AUSTIN, Texas — Student Democrats at the University of Texas at Austin spent weeks promoting Hasan Piker’s Wednesday appearance at the school, boasting a standing-room-only crowd for the leftist podcaster.
But when Piker took the stage, about half the seats in the William C. Powers Student Activity Center were empty. University Democrats had said more than 2,400 people RSVPed or joined a waitlist. That crowd did not show.
Outside, Austin Young Republicans held a demonstration in front of a statue of George Washington. In a letter to school administrators, the group said that Piker was advancing a communist ideology that was incompatible with American liberty.
Benjamin Shrader, chair of Austin Young Republicans, told The Daily Wire that the school was initially receptive. That changed the morning of the protest, when the school informed the group it would pursue criminal trespassing charges against its hired security guards.
The Young Republicans stayed. Security never showed.
The Daily Wire and others who said they had tickets were denied entry and told the room was overcrowded. But footage recorded inside by a University of Texas student and Turning Point USA chapter member who was allowed in showed about half the seats empty.
Piker, a commentator and Twitch streamer, has risen to prominence in recent months due to his association with Michigan Democrat Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed. Critics have called on El-Sayed to disavow Piker for a number of extreme statements, including the claim that the United States deserved the September 11 attacks.
Shrader said Piker “represents the new Left” and that Democrats cannot cut him loose. He also criticized Piker’s framing of Hamas terrorists as resistance fighters battling Israeli oppression.
“If the Jewish community put down their weapons, Israel would cease to exist,” he said. “If the Palestinian community, those that are participating in this terror, put down their weapons, there would be peace.”
Austin Young Republicans member and commentator Ben Williams invited Piker to formally debate him at the Austin event. He also sent the invitation to the University Democrats, which said they were not interested in hosting a debate, and to the Austin For Palestine Coalition, which on September 25 told Williams to “Go f*ck yourself.”
“I debate a lot of communists,” Williams said. “So I figured, since Hasan is coming to my city, I should issue a debate challenge to him, which I did with the Austin Young Republicans. Unfortunately, he wasn’t down with it.”
Kyle Hayes, speaking for the American Communist Party’s Central Texas chapter, told The Daily Wire he came to talk to Piker’s audience. He called Piker “a bit of a watered-down version of what a real leftist looks like,” brushing off the 9/11 remark as “a dumb example of him speaking.”
Asked about Piker’s defense of communist rulers like Mao Zedong and Fidel Castro, Hayes said that the reported death counts under the Chinese and Cuban leaders are inflated.
“There’s a lot of money on the line to make sure that we don’t take any examples from figures and movements and history that successfully won a class war,” Hayes said, claiming that people were better off under both Mao and Castro than under President Donald Trump. Hayes also claimed that aggressive anti-communism was “a mental disease.”
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