Courtesy of AP News
On Sept. 10, 31-year-old conservative activist Charlie Kirk was shot and killed at Utah Valley University, where he was speaking at the America Comeback Tour hosted by Turning Point USA (TPUSA).
The shooting occurred during a discussion with an attendee referencing the tragic shooting at a Minneapolis Catholic school that left two children dead and 21 others injured. The attendee questioned Kirk on the subject of gun violence, asking him if he knew how many transgender Americans have been mass shooters over the last 10 years. Kirk responded, “too many,” and the crowd cheered. The attendee then asked, “Do you know how many mass shooters there have been in America over the last 10 years?” Kirk replied, “Counting or not counting gang violence?” A single shot was then fired, fatally hitting Kirk in the neck. As of Sept. 19, the suspect in the shooting, 22-year-old Utah resident, Tyler Robinson, has been taken into custody.
Following the fatal shooting at Utah Valley University, reactions and effects rippled across college campuses in America. Many historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) have received safety threats, prompting Virginia State University in Petersburg, Virginia to enact a lockdown.
President Donald Trump ordered flags to fly half-mast at public institutions, an order that was reaffirmed by Gov. Tina Kotek who ordered all Oregon public institutions to fly flags at half-mast until sunset on Sept. 14. Lewis & Clark followed suit, despite being a private institution.
Lori Friedman, LC’s vice president of communications, commented on the college’s decision to fly the flag at half-mast through Sept. 15 in a statement to The Mossy Log.
“It is the college’s protocol to align our flag practices with those of the Oregon Governor’s which is what we did in this case. There was a delay in putting it back up to full staff due to the construction,” the statement read.
Kirk was a co-founder of Turning Point USA (TPUSA), a nonprofit organization that aims to organize young conservatives in high schools and colleges across the country.
Kirk became a close friend and ally to Trump, who called him a “conservative boy wonder.” Voter turnout of young, college-aged men in the 2024 election of Trump has largely been credited to Kirk and TPUSA.
“He didn’t just help us win in 2024, he helped us staff the entire government,” Vice President JD Vance wrote in a eulogy posted to social media. Trump has pledged to posthumously award Kirk the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Kirk was an avid defender of gun rights. At a 2023 TPUSA Faith event in Salt Lake City, Kirk spoke on his firm belief in the Second Amendment.
“I think it’s worth it. I think it’s worth it to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second Amendment to protect our other God-given rights,” Kirk said.
The assassination of Kirk adds to the growth of political violence in America since the Jan. 6 insurrection in 2021, with Reuters identifying more than 300 such cases. This trend marks the most severe surge in political violence since the 1970s.
Utah Gov. Spencer Cox said, “This is certainly about the tragic death, assassination, political assassination of Charlie Kirk, but it is also much bigger than an attack on an individual. It is an attack on all of us. It is an attack on the American experiment. It is an attack on our ideals.”
Politicians across the aisle have made statements denouncing Kirk’s assassination.
Gavin Newsom, the Democratic Gov. of California, shared on X, “The attack on Charlie Kirk is disgusting, vile, and reprehensible. In the United States of America, we must reject political violence in every form.”
Jesse Watters, a Fox News anchor, shared his thoughts on air.
“They are at war with us … What are we going to do about it?” Jesse said. “We are going to avenge Charlie’s death in the way that Charlie wanted to be avenged.”
This incident comes in a recent wave of high-profile political violence. On June 14, Minnesota House of Representatives Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband were stalked and killed by a gunman disguising himself as law enforcement. Trump has been the target of numerous assassination attempts — first at a Pennsylvania rally on July 13, 2024, and again at a golf club in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Sept. 14.
Kirk’s death has been met with varying reactions — some on the political left have celebrated, and some on the political right, like Fox News’ Watters, promised to seek retribution. Across the nation, educators and journalists alike have been disciplined or fired after allegedly sharing opinions on Kirk’s assassination.
While these reactions have received mounting news coverage, the overwhelming response to Kirk’s assassination has been one of compassion and shared desire to put an end to all political violence. “The scourge of gun violence and political violence must end,” Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wrote, “The shooting of Charlie Kirk is the latest incident of this chaos and it must stop. We cannot go down this road.”
In his 2018 book, “Campus Battlefield,” Kirk wrote, “What we have to get back to is being able to have a reasonable disagreement where violence is not an option.”
On Sep. 16, Tyler Robinson was charged with aggravated murder. A conviction would be punishable by the death penalty, life in prison, or life without parole for 25 years. Though Robinson’s trial is still in its preliminary stages, prosecutors say they will seek the death penalty.
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