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Daily Wire's Matt Walsh Says All Anime is "Satanic"

Right-wing political commentator, podcast host, and Daily Wire columnist Matt Walsh answered submitted questions in a livestream on Monday. One question asked Walsh what his thoughts were on anime. Walsh, who has previously appeared on Tucker Carlson Tonight, The Ingraham Angle, and Fox and Friends, responded that he thinks all anime is satanic.

Walsh stated he didn't have an argument for why animation produced in Japan is satanic, just the medium "seems that way" to him. He added that he thinks anime is "bizarre" and "creepy." He followed up that outside of rare exceptions, he doesn't think adults should be watching cartoons at all.

Fans didn't take the criticism lying down. Walsh responded on his Twitter account, "I'm catching some heat because I said that anime is satanic. I just want to clarify that yes it will literally lead to demonic possession in upwards of 87 percent of cases, studies show."

Anime has occasionally crossed paths with American politics. Republican strategist Rick Wilson likened Donald Trump supporters as "childless single men who masturbate to anime" in 2016. Republican representative Paul Gosar posted a political parody of Attack on Titan's first opening sequence that featured his political rivals as Titans who are then killed. The video led to Representative Gosar's censure and removal from committee assignments last year. Former president Donald Trump's son, Eric Trump, posted a tweet in 2020 insinuating that Google is manipulating Americans to associate mobs with anime after image results for "mob" showed characters and screenshots from Mob Psycho 100.