Bulwark Takes - Tim Loses Will to Live in Crazed Piers Morgan Panel

Episode Date: September 22, 2025

Tim Miller joins Piers Morgan Uncensored to take on Kari Lake, Wajahat Ali and Eric Bolling as they discuss the heated rhetoric in the wake of Charlie Kirk’s assassination. Get 30% off your order with Soul at https://GetSoul.com with promo code BULWARKTAKES.

I just think this is like one of the most depressing 35 minutes I've ever spent in my entire life. Hey, everybody, Tim Moore from the Bullwark here. I agree to do the Pierce Morgan show to talk about the fallout from the Charlie Kirk assassination. And I don't know what I was thinking, really. I guess I do know what I was thinking. I feel compelled to go into some of these spaces and try to bring some sense to people. I just, I feel like people have truly lost their minds in the fallout from Kirk. I feel like the right-wing effort to just to tamp down on people's speech and to smear everyone as wannabe murderers and smear half the country as part of some violent plot against them.

I feel like that is irrational and crazy and driving people to a very scary place. I should note, by the way, in the effort to take down the temperature. sure. I just got news right before I started taping. This is Jimmy Kimmel's going to be back on the air tomorrow night, which is great news. And so it's like, you know, the effort by the right to stifle him hasn't succeeded yet. I mean, we'll see what the fallout is from all that with the local stations, et cetera, but it hasn't succeeded with Disney. And the catastrophizing on the far left about how for the end of free speech is nigh hasn't come to pass. So I just think that, look, we're in very serious times. There are very serious threats from the Trump administration right now.

They're very real concerns that in the wake of this horrible, horrible tragedy, that it will be used as a pretext to crack down on people. And we at the Bullwark are fucking monitoring this as closely as possible. We are covering it. We're keeping you posted on what the administration is doing. At the same time, I just, I think that taking, making speed running this country into becoming the Balkans is not good for anybody. And we can all try our best to try to make passionate arguments in the marketplace of ideas about who's right and who is wrong without trying to accelerate us into a fucking hot war internally. So I feel compelled to be the person that is out there advocating for this. one of the spaces where people are trying to accelerate us into a hot war is these YouTube debate shows

so I agreed to go on and um well you grade me on how successful I did here's me with Pierce Morgan and just a cast of rabid characters uh who who didn't really have much appetite for dialing things back there's been a lot of fallout for Miss Charlie Kirk thing it's been a huge huge huge story. That we can all agree on. You know, the number of people here in the UK who've been talking to me about Charlie Kirk, someone the most of them had never heard of until, you know, 10 days ago, has been really fascinating. It's a global story with real impact. And at the heart of it, to me, is this, which is that Charlie Kirk may have had views that you may not have

agree with many of them. I'm sure you didn't. You know, he was a conservative Christian, right-wing person to his bootstraps. But he was also almost uniquely, actually, out there every week deliberately going into places where many people didn't agree with him and encouraging open-free democratic debate. Prove me wrong was his mantra. And when you watch those debates, he was respectful, he was polite, he tried to help the people on occasion. Why did that guy become this hate figure so detested that a 22-year-old wants to kill him? Well, Peers, I guess I don't completely agree at the whole premise of your question

because, you know, this 22-year-old, look, we have this deep problem in this country. It's something that you agree with, peers. It's very easy for people who have mental health issues to get access to high-powered weapons. And like this kid, this 22-year-old, he wasn't watching cable news.

He wasn't listening to Chuck Schumer, probably. He was a 22-year-old. If you look at the amount of hours that this kid was spending on social media, he is like deep in discord chats. He is deep in text messages with his various friends. He's playing these VR games. Supposedly he has this roommate that is transgender that he's in love with based on his text. And he's seeing these clips of Charlie on TikTok. And some of them are Charlie's own words to, some of them are misleading, some of them are taken out of context and you become radicalized and you get easy access to guns and he goes there to the school and I think it's part of a deep cultural issue that we have to we have to address in

our country is that for people who get radicalized online for people who get um you know who find themselves uh filled with hate towards someone either from a different political side or a different race we've certainly seen this with racially motivated violence as well we've seen like we've seen this from all stripes, right? Like, to act like this is one particular thing, I just think is wrong. What we have in this country is that people get radicalized, have easy access to guns and they went after them. And, you know, like, I think it's horrible. And I, and I wish that everybody would take more to heart what Erica Kirk was saying at the, at the memorial yesterday than what some of the other folks have said. And I think that, you know, but sometimes because it's like

a political talk show, you want to make, you know, people want to make this about us and like naval gaze about all this. But I think I think that Tyler Robinson was radicalized in a very different way. And I think we have to really think about, again, weapons, social media, what's happening online, how young people are consuming information, how young people are getting radicalized online. It's a real big challenge for the country. And it's just a tragedy that Charlie was a victim of it. Boatwork Takes is sponsored by Seoul. I still love a good night out, but I'm not always in the mood to drink. And luckily, I found a great alternative, Sol's out-of-office gummies. They give me that same light, happy buzz without the hangover, sugar, or awkward next morning.

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Can't beat that. Go to getsole.com and use the code bulwark takes. That's getsoul.com promo code bulwark takes for 30% off. I think college, just like Charlie, I think college is overrated. And in many cases, I know many, many of my friends have sent their children off to college, loving children, they come back, they don't like their family anymore. They've completely become politicized to an almost violent level. I stand by exactly what I said, but it goes a step further. Do you ask your Republican College to take it to that out?

Frankly, it's people like you who spread a little. lies in the media who have done more damage to this country in the minds of young people. And you had a chance to apologize. What you did yesterday, I didn't see it, thank goodness. But, you know, Pierce just asked, do you think that was appropriate? I really, I really, really questioned how kind of a person you are. Let me ask Tim, let me ask Tim, let me ask Tim Miller, because I can see you pulling a few faces here, but I'm just not entirely sure why. So explain what you're feeling right now about this. I just think this is like one of the most depressing 35 minutes I've ever spent in my entire

life being on with these people. And I think that this is a big tragedy. I think in a liberal democracy, that we all should agree that people are responsible for their own actions, that people should be held accountable for their own actions as individuals. That we, this is not, I don't want this country to become Yugoslavia where the Serbs hate the Croats and every Croat is bad and every Serb is bad and every man, every non-Maga. is responsible for Tyler Robinson's actions and every MAGA is responsible for David DePapes's actions and we come on here and we shouted each other and we say that oh what did what did carry just say oh that the liberals have become violent the liberal it's a violent movement it's like

that that is not true or that Wajahat comes on here and struts like shout not answered the question shouting like why are we what is the point of him but okay come back together we should be able to come back together and engage on the merits of what happened. Every liberal is not violent. I know lots of liberals. I talked to a lot of liberals don't own weapons, don't want to have weapons, preach peace. There were obviously a lot of Christians and Magas and conservatives that preach peace yesterday, including Charlie's wife.

Like, we're going to come on here and smear everybody from the other side and in sight and have Eric come on and say, I'm angry and I want to go at war with the left. I'm sorry. I just, I'm signing out from all this. I'm checking out from all of it. Tyler Robinson, what he did was horrible and he's responsible for his actions. People are responsible for their words if they're lying and they should, and they should be called out for it.

But like, what are we, why are we doing this? I mean, Megan Kelly yesterday was tweeting on me. Carrie, we retweeted it. She said, you, she said to me, you gleefully canceled all of us for five years. One of yours killed Charlie and then you laughed at our pain. I I carry just said they they did this use the word they I don't I didn't do any of that I didn't laugh at Charlie I didn't kill Charlie um I I don't I don't take any glee in his pain I've become it's it's really affected me emotionally in a in a deep way and I think that the way that

we've all decided to treat each other on these panels like we're fucking we're enemies and there's some civil war when like the reality is is a drain 22-year-old that got radicalized, did something really bad, and we should all fucking condemn it and say we don't want to become a country where people do political assassinations. Unfortunately, I just don't think that we're up for that, and I've got to listen to, like, this clown show, and it's pretty frustrating, frankly, and it's not frustrating, actually. It's really sad. It's really sad.

I'm depressed by it all. Do you know, that's a very honest, it's a very honest thing? Can I respond just a little bit to that? I mean, I think I got dragged there, and I'm, I agree. that the person who shot our friend is the one responsible. You came on and tried to blame it on guns. And it is a madman who did a terrible thing. But where did he get indoctrinated?

Where did he change his viewpoints? And it has been a constant. And Tim, you're in the media. I assume you would agree that you're in the media. I've seen you on all kinds of many different shows. And you have a spouse many, many viewpoints that have been very, very hateful. toward the right. And so I think it's time to take, you know, responsibility for it.

Now, this is a thing, Carrie, and this is the game you're playing, is like, is that people have said things and that we need to figure out where this guy got radicalized. That's true. We need to figure out where he got radicalized. I don't think that there's, if you, if you have kids, you know what 22-year-olds watch. I don't think there's any reason to believe that this 22-year-old was like watching MSNBC or something. Like, we should figure out where he got radicalized.

I agree with that. If you look at the carvings on his bullets, like this guy was deep into gamer culture. Like, this guy was, I'm deeply concerned about the social media companies and TikTok and YouTube and X feeding people, very divisive stuff. Why do we hide the elephant in the room? Why do we say? To say, oh, you've said mean things about MAGA, so you're responsible for this. That's crazy. That is not how we should be.

I do have kids, though. I have a 21 and a 22-year-old. So I have kids right at the age of the killer. And you know what? My kids tell me, Mom, the garbage that's been in culture, what they've taught us at school, what they've taught us at summer camp, what that has played into many people in their generation hating folks who are conservative. They'll probably not helpful in terms of lowering the temperature to branding one on X during a memorial speech. Let me bring Tim Miller. Let me bring Tim Miller back in here. Tim, this is shameless. Shameless, Pierce. It's actually, it is shameless because you keep deflecting

from any accountability for what you yourself have done. You're holding me at the same responsibility of Donald Trump and Stephen Miller. And you do not ask Donald Trump and Stephen Miller to lower the temperature when they are leading the country.

What are you doing here? Tim. Yeah, I don't know. It's kind of hard to thought. I mean, watch out's been the same point several times. The, I just want to respond to something Eric said because I do think that it is important where Eric talked about

I go around in the media and I criticize Donald Trump and I criticize macro Republicans. Yeah, I do that. I have like very deep criticisms of the policies that Donald Trump is putting forth. I have very deep criticisms of the policies that Kerry put forth. We've argued about that before in several different forums, not just here. We've had debates. But like here's the thing that the game that is being played that I don't like, right? Which is like Charlie was able to go out and have these debates in public.

and that was good and in those debates he smeared the left he went at him hard he went out of him really hard he attacked people from the left he attacked Joe Biden he attacked left politicians

and that was good that he was out there having those debates and that was a value that he was having those debates and he didn't deserve to die because of that and that is something

I 100% agree with but then you put it on the other side to say well Tim or whoever is out there and they're criticizing MAGA and they use harsh words and they criticize MAGA harshly and that they're responsible then for the violence.

And I just don't agree with that. That's kind of a leftist view, really, that like words are violence. But do you not think, Tim, on that point, Tim, do you not think? Because I got into this, there's a political show in the UK called Question Time. It's the most watched political panel show. And I was on it last week with Bonnie Greer, who's an American political commentator, who just has repeatedly called Trump Hitler. and MAGA supporters, Nazis, in the last few weeks.

And I simply said to her, you know, you're talking about lowering the temperature, again, the sort of theme, which is fine. But how does it lower the temperature to compare Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler, to compare his supporters to Nazis? And so I think language, like you said, language does matter, right? I do think when an impressionable young damaged mind puts on his bullet casings anti-fascist slogans, he's probably having that put in his head that Charlie Kirk and Donald Trump

and all the MAGA right are a bunch of fascist, Nazis, and Trump's Hitler. He's probably hearing that a lot because you know what? A lot of people on the left continue to call them that. And I think that's wrong. Well, okay, sure.

I guess my point is that I don't think any of us would disagree with the fact that Charlie Kirk used some very heated, intense rhetoric and leveled some very extreme allegations at the left. Can we stop trying to blame this on Charlie Kirk? He asked you a question, Tim.

Are you going to take any risk? Are you going to take any risk? Whenever you're asked a tough question, it goes back to what Donald Trump did and what Charlie Kirk did. What about what we've all said and done? And do you take any responsibility? That's what peers is asking. Because the point about the fascism, racism, well, the thing about the Hitler, Tim, Tim, Tim, Tim, Tim, Tim, Tim, the reason I mentioned the Hitler Nazi thing.

and the fascist thing, this constant use of this language, is that it's entirely consistent, logical, that if you're a damaged young mind and you genuinely think that Donald Trump is Hitler, or Charlie Kirk is a fascist, or, you know, MAGA supporters are Nazis, it's entirely logical if you're a disturbed mind that you might think, well, it's my duty to kill these people

because they are the new Nazis. They are the new Mussolini, you know. And it's like, no, they're not. I hear what you're saying, Pierce, and I promise I'm going to answer. I just, I got cut off when people saying I was trying to, when Kerry was saying, I was trying to, Charlie for this. I just want to be 100% clear. I was making the exact opposite point.

I was making the exact opposite point. I think that everybody should be careful about their language and accurate. I don't support hyperbole and smearing people falsely. I'm not for that. Okay. But here's the thing. That same logic, right, that because people, because somebody on the left has called Trump and Nazi, because people have called him a fascist.

that means they're responsible for this murderer, that same logic would rationalize any murder, right? I mean, Donald Trump uses the harshest language about his opponents. He calls them the enemy of the people. He's called them communist. He's called them fascists. He's his word fascists. He uses extremely nasty rhetoric all the time. Would that justify a right-wing person killing a left-wing person?

Of course not. No. And that would be crazy to say that. So here's the thing. Speech is not violence. Charlie would have said that. we all should be able to debate in the public square, sometimes intensely, but we shouldn't then go and say, okay, that means you are murderers and we need to have literal civil war. And that is what I'm

starting to hear out there from people on both the right and the left. And I fundamentally reject it. Okay, speech is not violence. We should all be more responsible. We should all be more respectful. I don't think we should, sorry, Wajahat, I don't think we should have been live hate tweeting, Charlie, during his memorial. We can be more respectful. Thank you, Tim. But birds are not violence. Thank you for saying that. Welcome. Words are not violence, though. And we shouldn't be accusing the other side and smearing everybody on the other side of being some evil enemy, like, because of one deranged kid's actions. This is going to end really bad.