FOX & Friends: Just Kill Homeless People

I thought I was done being shocked by anything that anyone said on FOX news at this point. After all, for decades they have woven their own alternative timeline in which facts have no place and reality is a distant memory. So very little that is aired on that network even raises a flag anymore. But the other day, during a conversation about what to do about unhoused people in America the initial suggestions were to put them in a mental institution or jail before Brian Kilmeade said, casually, with a straight face, “Or, involuntary lethal injection. Just kill them.”

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Think about that.

Human beings who just happen to be living on the streets, most often due to no fault of their own except not being able to afford the ever increasing global housing prices, are so dehumanized in the eyes of people who are fortunate enough to have a roof over their heads, that a suggestion to “just kill them” can be made on national television with absolutely zero repercussions.

Later that day, Charlie Kirk was killed, and Brian Kilmeade reacted in a very, very different way. What’s the difference between the two? Well, other than that zero homeless people are famous for spreading racism and hatred as a career choice, Charlie Kirk was lucky enough to have been born wealthy and made more wealthy from said career to have a roof over his head.

I will never understand how any human being can look at another and completely disregard their humanity, but the idea that thousands of people should be murdered, jailed, or institutionalized just because they don’t have a home is beyond appalling, it is terrifying.

Perhaps Brian Kilmeade is the one who isn’t human.

This is why I wake up every morning and go to bed every night obsessed with helping as many of the 26 million American adults who do not have IDs as I can. It’s life or death for them, absolutely, it is vital for our economy, definitely, but also because they should not have to suffer the cruelties of “people” like Brian Kilmeade because the government makes it impossible for them to get IDs.

It’s not easy right now. Nonprofit funding has cratered in the wake of the Trump administration. Foundations are pulling back and individual donors are struggling. Just surviving has become an Olympic sport for even the largest organizations, much less tiny ones like ours. But this morning on Skid Row in Los Angeles we had a line around the block as usual. People desperate for the housing, jobs, and services that they can only get with an ID.

I’ll admit it, lately I have been thinking that it would be easier to stop. I could breathe, not have a migraine once a day, stop stress crying over my breakfast, and help my staff find employment in the private sector before I crawl into a closet and eat several large blocks of cheese. It’s tough out here. But then I hear someone say on national television that we should just kill the humans I look into the eyes of every day and I know that I have to keep going, no matter what.

We cannot stop until every single person in this country has an ID and a safe place to land.

If you’re as angry as I am, you can do three things:

1. Email [email protected] and tell them how you feel about this segment.

2. Donate to help us help the people who need it most.

3. Share this with a friend who is as passionate about human rights as you are.

I am writing this before I head to the airport for my onboarding retreat as a new member of the board of Amnesty International. I am thrilled and honored to be able to use this new position to fight for human rights at home and abroad, to be able to “defend the defenders” as Amnesty likes to say. But this segment has reminded me that ID work is human rights work too. And right now, in this moment, we either fight for the most vulnerable among us, or we’re no better than Brian Kilmeade.

Kat Calvin