Hasan Piker: Too toxic for Democrats?

Should Democrats shun Hasan Piker? asked Lauren Egan in The Bulwark. The irreverent, far-left livestreamer, who has nearly 5 million subscribers between his YouTube and Twitch channels, has become a “litmus test” for the party. Some progressives view Piker, a 34-year-old video gamer and gym bro, as a “liberal Joe Rogan” who can reach “tuned out” young white men. “Operatives have hustled to get their candidates booked on his stream,” which runs eight hours a day, seven days a week. Recent Democratic guests include Tom Steyer, who’s running for governor of California, and Abdul El-Sayed, a U.S. Senate candidate in Michigan who invited Piker to campaign with him on college campuses.

But many Democrats say Piker’s extremism should be disqualifying: A self-described Marxist, he has said that it didn’t matter “if rape happened on Oct. 7,” and that “Hamas is a thousand times better than the fascist settler colonial apartheid state” of Israel. Piker has also used the C-word and other misogynistic slurs.

Piker’s language sometimes is unfortunate, said Aaron Regunberg in The New Republic. But moderate “Third Way” Democrats have, “in bad faith” and without context, seized on a few moments from “almost 20,000 hours of entirely unscripted, off-the-cuff streaming.” The son of Turkish Muslim immigrants, he is an anti-Zionist but not an antisemite, and in fact has warned that antisemitism is “a canary in the coal mine of fascism.” Piker didn’t condone Hamas’ sexual violence against Israeli women, but argued that the attacks didn’t justify Israel’s subsequent bombing and killing in Gaza.

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Why any Democrat would want to associate with Piker “is baffling,” said Michael A. Cohen in MS.now. A recent poll found that just 55% of Democrats have ever heard of him, and of those, “only 13% view him favorably.” Given his history of toxic comments, going on his livestream show is “a potential liability.” Sure, Piker can be “an insufferable jerk,” said Jesse Singal in his Substack newsletter, but Democrats he interviews don’t need to endorse his views. Piker appeals primarily to young, disillusioned males “who are looking to rebel.” In 2020, many in this cohort voted for Donald Trump. “It’s unfortunate” that young dudes are drawn to transgressive loudmouths, but to win back power, Democrats must “go to war with the potential voters they have, not the potential voters they want.”