MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
This week was supposed to mark the beginning of Charlie Kirk's latest national college tour. The influencer, activist and Trump ally made Utah Valley University his first stop Wednesday, where he took questions from a crowd, including this one.
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UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: Do you know how many mass shooters there have been in America over the last 10 years?
CHARLIE KIRK: Counting or not counting gang violence?
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
That question about mass shooters was the final one that Kirk took before he was shot. Authorities confirmed his death a short time later. Charlie Kirk was a significant figure in the conservative movement, far more than a social media influencer. He built an organization on hundreds of college campuses. And he held many events on campus, like the one yesterday. He invited students to challenge his political views in what he called Prove Me Wrong debates.
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KIRK: All right, we're going to have some fun today. If you guys disagree, you're welcome to the front. That's a big crowd. It keeps on going. Look at that crowd.
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MARTIN: Kirk had millions of followers across his social media platforms and consistently got millions of views on his YouTube channel. He was hailed by many conservatives for drawing young people to the Republican Party, who said they liked what they saw as his honesty and willingness to say things they felt but couldn't openly say. Others found his views offensive, even hateful.
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KIRK: Are you comfortable with both London and New York having Muslim mayors? I'm sorry, I think we should have a little bit of caution with that. That doesn't feel right.
INSKEEP: On another occasion, Kirk said there should be no exceptions for abortions, even in cases of rape.
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UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: No, no, no.
KIRK: Wouldn't it be a better story...
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: No, it wouldn't.
KIRK: ...To say something evil happened and we do something good in the face of evil?
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: No.
INSKEEP: He said that transgender people are not real.
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KIRK: A woman is an adult female with XX chromosomes.
INSKEEP: And he asserted that former Vice President Kamala Harris was a, quote, "DEI candidate" when she was picked as Joe Biden's running mate in 2020, chosen, he said, because she is a Black woman.
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KIRK: She ran San Francisco poorly. And she was chosen as a VP because she was a Black woman.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: She didn't...
MARTIN: Kirk also advocated for the right to carry weapons, as he did at this Turning Point USA faith event in 2023.
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KIRK: I think it's worth 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. That is a prudent deal. It is rational. Nobody talks like this. They live in a complete alternate universe.
INSKEEP: Kirk was 31 and had a career of influence far more than a decade even at that age. President Trump addressed his death in a video message Wednesday night.
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PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Charlie was a patriot who devoted his life to the cause of open debate and the country that he loved so much, the United States of America.
INSKEEP: NPR's Stephen Fowler covers the Republican Party, and he's next. Stephen, how did Kirk fit into the political ecosystem?
STEPHEN FOWLER, BYLINE: It is impossible to overstate the importance of Kirk to an entire generation of young conservatives, and to Republican politicians that benefited from those young conservatives showing up to vote. You could call him many things, an influencer, grassroots organizer, business executive, author, radio show host, an all-around avatar for politically active online and offline Gen Z Americans. When he was 18, just months before President Obama was reelected, he cofounded the group Turning Point USA as this sort of college campus free speech nonprofit. Here's how he described it last year.
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KIRK: I had the crazy and wild idea as I was driving home from Rockford, Illinois. A lot of things went into this. And I said, that's it. I want to try to start a youth organization to try and save Western civilization.
FOWLER: In the years since, it's grown to be an integral part of the Republican Party, with annual summits, expanded outreach to faith leaders, voter registration initiatives and a big seat at the table when it comes to the shaping discussion about policy and its impact on young people.
INSKEEP: And then what brought him to the campus in Utah?
FOWLER: This was the first stop of 15 planned American Comeback Tour events at college campuses around the country. And one of the signature things he did were these big outdoor debates, where Charlie Kirk would actually face off against people who are ideologically, and in some cases morally, opposed to his views that were sometimes provocative and inflammatory. And he would make content out of these dialogues.
Kirk and Turning Point were the smashmouth front line of the Republican Party's culture war. And at times he did weather controversy. He courted far-right figures on his podcast and made comments denigrating transgender people, vaccines, the 2020 election and so much more. He also delivered a made-for-social-media rebuke of President Biden's economic vision at last year's Republican National Convention.
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KIRK: The basic things our parents enjoyed are increasingly out of reach for Gen Z and millennials. You see, the American dream has become a luxury item for the wealthy elite.
FOWLER: He was close with President Trump and actually remained one of the president's advisers and figures who stayed by his side when Trump was out of power.
INSKEEP: We've already heard a little bit, but let's listen here. What did the president say about the news of Kirk's death?
FOWLER: Well, Trump did announce Kirk's death on his social media site and quickly ordered flags to be flown at half-staff. That's something that's typically utilized for figures of national importance to signify a period of mourning. Here's some more of that video message from last night.
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TRUMP: It's long past time for all Americans and the media to confront the fact that violence and murder are the tragic consequence of demonizing those with whom you disagree day after day, year after year in the most hateful and despicable way possible.
FOWLER: But the president went on to blame, quote, "radical left political violence," though we don't know anything about the shooter or the motive. He also listed a number of attacks against Republicans, including the assassination attempt on his life last year, and didn't mention violence against Democrats, like this summer's assassination of the Minnesota House speaker.
INSKEEP: NPR's Stephen Fowler. Thanks so much.
FOWLER: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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