The Campaign Against Hasan Piker Is About Crushing the Left
Centrist groups like Third Way are trying to cancel the popular progressive streamer as part of their campaign to ‘reduce far-left influence and infrastructure.’ Why are top Democrats joining in?
Donald Trump is leading a horrifying ethnic-cleansing campaign, gutting the Constitution, and trying to give himself king-like powers. He’s leading an illegal and reckless war against Iran, in partnership with Israel, that’s immiserating so many people here and abroad.
Meanwhile, prominent Democrats – ranging from elected members of Congress, to 2026 Senate candidates, to likely 2028 presidential hopefuls – are spending their time condemning Hasan Piker, the left-wing streamer and influencer, as part of a cancellation campaign spearheaded by Third way, the centrist think tank.
Third Way, which is funded by billionaires and corporate interests, has been quite open about its broader goal and ongoing campaign to marginalize the left. “We will be the chief opponent of the left in the 2028 Democratic presidential primary,” the organization’s president, Jon Cowan, recently pledged. Asked to define the kind of lefty candidates Third Way doesn’t like, he pinpointed pols who “are for Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, abolishing ICE, open borders.”
Cowan told the New York Times that Third Way will “probably spend $30 million to $50 million” toward this campaign over the next few years.
In a memo last year, Third Way advised Democrats to build “a moderate Democratic infrastructure, including media, talent pipelines, and communications networks.” And it urged Dems to “reduce far-left influence and infrastructure,” neither of which meaningfully exists yet in US politics.
Third Way is targeting Piker as part of a broader effort to keep the Democratic Party under the control of big corporations, the ultra-wealthy, and supporters of Israel, no matter what the party’s base wants.