Glenn Beck

Glenn Beck claims he doesn't hate Islam, just its "evil" extremists, but during his eponymous CNN Headline News show and the Glenn Beck Program--the third highest-rated national radio talk show among adults ages 25 to 54 (CNN.com)--he has repeatedly associated Islam with Nazism. He drew a parallel between Mein Kampf and "jihad" because, he said, both mean "my struggle" (Glenn Beck, 11/17/06), and he has warned (Glenn Beck, 7/12/06) of "World War III and the impending apocalypse," declaring that "whether you like it or not, this is a religious war. Radical Muslims want to wipe everybody else off the face of the earth."

Beck reserves some hate-talk even for "good" Muslims (Glenn Beck Program, 8/10/06):

All you Muslims who have sat on your frickin' hands the whole time and have not been marching in the streets and have not been saying, "Hey, you know what? There are good Muslims and bad Muslims. We need to be the first ones in the recruitment office lining up to shoot the bad Muslims in the head." I'm telling you, with God as my witness... human beings are not strong enough, unfortunately, to restrain themselves from putting up razor wire and putting you on one side of it.... When people become hungry, when people see that their way of life is on the edge of being over, they will put razor wire up and just based on the way you look or just based on your religion, they will round you up. Is that wrong? Oh my gosh, it is Nazi, World War II wrong, but society has proved it time and time again: It will happen.

Beck had made earlier allusions to putting Muslims in concentration camps, predicting in 2006 (Glenn Beck, 9/5/06): "In 10 years, Muslims and Arabs will be looking through a razor wire fence at the West."

Beck has asked Muslim guests to distinguish themselves from Islamic terrorists. "I mean, you're reasonable," he said to Sharida McKenzie, organizer of a Muslim Peace March (Glenn Beck, 10/4/07). "How do we know the difference between you and those that are trying to kill us?"

When Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, appeared on his show (Glenn Beck, 11/14/06), Beck said: "I have been nervous about this interview with you, because what I feel like saying is, 'Sir, prove to me that you are not working with our enemies.'" Beck added: "I'm not accusing you of being an enemy, but that's the way I feel, and I think a lot of Americans will feel that way."

Commenting on ABC News (Good Morning America, 5/23/07) on a Pew Research Center public opinion poll of American Muslims, which, according to Pew's report ("American Muslims: Middle Class and Mostly Mainstream," 5/22/07) showed" absolute levels of support for Islamic extremism among Muslim Americans are quite low, especially when compared with Muslims around the world," Beck stated that the findings showed that "the seeds of destruction are being planted."

Although Beck apologized for the remark (Reliable Sources, 3/18/07), he continues to display anti-Muslim sentiment on his radio and television programs, through his magazine Fusion and as an occasional source on ABC News.