By Jamie Dettmer
Copyright politico
America now seems set for another ugly episode of what late historian Richard Hofstadter dubbed the paranoid style of deep conspiracy-mongering, disinformation and scapegoating. Think the Salem witch-hunts of the 17th century; the Know Nothing agitation of the 1840s and 1850s, with Catholics falsely accused of subverting civil and religious liberty; and, of course, the Red Scare of the 1950s.
The Kirk assassination is almost certainly going to offer a pretext for further crackdowns by an administration that’s been skirting democratic norms and — for all its talk of defending free speech — seeking to emulate the cancel culture it so fiercely decries.
It won’t be bound to one side of the Atlantic either. MAGA ideologues see themselves as warriors, fighting not only a national battle but a civilizational, politico-cultural crusade that needs to go beyond America’s shores to be successful. And they’re keen to export their revolution.
European nations have their own ugly political dynamics underway too — one of grievance and resentment. Much like in the U.S., the continent’s liberal and centrist politicians have been all too ready to dismiss the real grievances causing many to turn to right-wing populism and nativism, fueled by economic and status anxiety, and a sense of dispossession and dislocation amid great social change.
There are differences, to be sure, but Europe’s populists see just as much reason and potential gain to marry their causes and learn from each other as their American counterparts. Hence, far-right figurehead Tommy Robinson enlisting Musk to speak at his U.K. rally last week, and the youth wing of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy choosing to focus on Kirk’s legacy at its upcoming conference.
Furthermore, Europe has been experiencing an alarming descent into extreme political acrimony and violence as well. Britain has seen two lawmakers, Jo Cox and David Amess, murdered since 2016. Last year, there was an attempt on the life of Slovakia’s Prime Minister Robert Fico — the first on a head of government since 2003. And in May, the German government reported that police recorded 84,172 politically motivated crimes in 2024 — the largest number since records began in 2001 and a 40 percent increase from 2023, itself a record year. Much of the rise was fueled by right-wing extremism.
