Welcome to the new McCarthyism! The Charlie Kirk assassination and the aftermath!

Charlie Lewis is Crikey’s reporter-at-large, focusing on politics, culture, history and the US. Got a tip? Contact him securely on Signal @clewis.25. He was Crikey’s Tips and Murmurs editor between 2020 and 2025. He has previously worked across government and unions and was a researcher on RN’s Daily Planet. He currently co-hosts Spin Cycle on Triple R radio.

“Wisconsin senator Joseph McCarthy’s career was stalling by February 1950. He had managed to ride his tireless ambition, powerful oratory and a habitual looseness with the truth — an injury sustained falling off a ladder was repurposed as a “war wound” — past three-term incumbent Robert Marion La Follette Jr into the Senate in 1946. But his quick temper and lack of regard for the established rules of conduct had left him isolated”

https://www.crikey.com.au/2025/09/22/mccarthism-donald-trump-america-united-states/