As the multi-day Democratic Party fight over association with Twitch streamer Hasan Piker continues, the party’s progressive flank and even some centrists fume that party leadership has once again lost the plot.
Just under a dozen members of the party’s elected officials in Washington have made statements condemning Piker in the past week over two individual comments Piker made on-stream about the September 11 attacks and the backlash against Jewish supporters of Israel, both of which he argues are being taken wildly out of context. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries pledged in an interview this week to “continue” speaking out about Piker and comments he claimed were antisemitic.
At the same time, Piker remains a popular figure among younger Democrats and those Democratic candidates who’ve been supported by the left-wing pundit have firmly refused to back away from him, denouncing the criticism as dishonest smears. Piker himself has denied charges of anti-Semitism, and apologized for offending viewers with his remarks about 9/11.
All of this is occurring under the spectacle of a national media frenzy surrounding Piker and the Democratic Socialists of America, whom journalists have made the focus of their questions to Democrats of all stripes. And some Democrats are beginning to air publicly their resentment over party leaders like Jeffries falling into what they call a Republican trap. Campaigning alongside Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan, Rep. Debbie Dingell rolled her eyes at them on Wednesday.
“Don’t any reporter ask me again about Hasan Piker,” complained Dingell, who endorsed El-Sayed’s rival in the primary. El-Sayed openly campaigned with Piker during the contentious Democratic contest, but quickly won endorsements from his challengers after it was over.
“It’s not what November is about. Republicans are trying to make it-- Republicans are trying to divide us,” Dingell went on, speaking at an El-Sayed town hall event in Ann Arbor. “And we gotta stop letting them try to divide us.”
Republican plot or not, the divisions are real. Dingell’s fellow Michigander in the House, Rep. Hillary Scholten, is refusing to campaign alongside El-Sayed or be associated with him on campaign literature over the Piker debacle. At a town hall event this week, the congresswoman representing Grand Rapids and parts of the state’s western regions was lectured by a constituent and accused of contributing to the spread of Islamophobic rhetoric against El-Sayed, which she denied.
Ro Khanna, a Democrat very publicly eyeing a 2028 bid for president, was even less sparing in his criticism of his colleagues on X.
“Quit calling Bernie Sanders an antisemite. Stop wasting time attacking Hasan Piker instead of Trump’s robber baron corruption,” Khanna advised Democrats on Wednesday.
“Too many demotivated Democrats stayed home in 2016 and 2024. We can’t repeat past mistakes,” he added.
Khanna and Dingell’s criticism is evidence of a deep fracture that has emerged within the party at a critical time. With just over two months to go before the midterms and most of the primary season now over, the Piker and DSA media cycles have prolonged factional Democratic fights that otherwise would have ended at the ballot box. Particularly progressives but even some more moderate Democrats see this as a losing strategy.
“Calling on all Dems to take the Don’t Talk About Hasan Piker For A Day Challenge,” wrote Pod Save America co-host Jon Favreau. “Can we do it??? Lots of other topics to focus on with 69 days left until the midterms.” His criticism was echoed by the likes of Ben Rhodes, another senior Obama administration staffer.
Democratic strategist Tom Bonier begged his party to look at the polls showing what issues Americans found most important as they decided their midterm choices: “I guarantee you that 80%+ of Dems have no idea who Hasan Piker is. This is a dumb distraction and Dems should stop taking the bait.”
The backlash to the backlash is now fully underway; it’s unclear what will actually bring PikerGate to an end. Progressives hope that many on their side of the aisle will take a cue from Angie Nixon, the party’s nominee for Senate in Florida, who batted away a question from NBC’s Kristen Welker during an interview last week when she was asked about the relatively unknown DSA policy platform, labelling it a Washington-centric story.
“You all are the only ones that are distracted. I’m actually going out, talking to voters about the things that matter to them,” she said, adding: “We should make sure that we’re pivoting to the right conversations.”
