(Picture credit Hasan Piker)
Hasan Piker, a self-described Marxist, said Independent Dan Osborn was right for saying the lives of rural, Trump-voting Nebraskans “suck.”
“We have an Independent politician out of Nebraska who is saying the f***ing truth,” Piker said on a livestream on Wednesday. “It’s not like he’s disparaging them; he’s saying their lives f***ing suck. It’s true.”
“The average Nebraskan living next to the Trump store lives a dogsh*t life. The whole point of why people are running for office, people like Dan Osborn, is to fix that problem.”
Piker’s comments came in response to Osborn joining CNN to walk back comments he made that were released early Wednesday morning.
“Sure sounds like me,” Osborn told CNN when asked to confirm the audio. The candidate said he “did not remember the context” of his remarks but that he was running to try and make the lives of Nebraskans better.
Osborn also went on “Pod Save America” on Wednesday, a podcast hosted by former Barack Obama staffers, where he said that he was “angry” when he made his initial remarks.
Osborn can be heard on the audio, released by the Omaha World Herald, saying, “Billy Bob in f------ Red Cloud, Nebraska, who lives next to the f------ Trump store as you pull into town and is waving the flag, all he knows is that he's on the winning team. It's really that simple. And Trump, that's why he's been so effective.”
“He's been so effective at taking Billy Bob and his wife Mary Jane or Mary Jo and telling them ‘look we’re winning, you're on the winning team.’ And that's all they care about, because their lives probably suck so f------ bad.”
Osborn remarks were quickly slammed by Republicans, who compared it to Hillary Clinton’s “deplorables” moment during the 2016 presidential election.
The Trump campaign sent out a statement on Twitter saying Osborn “appears to doubt the political intelligence of Nebraskans who support President” and “Senate Democrats think Trump supporters are stupid.”
Piker Long History of Controversy
Piker, for his part, has a long history of making controversial remarks. In a 2019 video stream, he said that America “deserved” 9/11. The comment has since become a source of controversy in the Michigan Senate race as the Democratic nominee Abdul El-Sayed has campaigned with Piker.
“I was simply referencing the fact that all of the foreign policy decisions and our arming of insurgent groups in the region and our efforts in destabilizing the Middle East have a direct consequence, a boomerang effect, rather, if you will, in causing 9/11," Piker said in a clarification of his remark.
Piker also has made numerous antisemitic remarks, including suggesting violence against American Jews might be necessary if they continue to support the state of Israel. He has made comments saying he doubts the severity of the October 7th attack on Israel.
Piker is the nephew of The Young Turks founder Cenk Uygur, and worked for the platform in 2016 before launching his own show on the streaming platform Twitch a couple of years later. He has been suspended multiple times from the platform, including after using the term “Zionist pig.”
In April, he said of Israel, “I'm a lesser evil voter and therefore I would vote for Hamas over Israel every single time.”
— John Gage is the executive editor of The Plains Sentinel.