BBC producer faces backlash for post describing Charlie Kirk’s widow as 'Zionist handler'

Jayne Egerton, a BBC Radio 4 producer, is facing a backlash for reposting a controversial post that described Charlie Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk, as his “Zionist handler,” Jewish News UK reported. 

The post was originally written by the feminist activist Sasha S. Graham.

“Erica is not some ‘strong figure,’” Graham argued in her post. “She was Charlie’s Zionist handler who only exists in his sphere to redirect her husband’s organization into a politically acceptable organization. Her history tells the story of a traitor. Hell, she married a male supremacist,” Graham claimed without elaborating. 

According to Jewish News UK, Egerton reposted the post in "Actual Gender Critical Left," a female-only Facebook group with 2,300 members, where she is a moderator. The group says it is “open to all persons of the female sex, including trans men, and non-binary, detransitioned, and re-identified women.” Furthermore, the group stresses that it rejects “all alliances, collaboration, and coordination with organizations of the religious right or white nationalist/xenophobic right.”

Following the controversial post, the BBC contacted the group, which reportedly changed to a restricted “private membership.” The controversy also prompted Egerton to resign from her role as a group moderator. 

However, this is reportedly not the first anti-Jewish controversy linked to Egerton. In July, Jewish News UK reported that Egerton had published a post in the group titled “Debunked: A Reckoning with Zionist Charges in Contemporary Left Discourse.” The piece blasted individuals who backed the Jewish state in the name of feminism. The authors of the text claimed that they intend to “arm anti-Zionist feminists with a useful toolkit of information.”

Egerton responded approvingly by describing the controversial content as “impressive and deserving of circulation.”

The group where Egerton served as a moderator until recently has also published posts that accuse the Jewish state of “pinkwashing,” a reference to using LGBTQ+ rights in Israel to present a positive image of the Jewish state. Israel is the only country in the Middle East with Pride parades and especially Tel Aviv has become internationally known as a LGBTQ tolerant city. 

Jewish News UK also noted that the group published a controversial post about Harry Potter writer J.K. Rowling with the title “Feminism, Zionism and the Death of Truth.” The post included antisemitic comments that compared Israel to Nazi Germany and accused the Jewish state of “ethnic cleansing.” 

Egerton also shared another post that addressed the so-called “femi-genocide” in Gaza, adding "the scale and nature of the crimes inflicted on Palestinian women and girls by Israeli forces are so extreme that existing legal and criminal frameworks can no longer adequately describe or capture them.”

Following the latest controversy with Egerton, Jewish News UK quoted an unnamed BBC spokesperson who vowed to react to any breaches of the company’s social media guidance rules. 

“We take allegations of breaches of our social media guidance very seriously. We do not comment on individual staff matters; however, if we find breaches, we take the appropriate action.”

Evangelical Christian Charlie Kirk, who founded the conservative non-profit organization TurningPoint USA, was assassinated last month at a speaking arrangement in Utah. 

Kirk was praised as a “Lion-hearted friend of Israel” and his support for the Jewish state was motivated by his love for the Bible and Jesus.