plane that may include conservative passengers?
Media Hypocrisy on Cancel Culture
The panel then turned to what they saw as breathtaking media hypocrisy. One panelist added another level of what he called insanity: The Washington Post and New York Times wrote about these firings over the weekend, and their reproachfulness in the news stories was not about what people were writing about Kirk's death, but about people trying to call attention to it and the subsequent firings.
After two decades of celebrating cancel culture and having no hesitation to help people get fired, these outlets were suddenly questioning how people could be identified as doing something wrong and be fired. They called it "accountability culture" when it affected their ideological allies. The panelist argued these stories should have been about what's wrong with America that teachers, doctors, and pilots would say such things about a man who was just assassinated.
Kelly expressed her reaction with colorful language, saying a certain gesture comes to mind when hearing mainstream media outlets lamenting cancel culture. She pointed out that some people have experienced cancel culture up close and personal over trivial things like talking about Halloween costumes, and now these same media outlets want people to feel bad that somebody gets fired because they cheered a political assassination of an innocent 31-year-old father of two.
Inflated Definitions and Bad Faith Arguments
Emily identified a common thread in these incidents: the inflation of definitions. When you can inflate the definition of racism, you can weaponize it. She pointed to Attiah's post as an example - as a journalist, Attiah should have taken time to contextualize Kirk's statements, read the full remarks, and not just relied on social media posts. That kind of carelessness is, in Emily's view, disqualifying for an editor at the Washington Post and insane that it made it into print, especially since it wasn't just a Twitter post but appeared in Attiah's column.
Emily questioned how a journalist could reach a point where they aren't actually presenting the argument at hand, but instead taking it out of context, flattening it into something completely different. Doing so either represents bad faith or incredible stupidity. This pattern has been happening over the last 10 years, with many on the left either cheerleading for it or staying silent. If people are concerned about cancel culture now, Emily said, they should join the club - everyone's been concerned about it for 10 years outside of the mainstream left.
Emily noted that Attiah and those like her created the cancel culture bandwagon. This is what happens when definitions of racism, sexism, and misogyny are broadened - nuance gets lost. For Attiah specifically, using misleading quotes and taking things out of context doesn't make the best argument and ends up hurting her credibility because she makes stupid arguments instead of ones that would actually make sense. Kelly added that Attiah is now claiming to be free to say more and be even more bold, to which Kelly sarcastically responded that literally no one is going to watch that.
The Return to Political Tribalism
A panelist observed that just five days before Charlie was alive, people like Attiah and Adam Schiff were completely oriented around attacking MAGA supporters. Maybe for 10 hours after Charlie was assassinated, there was a moment of reflection to consider everything, but immediately they returned to their default orientation. They spent the weekend trying to claim the shooter was "super MAGA" and that's why he killed Charlie.
The panelist pointed out they seized on the fact that the shooter had two white parents who were registered Republicans, even though the shooter himself is registered as unaffiliated. Everyone from the Utah governor to the FBI to the shooter's friends and family say he had been radicalized by leftist ideology, yet certain media figures and politicians couldn't help but try to pin it on the right.
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