Hello and welcome to Background Briefing available 247 at Background Briefing.

I'm Ian Masters, and today we'll look into a number of stories and issues in the

news. We'll begin with the inflammatory narrative, Trump, Miller, and Vancey, continuing to push

that Charlie Kirk's assassin was acting on behalf of the Democratic Party and the radical left

financed by George Soros, when a much more personal motive appears to be emerging.

According to Utah's Republican governor, the 22-year-old shooter comes from a devout conservative family

and was living with a partner who was transitioning from male to female.

This raises the possibility that Kirk's cruel and hostile scapegoating of trans people,

which he was engaged in when he was shot, is more likely a motive.

Joining us is Ben Burgess, the host of the Give Them an Argument podcast and YouTube channel,

a professor at Rutgers University and a columnist for Jacobin.

His books include Give Them an Argument, Logic for the Left, Cancelling Comedians, While

the World Burns, a critique of the Contemporary Left, and Christopher Hitchens, what he got

right, how he went wrong, and why he still matters.

He debated Charlie Kirk on Democratic Socialism versus Conservative Populism,

and we'll discuss Ben's article with Megan Day at Jacobin.

Charlie Kirk's murder is a tragedy and a disaster.

Then we'll examine the latest protest songs against Trump and Maga Fascism

as a No King's Opposition movement is being mobilized across the country

and speak with William Tallinn, better known as the Reverend Billy, a pastor for the Church

of Stop Shopping, a group of activists based in New York City who protests consumerism and monoculture

through musical performance, including singing while trespassing.

...