Sports journalist Jason Whitlock has caused quite a stir after comparing Black Lives Matter to the Ku Klux Klan during an appearance on the Fox News “Tucker Carlson Tonight” show Jan. 20.

“I compare Black Lives Matter to the KKK; I really do and some people don’t understand it, but if you go back to the 1860s after the Emancipation Proclamation, the KKK was started and it was the enforcement arm of the Democratic Party,” Whitlock said. “And what’s the enforcement arm of the Democratic Party right now? Black Lives Matter and Antifa. They will come to your home and violate your home, try to intimidate the people in your home if they disagree with you politically.”

Whitlock made the comments after he praised Carlson’s opening monologue criticizing Democrats and the left as “the most powerful, profound, poignant thing I’ve seen on television in 20 years.”

After adding every American citizen needed to hear it, Whitlock added, “We are in a scary time. American freedoms are being obliterated under the name of politics, under the guise of installing equality and they’re stripping us of our American freedoms.”

He went on to say the American public had been fed lies all summer “about the police killing Black people randomly.” Whitlock added Black people in particular have been “fooled” into believing Black Lives Matter was fighting a “war on white supremacy” but it is actually pushing “secular values” to maintain the control held by the “left and this power elite.”

“Black Lives Matter is a Marxist organization. Marxism is hostile towards religion. That’s why I’m glad you went there today,” Whitlock said. “These are atheist values being expressed from our leaders demonizing individual citizens here in America, branding them as white supremacists because we disagree with their opinion about something. This is lunacy and it’s dangerous.”

The IndyStar said it reached out to Whitlock after the interview and asked him to expound on his statements. He said because it was a “sensitive topic” he’d prefer to respond in an email. “Despite the sweet-sounding name, Black Lives Matter acts as a racial divider, no different from the KKK,” Whitlock told the IndyStar in an email.

He said like the KKK, Black Lives Matter was founded to undermine racial progress and terrorized its targets at night.

“Black Lives Matter and Antifa protests have primarily terrorized and destroyed property in (B)lack communities at night,” Whitlock’s email continued. “BLM and Antifa have attempted to intimidate white Republicans. BLM protests have been violent and caused the assassination of law enforcement officers and other citizens.” 

Doubling down on his comments in an op-ed on right-wing media outlet The Blaze, Whitlock said he stood fully by his words. “It’s a provocative and jarring analogy. It’s a comparison I truly believe,” Whitlock wrote. He then published what he said was his full email response to the IndyStar about the subject.

“My analogy is not far-fetched or hard to comprehend, particularly for the mainstream media. My analogy is far more substantive and accurate than pretending the events at the Capitol on January 6 were an armed insurrection analogous to Pearl Harbor and 9/11,” Whitlock wrote. “BLM, founded by self-described trained Marxists, has a stated goal of disrupting Western Civilization traditions and values.”

Many have criticized Whitlock for his words. Among them are historian and University of Notre Dame professor Richard Pierce and scientist Francis Enane, who responded to Whitlock with an op-ed of his own.

Pierce — who told IndyStar he would not take the time to describe all the ways Whitlock is wrong — called Whitlock’s words a “provocative, inflammatory screed.” Enane said “such comparisons are clearly disingenuous.”

“The KKK rioters commonly wore hoods to camouflage their identity and mimicked confederate general Nathan Bedford Forrest’s marauding practices honed during the Civil War. Their very anonymity added to their intimidation,” Pierce said, addressing Whitlock’s comparison that both groups terrorized communities at night. “Protesters, prior to COVID-19 safeguard measures, were mostly unmasked. I’ve never seen a hooded Black Lives Matter protester.” 

“BLM did not arise from a political leader or party affiliation. It is unbelievable that it needs to be said, but BLM is not a terrorist organization or a hate group; the KKK most certainly is,” Enane wrote before highlighting the extensive list of unarmed Black Americans who’d been killed at the hands of police. “Surely, Mr. Whitlock’s assertion that BLM events only happen during election cycles is contrary to this evidence. The idea that BLM events are divisive and violent is similarly not supported.”

Whitlock, who has previously worked as a co-host on Fox Sports as well as a columnist at ESPN, partnered with Clay Travis to start OutKick in 2020, a media site that covers sports and politics. He is unmoved by his critics.

“Whoever the left disagrees with gets painted as a white supremacist … It’s happened to me and I’m Black,” Whitlock said. “It’s my belief that the KKK and BLM share the same intent. They use race, intimidation, violence, and property destruction to achieve political goals on behalf of the Democratic Party.”