Stephen King has repeatedly apologized for a false accusation he made about conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who was fatally shot at a college campus in Utah on Sept. 10.
"The Long Walk" author claimed in a now-deleted X post that the 31-year-old political commentator previously advocated for the act of throwing stones to kill gay people. He later retracted the statement and expressed regret for taking a comment Kirk made on his podcast last year out of context.
In 2024, Kirk criticized children's YouTuber Ms. Rachel for arguing that the bible verse "love thy neighbor" in the Leviticus 18 scripture should apply to gay people. On the podcast, Kirk said: "by the way, Ms. Rachel, you might want to crack open that Bible of yours. In a lesser reference, part of the same part of scripture, is in Leviticus 18, is that ‘thou shall lay with another man shall be stoned to death.' Just saying."
"I apologize for saying Charlie Kirk advocated stoning gays. What he actually demonstrated was how some people cherry-pick Biblical passages," King wrote on X on Sept. 12.
Among those who condemned King's initial post was Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, who responded to the post calling the "It" writer a "horrible, evil, twisted liar."
"The horrible, evil, twisted liar apologizes," King replied. "This is what I get for reading something on Twitter (without) fact-checking. Won't happen again."
Cruz later responded on X adding that he appreciates King' apologizing and deleting the post.
Erika Kirk...
Stephen King, the author of Misery, faced heavy backlash after comments he made about Charlie Kirk, who was recently killed. Critics called King “a horrible, evil, twisted liar” and even said he wa...