The last few days were marked first by the sharp crack of a gunshot – the one that killed Charlie Kirk, the young American influencer and staunch supporter of Donald Trump, on September 10. Then came the outcry from his supporters, rightly shocked by this brutal assassination. They were not the only ones stunned; we all were, witnessing yet again the American political stage plunged into mourning by a heinous murder.
I was also stunned when the European far right – always quick to call themselves patriots and usually so hostile to the symbols of globalization they routinely condemn – immediately campaigned for a tribute to Kirk. The escalation was swift: Why not award him the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought, the French far-right party Reconquête suggested. Why not demand a minute of silence in the European Parliament's plenary session, asked a Swedish MEP, instantly backed by France's far-right Rassemblement National (RN). Why hold back and not adopt the slogan "Je suis Charlie" [a rallying cry after the 2015 terrorist attack on the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo], dared RN leader and MEP Jordan Bardella.
I was stunned that some wanted to turn Kirk from a victim into a hero – and even more so a European hero. That anyone would dare ask our Parliament to pay tribute to an activist who glorified racial segregation and slavery, called for women to return to the home, demonized homosexuality, spewed hatred toward Ukraine, accused Jews of encouraging immigration and called for the death penalty for Joe Biden. And that we, members of the European Parliament gathered in Strasbourg – in the chamber once presided over by Simone Veil, the Holocaust survivor who championed women's rights in France, would be asked to bow our heads in memory of a man who compared abortion to the "Holocaust of the 21st century."
I was stunned, but I was not silent. I responded to these demands from the far right, which were both insistent and repeated by all their MEPs, by laying out my arguments [on September 12]. I expected to be just one voice among many. I was the only one, out of 720 MEPs, to speak up and ask that we distinguish between the unanimous condemnation that the assassination of a man deserves and the refusal to endorse his ideas. No other lawmaker took the trouble to share their perspective. To be sure, the president of the Parliament denied the requested minute of silence, but without explanation. Yet the silence of my colleagues in the face of the far right's demands lasted much longer than a minute.
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