Hasan Piker, a left-wing commentator with a large following on the streaming platform Twitch, recently said he could’ve phrased the statement “America deserved 9/11” in a better way but held firm to his frequent use of “pejoratives” to describe racial supremacist groups.
The comments regarding the terrorist attacks were made by Piker during a live Twitch broadcast in August of 2019. He said the U.S. “totally brought it on ourselves” but walked back the remarks two days later in an interview on “The Young Turks.”
“I said it in 2019, and you know if you listen to the full conversation, you very quickly understand what I’m talking about,” Piker said in an interview with Mehdi Hasan on Zeteo’s “We’re Not Kidding” podcast late last month.
“I should have phrased things better. I apologize for those who I have offended, but most importantly, apologize for giving an opportunity to the right to just like use this against me,” he later added.
Piker said once the clip circulated online, he was all over Fox News and received an “unbelievable amount of death threats.”
“I’m a big boy. I can handle it. It is what it is,” he continued.
Seven years later, the comments still follow Piker and recently impacted Abdul El-Sayed, whom the Twitch streamer campaigned with and who is now the Democratic nominee in the Michigan Senate race.
El-Sayed’s foreign policy views on the Middle East have been scrutinized as he raises strong opposition to campaigns and lobbying efforts supported by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.
Ties to Piker, who admits that he frequently uses “pejoratives” when describing Israeli settlers and racial supremacist groups, have been questioned by some voters and used in Republican attack ads targeting El-Sayed.
“I still definitely utilize the term ‘inbred’ quite frequently when talking about religious and ethno-supremacist groups, but with the exception of anything that touches Israel, because I don’t want people to just like keep weaponizing that against you,” Piker told Hasan during the interview.
“I’ve called Republicans inbred hicks my whole life. I call, you know, Nazis inbred. I call them pigs. You know all these different things. I’ve gotten banned for this,” he continued, decrying the Anti-Defamation League’s efforts to block some of his content with offensive language.
Piker says the advocacy group has contributed to his suspension from social platforms and travel bans because of his past remarks.
During a Sunday appearance on NBC New’s “Meet the Press,” El-Sayed said Piker “disavowed” his beliefs about the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.
“It was a dumb statement,” El-Sayed said.
“And, of course, I think Hasan, himself, would say that was a dumb statement. He disavowed it.”
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