Former US president Barack Obama has condemned the rhetoric of Donald Trump and his allies following the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, warning that the country is in a 'dangerous moment'. Speaking in Erie, Pennsylvania, Obama said political violence was 'anathema to what it means to be a democratic country', but criticised the rush to identify an enemy before the facts were known.
Obama addressed the killings of Kirk and Minnesota lawmaker Melissa Hortman, calling both incidents 'a tragedy'. He said Trump had deepened divisions rather than unite the country. 'There are no ifs, ands or buts about it: the central premise of our democratic system is that we have to be able to disagree and have sometimes really contentious debates without resorting to violence,' he said.
The former president warned that the White House response to Kirk's assassination could deepen political and cultural divides. He noted that Trump and his aides had called political opponents 'vermin, enemies', which he said 'speaks to a broader problem'. Obama contrasted this with his own leadership after the 2015 Charleston church shooting, saying a president's role in a crisis was to remind Americans of their shared bonds.
The White House hit back, with spokesperson Abigail Jackson calling Obama 'the architect of modern political division in America'. She claimed that more Americans felt Obama divided the country than united it. Meanwhile, political leaders including Mike Johnson, Joe Biden and George Bush have called for an end to political violence and a return to reasonable debate.
Obama sought a middle ground, praising Utah Governor Spencer Cox for showing that it is possible to disagree while abiding by a basic code of public debate. He said that while he believed Kirk's ideas were wrong, that did not negate the tragedy of his death, and that it was possible to mourn the victim while debating his ideas.
