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Today in Focus
Cenk Uygur and Hasan Piker: the US commentators banned from the UK
00:24:37
The leftwing American commentator Cenk Uygur talks about the ban on him and his nephew, Hasan Piker, entering the UK this week. With reporting from Kiran Stacey
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- [00:00]
Lucy Hoff
This is the Guardian. Today, the left wing US commentators banned from coming to Britain.
- [00:22]
Kieran Stacey
From globalization to innovation, sustainability to market volatility, there's always more than one side to a story. Explore different perspectives on today's most important business and economic issues with the Flipside podcast from Barclays Investment Bank. Hear two research analysts in a lively debate and get insights from every angle. To further inform your view, listen to the Flipside on your favorite platform.
- [00:55]
Lucy Hoff
A few days ago, Cenk Hugo was at the airport.
- [00:59]
Cenk Uygur
So I went to LAX in Los Angeles. Going to Heathrow, didn't think twice about it. I have that ETA last two years and since I'd come to speak at Oxford last year, it was still in effect.
- [01:12]
Lucy Hoff
An eta, an electronic travel authorization, allows travelers to enter the uk. But Cenk, a left wing commentator and host of the Young Turks YouTube channel, was having some problems.
- [01:25]
Cenk Uygur
I couldn't log on from my computer, which I found to be a little bit strange, but I thought, oh, I'll probably have to give the ETA number at the terminal. So I go to the terminal and a woman comes to help me and she tries to check me in through a kiosk and says, oh, that's weird, I can't check you in, let's go look at my computer terminal. And she does and she says, oh, wow, I've never seen this. You've been rejected by the British government.
- [01:50]
Kieran Stacey
Foreign
- [01:54]
Cenk Uygur
we're not allowed to put you on the plane. You, you can't board because the British government has withdrawn your ETA and, and said you're not allowed to enter the country.
- [02:05]
Lucy Hoff
How did you feel?
- [02:07]
Cenk Uygur
Well, at, at first I thought it was a bureaucratic snafu. I was like, well, that can't be right, that's absurd. I was just there, right, and there's no reason to ban me. Then that piece from the Times came out about 15 or 20 minutes after that.
- [02:21]
Lucy Hoff
As Cenk found out he'd been banned from entering the uk, seemingly for things he'd said about Israel in the past.
- [02:28]
Cenk Uygur
I had said that America is controlled by Israel and in reference to how the Israeli lobby has given more to American Congress than any other lobby in the last election cycle. Later they added to the story and said Cenk said that Israel had committed a genocide and their acts were barbaric and savage.
- [02:54]
Lucy Hoff
And Cenk wasn't alone. He'd been due to speak in the UK this week with his nephew Hassan Piker, the hugely popular left wing streamer, that Hassan too had been barred. And as the Home Office becomes ever more hardline, Cenk and Hassan are unlikely to be the last to be banned from coming to the UK to speak. From the Guardian, I'm Lucy Hoff. Today in focus, Cenk Juga on Israel free speech and his ban from the uk. So, Cenk Yuga, you will be a familiar face and voice to many of our listeners. You spent more than 20 years building a huge audience through your talk show, the Young Turks. But for anyone unfamiliar with your work, how would you describe what you do?
- [03:46]
Cenk Uygur
Young Turks is the flagship show of the TYT network. The TYT network is on dozens of platforms, including as a 24 hour channel. So you can see that on Roku, Amazon Prime, YouTube TV and so many other places. But our home base is YouTube. We're the longest lasting online show in history. We're considered on the left and I certainly am, but all of our hosts have slightly different positions, so. So there is no one position for the TYT network, but we are known for being generally on the left. Maybe the assassination was like, not something that we. We don't know the full story. We are the first YouTube channel ever and so that makes me the original YouTuber.
- [04:34]
Lucy Hoff
What an accolade.
- [04:35]
Cenk Uygur
Yeah, we're the longest lasting online show in history. And in fact, I was coming to London to speak at south by Southwest about digital media, which I'm an expert in. So at Oxford I was going to speak about Israel and foreign policy, but at South By, I was just speaking on digital media.
- [04:55]
Lucy Hoff
So you were due to come and give a talk in the uk. As you say it, it's not the first time you've traveled to the UK to do such an event, right?
- [05:03]
Cenk Uygur
That's right. I've spoken at Oxford twice before and I've been to the UK many times. And in fact they went and found old blogs from 30 years ago. That was some manufactured controversy from a decade ago. Wait, I've been in Britain many times since then, so why are we now bringing those issues up? Oh, so this is an attempt at character assassination. This doesn't have anything to do with what I actually said, and that's because there's no reason to ban me at all. In fact, if you ban me, the great majority of British citizens agree with me. Are you gonna ban your own citizens? Are your own citizens a threat to the public order? And in a sense they are right because the order is set by the powerful and so they don't want you disturbing their order.
- [06:03]
Lucy Hoff
Kieran Stacey, you are policy editor for the Guardian. You're speaking to us from Parliament, so you're very well placed to speak to us about the decision by the government this week to ban these two American commentators. We've heard this sort of official statement from the Home Office that they felt that this visit would not be conducive to the public good. But what else do you understand about the decision from the Home Office to bar them?
- [06:27]
Kieran Stacey
Yeah, well, I mean, it comes in the context of a kind of ramping up of similar action over the last few months by the Home Office. Piker and UGA are by no means the only people to have had their travel permission revoked in recent months to the uk. They are unusual in that they are on the left of politics. Mainly we've had people on the right of politics being banned from traveling. Whether that's Kanye west or whether that's a group of activists, commentators and politicians who are banned from coming to a rally hosted by Tommy Robinson, Stephen Yaxley Lennon, the far right agitator over here in the uk this has been happening quite a lot and these two are simply the latest to have this happen as a result of action by the Home Office.
- [07:12]
Lucy Hoff
So Piker and Hugo were due to be traveling to the UK for two events. One was south by Southwest UK as well as a talk at the Oxford Union. The Oxford Union have said on Wednesday that they are going to go ahead with the event but instead do it remotely. But Hugo traveled to Oxford last year without any issues. So what are some of the concerns now that the Home Office are worried about that they've said? Is it recent comments because Jugo said they've looked back at comments that he said a very long time ago?
- [07:44]
Kieran Stacey
Yeah, I mean, first thing to say is that we don't completely know because the Home Office doesn't have to say. However, judging by some of the comments that have been flagged by people close to the Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood, and have appeared in press reports. Hassan Piker I think the comments that come up again and again, ones where he said he would vote for Hamas over Israel. He thinks that Hamas is a thousand times better than Israel. He has described Orthodox Jews as being inbreds. He's also claimed that America deserved 9 11, as you say. None of these are particularly new comments, but you can see, especially with Hamas being a prescribed entity, why support for what is essentially regarded in the UK as a terrorist organization might have been flagged at high levels within the Home Office.
- [08:29]
Cenk Uygur
I think it connects to another comment of yours that's been circulating. This is one from January. Hamas is a thousand times better than a Fascist settler, colonial apartheid state. I stand by that.
- [08:39]
Kieran Stacey
For Ch Yuga, it's slightly different. His language has been less clear cut. The things that have been flagged with him are he has repeatedly framed Israel's actions as genocide, barbaric and savage, particularly in Palestine. He's accused Israel of using Jews as human shields. Also, there was one exchange on Uncensored with Piers Morgan in which Uyghurs seem to dismiss evidence relating to grooming gangs in towns in the north, such as Rotherham. But Cenk, Cenk, I'm. Look, I'm a Jew, right? And I've already sat here and I can say there are huge problems that I find in the Hasidic Jewish community. Why can't you guys, when we talk about the grooming gangs, when we talk about Islamism, can you address it?
- [09:20]
Cenk Uygur
Can you shut up and let me address it?
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Kieran Stacey
Can you address it without mentioning Israel or can you address grooming guy?
- [09:27]
Cenk Uygur
No, because that's the whole reason we're having this conversation, because your Israeli buddies wanted a distraction from the Epstein files. That's why they threw this garbage into the media. So now let me.
- [09:39]
Kieran Stacey
This has become quite a sensitive racial issue in the uk and what Yuga went on to say on Piers Morgan's show was, well, these aren't really such a big issue. And he said in fact that concerns about this themselves were Islamophobic. Now, I think it is a pattern here from the Home Office of drawing the line potentially further lower down than it might have done in the past as to what constitutes unacceptable language.
- [10:06]
Lucy Hoff
Yeah. And in terms of what's led to the decision, we understand that the Community Security Trust, a Jewish security organisation, had raised concerns last week about this scheduled visit and had spoken to the government about it. What do we understand about what has influenced this decision?
- [10:24]
Kieran Stacey
Yes, we're told that that is the case. I mean, I would say that the CST is in regular contact with the government and will always flag people coming into the country that it regards as being anti Semitic and you know, should not be here. That's fairly open. That's what they do. I would say that politically part of the sensitivity around this is that the British police have been accused, and in fact are being accused again as we speak, of so called two tier policing and that's basically of treating right wing people differently from left wing people or in certain occasions white people differently from non white people. And I think the government's quite sensitive about this. So if it is going to ban people like for example, Valentina Gomez, a right wing campaigner, agitator, because she was filmed burning a Koran and has referred to rapist Muslims, then it also, I think, felt it was under an obligation to act quite strongly against anybody who had made what it regarded as anti Semitic comments as well.
- [11:24]
Lucy Hoff
Yes. So both Piker and Juga vehemently deny that they're anti Semitic. And you mentioned that this is not unprecedented, that there are a number of people who've been barred from entry. I mean, what is the logic? Is there a sense from the Home Office that they are increasingly not allowing people who've said certain offensive things? And is that because there are fears of civil unrest or just merely people being offended or disagreeing?
- [11:51]
Kieran Stacey
No, they would definitely say that these are fears of civil unrest that they have. I mean, I don't think anybody in the government would say that they are trying to police free speech. Ministers in the department know that if they start getting into an argument about what is acceptable and what isn't acceptable speech, they're going to very quickly be dragged into a quagmire that's going to be difficult to escape from. So the government would say that they're simply trying to safeguard the public in their argument. But you have to look at these cases in the context of what else the Home Office has done recently. And in Shabana Mahmud we have quite an authoritarian buy in instinct Home Secretary. And in Keir Starmer in Downing street, you do also have somebody who really believes in the power of the state, and I mean, wouldn't call him authoritarian, but certainly believes that the state can be used to curtail people's liberties in a way, I think, that former Prime Ministers haven't. And so this is within their political philosophy to take stronger action on preventing people coming into the country than they might otherwise have done. I mean, let's just think about that Unite the Kingdom rally, by the way, for a moment there were genuine concerns that that rally was going to turn violent and this was going to be an extremely sensitive mom in British political history. And I think that's why they took quite strong action going into that. I just think having set that bar now, officials in the Home Office feel that they have to meet it every single time. And so let's see how many others end up falling foul of exactly where the Home Office has drawn that line.
- [13:15]
Lucy Hoff
Yeah, and I suppose it comes at a particularly delicate moment here in the uk. We've had appalling attacks on a synagogue in Manchester and more recently a fatal attack in Golders Green at the end of April at the Same time we have the ongoing Palestine action cases with proscription of that group. This is a sensitive issue at a sensitive time and so I sense that there is a lot of politics driving this decision.
- [13:44]
Kieran Stacey
I think that's right. But, you know, that's part of the job of politics, isn't it? These decisions don't take place in a vacuum and politicians do have to take into account the context in which they're being made. And there are decisions being made that maybe they wouldn't have done at a more harmonious time in our recent history, but we're not living in those times. And so that's why I think the Home Office is being much more hardline than it might have been in the past.
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Lucy Hoff
So, Cenk, in the statement from the Home Office, which I quote, these individuals ETAs have been cancelled on the grounds that their presence in the UK may not be conducive to the public good and that these decisions can be made on assessment to the potential risk an individual may pose to UK society. I wonder what it's like to hear that language.
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Cenk Uygur
I mean, it's both haunting and hilarious. So they've pulled off an interesting combo there. So their claim that if I step onto British soil, it will immediately cause public disorder, that mayhem will break out. Well, then why didn't it break out when I came last year? Yeah, I mean, come on. But I will tell you, when I first found out, it was because of this. It was a bit of a gut punch and I have very thick skin and anybody who follows the Young Turks or see me debate knows, oh, my God, I could take almost anything. By the way, Israeli supporters, including Brits, British citizens have called me a parasite, a cockroach, all on air. They've suggested that my co host, Anna Kasparian, should be killed. And none of them have been banned, none of them have been sanctioned. This double standard is so over the top, so brazen, that it's become unconscionable. Yeah, it's indefensible.
- [15:50]
Lucy Hoff
Well, because it wasn't just you that was banned. It was Hassan Piker, the political commentator at Twitch Streamer with millions of followers. We should also add that he is your. Your nephew. When did you learn that he had been banned?
- [16:05]
Cenk Uygur
So once I realized that I was banned, I texted Haas because he was coming a day after me and I said, look, I got banned, so double check, don't bother coming to the airport, you know, because if they ban me, they're almost certainly going to ban you. And. And he said, no, no, I Already have a visa. And I said, so did I. So he then double checked and he said, yep, no, you're right, they took mine away as well. They took away the eta. And I'm also banned. So Haas has said some things I don't agree with, to which I say, so what? Every Thanksgiving we do something fun on his show called jenksgiving and we usually debate for office. It's the Thanksgiving treat at this point. You know, you have turkey, you watch football, maybe you toss the pigskin around yourself. And I and my uncle get together and have a jank off. That's right, A real uncle nephew standoff. That's right. I'm on the left, but I'm a capitalist. He's on the left, but he's far more of a socialist. So we, we have sometimes three hour debates, four hour debates once. And so we're allowed to disagree with one another without hating one another, without banning or canceling one another.
- [17:24]
Lucy Hoff
So what do you understand about whether this ban is permanent?
- [17:28]
Cenk Uygur
I mean, look, look. So first off, as far as I know, only one person has ever had this reversed and that was Snoop Dogg. But that's when the Queen said he has done no wrong because her grandbabies loved me back then. That's what it was. They was like, grandmama, we like his music. She was like, well, you know what? My grandbabies like him and he ain't done nothing in the uk, so leave him alone. He's welcome. Is this really permanent? Is. Has the British government lost its mind? Now I'm going to have to hire a lawyer to try to overturn. I, I don't know if people know I'm not that wealthy. So I now apparently have to spend an extraordinary amount of money to overturn these things and there's almost no precedent for overturning them. So is the British government going to pay us back for this? And I want to be clear, you know, I disagree with some of the things that Hasan has said, but he's never said anything anti Semitic. Right. They're just disagreeing with are different ways of disagreeing with Israel. So and so it not only takes away our freedom, enhance the cost of our liberty, but it's also got a financial cost.
- [18:39]
Lucy Hoff
Coming up, Cenk on why he thinks he was really banned from entering the uk.
- [18:56]
Podcast Narrator
A History of the United States in 100 Objects is a brand new podcast from 99% Invisible in BBC Studios. Each week we're looking at a different object from across American history with a unique story to tell about who we've been what we've built and what we've allowed ourselves to forget. Some of these objects are well known, many are not. But all of them carry the story of how we got to this moment. Find a history of the United States and 100 objects on the 99% invisible feed wherever you get your podcasts.
- [19:32]
Lucy Hoff
So your views on the Israeli government and its actions are very clear. But as you've said that it was understood that this decision was based on concerns that your presence would risk exacerbating anti Semitism. Critics of yours would say that your statements contain anti Semitic conspiracy theories about Israeli control of governments or media propagating tropes by claiming Israel controls America, including by financial means. Means. How do you respond to that?
- [20:03]
Cenk Uygur
It's utter nonsense. And it's done so that they found a hundred different ways to make sure that you shut up and never oppose the Israeli government. So, for example, big oil gets $35 billion in subsidies every year. That's 10 times what Israel gets every year. That's an absolute outrage. And they obviously control the American Congress. They say, oh, that's okay. You can say that all day long. The only lobby you're not allowed to criticize is the Israeli lobby. Well, I'm not doing the discrimination. You're doing the discrimination. 63% of American Jews are against the current Israeli government. Are they all anti Semites? This is insane. No, this is a smear they do of anyone who opposes the government of Israel.
- [20:53]
Lucy Hoff
I mean, here we've had a spate of very grave anti Semitic attacks. There was an attack on a synagogue in Manchester. There was more recently an attack in Golders Green, a fatal attack. The Community Security Trust, the cst, the Jewish organization, has been urging the government to, quote, to act responsibly and not allow the UK to be a platform for Hassan Paika, who they say promotes rhetoric that includes anti Semitic themes. And I guess here we are balancing balancing the need for people to freely go to demonstrations in support of Palestine and Palestinian people versus the safety of Jewish communities and Jewish people who do say that they feel at risk and in danger.
- [21:39]
Cenk Uygur
No, that's not how you balance things. And that one is not related to the other. And as Benjamin Franklin said, if you trade your liberty for security, you'll have neither. And that is certainly true. What the British government is saying is, if you don't agree to our authoritarianism, then you're a threat to Jewish people in the uk that's absurd. So what do I say on the Young Turks, on Tyt or Anywhere else. I tell everyone, do not ever judge people based on religion or race. Not only are we against anti Semitism and discrimination and bigotry against everyone, but we are religiously nonviolent. We think that violence of any sort, terrorism of any sort, is terrible. The oppressive occupation of the Israelis does not justify killing civilians. Okay? And it's about the most disgusting, oppressive dictatorship you will find on planet earth. Calling Israel a democracy is invalidating the humanity and the existence of five and a half million Palestinians. But the fact that they're assassinating our characters, both me and Hasan, and saying that we advocated, in essence, they seem to be saying we advocated for that kind of violence when we've done the exact opposite. How many times is the British government going to lie about me? And why are they lying about me? What a bizarre thing to do, to go out of your way to invent things about us, to ban us from the country.
- [23:08]
Lucy Hoff
You are not the only people that have been banned from entering the UK recently. We've had far right activists who've been blocked from entering the UK before a rally by Tommy Robinson, the far right activist, including Valentina Gomez, a US based anti Islam influencer. We've also had a Dutch influencer and a Polish politician. And MEP Kanye west, or YE as he now known, was also banned from entering the country for anti Semitic remarks. I mean, do you feel that this is a blunt instrument that is being used by the government that is setting an increasing precedent?
- [23:46]
Cenk Uygur
Yeah, so look, I, I don't agree with any of the bands. Like for example, I come originally from a Muslim family, I'm atheist now. But Valentina Gomez has said terrible, despicable things about Muslims. Kanye west has said terrible, bigoted things about Jewish folks. But I wouldn't abandon either one of them. I'm not afraid of any debate. So we talk about Valentina Gomez on our show. We make fun of her, we ridicule her, and she should be ridiculed for her over the top bigotry. But she shouldn't be banned. One more thing about that. So, okay, I disagree with banning people overall, but when you come to the bucket of people who have been banned, so now we have people who have said outrageously anti Semitic things about Muslims and Jews and me. Wait, why am I in that category? I haven't said any of those things. Not only that, I've been fighting against that kind of bigotry my whole career, but because I criticized Israel, now all of a sudden I'm in that same bucket. No, that's not fair. And that's not right.
- [24:51]
Lucy Hoff
That was Cenk Yuga from the Young Turks. My huge thanks to him and also to our policy editor, Kieran Stacey. You can read all about this case over at the Guardian Document. You can also listen to an interview with Chenk's nephew, Hassan Piker, on our sister podcast Stateside with Kyan Carter, recorded before he was banned from traveling to the uk. That's all for today. This episode was presented by me, Lucy Hoff. It was produced by Guy Safman, sound design was by Brian McNamara, and the executive producers were Sammy Kent and Elizabeth Kassin. This is the Guardian.
- [25:46]
Podcast Narrator
A History of the United States in 100 Objects is a brand new podcast from 99% Invisible in BBC Studios. Each week we're looking at a different object from across American history with a unique story to tell about who we've been, what we've built, and what we've allowed ourselves to forget. Some of these objects are well known, many are not, but all of them carry the story of how we got to this moment. Find A History of the United States and 100 objects on the 99% invisible feed. Wherever you get your podcasts.