Episode 290 – What is next for the US after the killing of Charlie Kirk?
The US is, alas, no stranger to political violence. Three presidents have been assassinated as have several public figures like Martin Luther King. The political atmosphere of hate and retribution is magnified in today’s world of social media and dis/misinformation where calls for revenge are all too common. Factually incomplete statements by political leaders also feed this demand for blood. In the wake of the fatal shooting of Republican star Charlie Kirk what is next for the US? I am joined once again by a specialist in the US far right to look into these issues.
Trump says ‘we have to beat the hell’ out of ‘radical left lunatics’ after Kirk killing – POLITICO
Kirk Shooting Suspect Held ‘Leftist Ideology,’ Utah Governor Says – The New York Times
Is “radical-left” violence really on the rise in America?
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About my guest
Cynthia Miller-Idriss is an award-winning author and scholar of extremism and radicalization and the founding director of the Polarization and Extremism Research & Innovation Lab (PERIL) at the American University in Washington, DC, where she is also a Professor in the School of Public Affairs and in the School of Education. She regularly testifies before the U.S. Congress or briefs policy, security, education and intelligence agencies in the U.S., the United Nations, and other countries on trends in domestic violent extremism and strategies for prevention and disengagement. Ms. Miller is also the author of several books, including Hate in the Homeland: The New Global Far Right and Man Up: The New Misogyny and the Rise of Violent Extremism.
Canadian Intelligence Eh
In a world of multiple voices and opinions it can be very hard to know where to turn. One choice is to look to those who actually worked in counter-terrorism in the national security world.
In these half-hour podcasts, 32-year Canadian intelligence veteran Phil Gurski is joined by a fascinating array of individuals with something meaningful to say about these issues as they provide insight into what they mean and what we need to do about them.
About Phil Gurski
Phil worked as a senior strategic analyst at CSIS (Canadian Security Intelligence Service) from 2001-2015, specializing in violent Islamist-inspired homegrown terrorism and radicalisation. From 1983 to 2001 he was employed as a senior multilingual analyst at Communications Security Establishment (CSE – Canada’s signals intelligence agency), specialising in the Middle East. He also served as senior special advisor in the National Security Directorate at Public Safety Canada from 2013, focusing on community outreach and training on radicalisation to violence, until his retirement from the civil service in May 2015, and as consultant for the Ontario Provincial Police’s Anti-Terrorism Section (PATS) from May to October 2015. He also ran Borealis Threat and Risk Consulting from May 2015 to May 2025.
He was the Director of Security and Intelligence at the SecDev Group from June 2018 to July 2019 and the Director of the National Security Programme at the University of Ottawa’s Professional Development Institute from 2020-2022. He has also taught on national security issues at George Brown College, the University of Ottawa and Georgian College. Mr. Gurski has presented on violent Islamist-inspired and other forms of terrorism and radicalisation across Canada and around the world and is actively sought by Canadian and international media on national security and intelligence issues. He has written hundreds of op-eds on these matters for several Canadian media since 2016
He is the author of The Threat from Within: Recognizing Al Qaeda-inspired Radicalization and Terrorism in the West (Rowman and Littlefield 2015) Western Foreign Fighters: The Threat to Homeland and International Security (Rowman and Littlefield 2017), The Lesser Jihads: Taking the Islamist fight to the world (Rowman and Littlefield 2017), An end to the ‘War on Terrorism (Rowman and Littlefield 2018), When Religion Kills: How Extremist Justify Violence Through Faith (Lynne Rienner 2019), The Peaceable Kingdom? A history of terrorism in Canada from Confederation to the present (self-published: 2021, republished by Double Dagger in 2022), and the forthcoming The Fenians: Brotherhood of fools or Canada’s first terrorist threat? (Double Dagger: 2025). He regularly blogs and podcasts (Canadian Intelligence Eh!), and posts on Bluesky (@borealissaves.bsky.social) on terrorism and intelligence matters.
