Hedges has described himself as a
socialist and an
anarchist. His books
Death of the Liberal Class and
Empire of Illusion are strongly critical of
American liberalism. Hedges's 2007 book
American Fascists describes the
fundamentalist Christian right in the United States as a
fascist movement. In March 2008, Hedges published the book ''I Don't Believe in Atheists'', in which he argues that
new atheism presents a danger that is similar to religious extremism. In November 2016, following the election of Donald Trump as next US President, Hedges' predicted in Truthdig: "The repression of dissents will soon resemble the repression under past totalitarian regimes. State security will become an invasive and palpable presence. The most benign forms of opposition will be treated as if they are a threat to national security. Many, hoping to avoid the wrath of the state, will become compliant and passive."
Russian invasion of Ukraine In March 2022, Hedges condemned Russia's aggression as criminal and criticized
NATO's expansion as a dangerous and predictable provocation that baited Russia to initiate a conflict. Hedges called for Russia's withdrawal, an immediate ceasefire and moratorium on arms shipments to Ukraine. He later stated that the invasion was "set to become a lengthy
war of attrition, one funded and backed by an increasingly bellicose United States." Hedges criticized the $40 billion aid package for Ukraine in a May 2022 piece, which he says demonstrates that the United States is "trapped in the death spiral of unchecked militarism" as the country "rots, morally, politically, economically, and physically," with no real plans to address the epidemic of
mass shootings, decaying infrastructure, lack of
universal health-care, rising
income inequality,
student debt,
child poverty and the
opioid epidemic. In his 2022 book
The Greatest Evil is War, Hedges wrote that "Russia has every right to feel threatened, betrayed, and angry. But to understand is not to condone. The invasion of Ukraine, under post-Nuremberg laws, is a criminal war of aggression." Hedges accused online social networks of censoring those who opposed the "dominant narrative on Ukraine", and criticized the decision to remove
Scott Ritter from Twitter for providing the "counter-narrative" that the
Bucha massacre was perpetrated by Ukrainian national police rather than the
Russian Armed Forces.
Israel’s Genocide in Gaza In late 2023 and early 2024, Hedges gave lectures on the
Gaza genocide, dedicated episodes of his show
The Chris Hedges Report to the topic, and appeared as a guest on the
Mark Steiner Show. He believes that, since Zionism's early days, its goals were the possession of all of
Mandatory Palestine and the extermination of the Palestinian people. He states that the end game of Netanyahu's ruling coalition is to permanently destroy the idea of a
State of Palestine, to be accomplished through acts of
genocide and
ethnic cleansing. He cites the withholding of food, water, medicine, and the bombing of hospitals, during the war as examples of such acts. He states that Israel, with the rise to power of the ultranationalist Jewish-supremacist far-right, which he calls the heirs to
Meir Kahane, as evidence of Israel having developed into a fully fascist, hate-filled,
Jewish-supremacist apartheid state. Furthermore, he predicts that the state will continue to pursue its transformation into an ethnoreligiously pure state with the expulsion of all Palestinians, including even
Israeli citizens of Palestinian ethnicity. Hedges criticizes the "total support" for the Israeli narrative shown by former U.S. President Biden, the U.S. government, and U.S. and European media. Examples of such "total support" include providing military support and voting down cease-fire proposals in the
United Nations. He supports the
BDS movement, ending aid to and sanctioning Israel. Hedges argues that Israel's genocide of Palestinians has "signed its own death sentence" with respect to its "social capital", losing its "facade of civility, its supposed vaunted respect for rule of law and democracy, its mythical story of the courageous Israeli military and miraculous birth of the Jewish nation will lie in ash heaps". Hedges has argued that the impact of
population growth must be addressed, saying "all measures to thwart the degradation and destruction of our ecosystem will be useless if we do not cut population growth."
Occupy involvement Hedges appeared as a guest on an October 2011 episode of the
CBC News Network's ''
Lang and O'Leary Exchange'' to discuss his support for the
Occupy Wall Street protests; co-host
Kevin O'Leary criticized him, saying that he sounded "like a left-wing nutbar". Hedges said "it will be the last time" he appears on the show, and compared the CBC to
Fox News. CBC's ombudsman found O'Leary's heated remarks to be a violation of the public broadcaster's journalistic standards. On November 3, 2011, Hedges was arrested with others in New York City as part of the Occupy Wall Street demonstration, during which the activists staged a "people's hearing" on the activities of the investment bank
Goldman Sachs and blocked the entrance to their corporate headquarters.
NDAA lawsuit In 2012, after the
Obama administration signed the
National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), Hedges sued members of the US government, asserting that Section 1021 of the law unconstitutionally allowed presidential authority for indefinite detention without
habeas corpus. He was later joined in the suit,
Hedges v. Obama, by activists including
Noam Chomsky and
Daniel Ellsberg. In May 2012 Judge
Katherine B. Forrest of the Southern District of New York ruled that the counter-terrorism provision of the NDAA is unconstitutional. The Obama administration appealed the decision, and it was overturned in July 2013 by the
Second Circuit Court of Appeals. Hedges petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case, but the Supreme Court denied
certiorari in April 2014. Hedges was previously a plaintiff in
Clapper v. Amnesty International.
PEN America Chris Hedges reported in his The Chris Hedges Report website in March 2024, "In May 2013 I resigned from
PEN America over the appointment of former
State Department official
Suzanne Nossel. A decade later, PEN America has become a propaganda arm of the state." ==Personal life==