Amanda Seyfried defends calling Charlie Kirk ‘hateful’ amid backlash

Amanda Seyfried is defending herself from backlash after calling Charlie Kirk “hateful” in a comment posted after his death.

Days after Kirk was fatally shot in the neck during a college speaking event in Utah on Sept. 10, an Instagram video from the account @So.Informed highlighted several controversial remarks that Kirk had made about abortion, immigration, trans rights, and more. Agreeing with the post in a Tuesday comment, Seyfried wrote, “He was hateful.”

She was subsequently criticized for the comment, prompting the actress to clarify her remark in a separate Instagram post.

“We’re forgetting the nuance of humanity,” Seyfried wrote in her Wednesday statement. “I can get angry about misogyny and racist rhetoric and ALSO very much agree that Charlie Kirk’s murder was absolutely disturbing and deplorable in every way imaginable. No one should have to experience this level of violence. This country is grieving too many senseless and violent deaths and shootings. Can we agree on that at least?”

She captioned the post with the note, “I don’t want to add fuel to a fire. I just want to be able to give clarity to something so irresponsibly (but understandably) taken out of context. Spirited discourse- isn’t that what we should be having?”

Kirk, a 31-year-old conservative activist and the co-founder of Turning Point USA, was discussing mass shootings on the campus of Utah Valley University when he was shot. Though he was rushed to a nearby hospital, he was soon pronounced dead. Kirk’s death has divided the public. 

Seyfried is one of many public figures who have sparked outrage for bringing up past statements of Kirk’s, with critics claiming that such a reaction condones politically motivated violence. The Trump administration has since vowed to punish those it deems not properly mournful.

Seyfried’s second statement is more in line with the approach that several of her Hollywood peers have taken, condemning Kirk’s shooting death while disagreeing with his politics. Earlier this week, Jamie Lee Curtis fought back tears on Marc Maron’s “WTF” podcast when discussing Kirk.

“I disagreed with him on almost every point I ever heard him say, but I believe he was a man of faith, and I hope in that moment when he died, that he felt connected with his faith,” the Freakier Friday actress said. “Even though his ideas were abhorrent to me. I still believe he’s a father and a husband and a man of faith. And I hope whatever connection to God means that he felt it.”

Expressing a similar sentiment at the Investigative Reporters and Editors’ 50th anniversary gala on Monday, Michael Keaton told reporters, “Regardless of how I probably — not probably — have disagreed with many things he said, Charlie Kirk leaves behind two kids and a wife. You gotta remember that.”

He then added that “in the end, shooting people will never answer anything,” while noting “the irony that he was killed with a gun is unbelievable.”

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Like Keaton, many have pointed out the irony that Kirk was a staunch supporter of the Second Amendment. During a clip shared from a 2023 interview, he argued, “It’s worth to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second Amendment to protect our other God-given rights.