Author Stephen King apologized Friday for a post on X that, after Charlie Kirk's assassination, falsely claimed the conservative activist had advocated "the stoning of gays to death."
In the now-deleted post Thursday, King wrote: "He advocated stoning gays to death. Just sayin."
He was reacting to a post Wednesday by Fox News host Jesse Watters, who wrote just hours after Kirk was shot to death: "Charlie Kirk was not a 'controversial' or 'polarizing' figure. Charlie was a PATRIOT. THIS is a turning point, and we all need to turn in the right direction. Rest in peace, my friend."
King, a nemesis of President Donald Trump, received substantial blowback from Kirk supporters, including Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas.
"You are a horrible, evil, twisted liar. No, he did not," Cruz wrote on X. "Your party — which you shamelessly shilled for — sent $100 billion to the Ayatollah … who does routinely murder homosexuals. Why are you so dishonest & filled with hate?"
King reversed course Friday, deleting the tweet and posting apologies on X.
"I apologize for saying Charlie Kirk advocated stoning gays," King wrote in one post. "What he actually demonstrated was how some people cherry-pick Biblical passages."
King also replied to Cruz's post: "The horrible, evil, twisted liar apologizes. This is what I get for reading something on Twitter w/o fact-checking. Won't happen again."
Cruz responded: "I appreciate that @StephenKing deleted the false tweet about @charliekirk11 and apologized. All of us — on both sides of the aisle — should treat each other with respect & decency, even if we disagree on politics. Charlie did that every day, and I admired him for it."
King's post followed a trend of left-wing activists who either celebrated or smeared Kirk in the wake of his killing at an event at Utah Valley University.
Author Gretchen Felker-Martin, whose 2022 novel, "Manhunt," was a post-apocalyptic horror story featuring transgender characters, celebrated Kirk's death on BlueSky. She reportedly wrote "thoughts and prayers you Nazi [expletive]" and "Hope the bullet's okay after touching Charlie Kirk."
DC Comics canceled her debut "Red Hood" series the next day, citing her inflammatory comments.
Felker-Martin, who is transgender, refused to apologize, telling The Comics Journal she had no regrets about her remarks.
Kirk's killing "just didn't strike me as an especially hot flashpoint," she said. "This is such a loathsome person. Everyone on the entire internet is talking about how pleasant it is that he got his. … I saw that he had died in the middle of spreading more of the bigotry that he spent his every waking moment promulgating, and in a way that he had advocated for others to die and felt nothing but contempt for his life.
"I mean, this is a man who I've watched for years go on television and on enormous stages and convention halls and say that me and everyone like me should be stoned to death."
Meanwhile, MSNBC fired political analyst Matthew Dowd on Thursday after he said on the air that "hateful thoughts lead to hateful words which ultimately lead to hateful actions" and suggested early reports of the shooting warranted scrutiny of political rhetoric.
Dowd also wrote on X that Kirk's "hateful words" led to "hateful actions," language that many saw as blaming Kirk for the violence.
Michael Katz ✉
Michael Katz is a Newsmax reporter with more than 30 years of experience reporting and editing on news, culture, and politics.