Polarization in the USA: A “Marxist” in a tailored suit on Twitch

Around Halloween, houses in the USA are decorated: with cobwebs, skulls - and of course with pumpkins. This is what the left-wing streamer Hasan Piker did. Only the orange turnip heads that you see in his videos on the shelf behind him bear the scary faces of Elon Musk, Benjamin Netanyahu and Donald Trump.

Many people tend to be frightened by Piker himself. The 35-year-old son of Turkish parents from New Jersey, who now lives in Los Angeles, has become a notorious voice in American politics. With 3.1 million followers on Twitch, a live video platform otherwise known primarily for gaming, and millions more on YouTube, Tiktok & Co., he is one of the most successful political streamers in the world. Under the name "HasanAbi" he criticizes the influence of lobby organizations, inequality in the USA, but above all Israel's war in Gaza - and sometimes with rather harsh words. E is the left-wing enfant terrible of the US streamer scene.

It is frowned upon by right-wing, Republican and centrist Democrats. Donald Trump called Piker a “communist agitator,” and Democratic House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries called Piker’s Israel comments “dangerous and anti-Semitic.” Even Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lashed out against the streamer in his speech to the UN General Assembly in September.

The reason: the self-confessed anti-Zionist Piker likes to exceed what was long considered the limit of what could be said in the USA. He once called Mao Zedong a “great leader,” and he described Hamas as the lesser evil and “a thousand times better” than Israel. He has since apologized for his statement in 2019 that the USA “deserved 9/11”. He rejects accusations of anti-Semitism and instead passes them back to his critics: They would equate Israel with Judaism.

If you want to classify all of this, you need a long breath. Because Piker says a lot when the day is long. The broadly built, glasses wearer sometimes streams eight hours a day, seven days a week. In addition to quite astute political analysis, he delivers a lot of exaggeration and provocation. Piker, who is usually seen in wide-cut suits and sometimes spoons Asian noodles out of the to-go box in front of the camera, addresses an audience that until recently was flocking to the arms of the Republicans: they are under 30, male and heterosexual. When his channel isn't about politics, it's about video games or strength training.

Piker calls himself a “Marxist.” Many of his domestic policy demands are not very radical: health insurance for all, a tax on the rich and public housing. He hardly seems to have any problems with the capital he makes from his Twitch subscriptions. Even though his almost three million dollar house in West Hollywood has earned him some criticism from his followers. “I would rather be a rich socialist than a poor bastard defending capitalism,” Piker once said in a stream.

Being supported by him is a mixed blessing. Ahead of the midterms on November 3, Democrats and Republicans are outdoing each other in calling on all candidates with whom Piker sympathizes to distance themselves from him. This was already the case with New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani. Now the Senate candidate from Michigan, Abdul El Sayed, is among those affected. Both of them did this half-heartedly, because it's not worth openly turning away from him: he's too influential for that.

You don't have to like Hasan Piker, neither his political stance nor his self-promotional manner. But he obviously hits a nerve in a country in which many people, especially young people, now look very critically at Israel - and at billionaires like Donald Trump.