Prominent right-wing activist Charlie Kirk, the 31-year-old leader of Trump's organization Turning Point USA, was shot and killed on the campus of Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah, while answering questions from students under a gazebo. Videos circulating on social media show the bullet hitting him in the base of the neck, with the wound immediately beginning to bleed profusely as the meeting's attendees fled. Police arrested a suspect, who was later determined not to be the perpetrator. Kirk died after a brief hospital stay in critical condition.
Charlie Kirk, a legend in truth telling and fighting evil, has been shot while giving a speech at Utah Valley University (UVU) in Provo Utah. It looks as though he was shot in the neck… still waiting for details.
— Rusty Lindquist (@RustyLindquist) September 10, 2025
Turning Point USA is the youth voice of Donald Trump's MAGA (Make America Great Again) movement, and played an active role in the protests challenging the legitimacy of Joe Biden's 2020 election victory."In honor of Charlie Kirk, a truly great American patriot, I am ordering all American flags in the United States to be lowered at half-mast until Sunday evening at 6 p.m.," Donald Trump announced on Truth.
Kirk was in Utah to participate in a stop on the American Comeback Tour, organized by the local chapter of Turning Point. The event had sparked controversy within the university: an online petition to the university to prevent it had garnered nearly a thousand signatures, but the university defended itself by invoking the freedom of expression enshrined in the First Amendment to the US Constitution. The attack occurred approximately twenty minutes into the activist's speech: the gunman struck with a sniper rifle from the roof of a building nearly two hundred meters away. At the time of his death, Kirk was answering a question about transgender people who have committed mass shootings in the United States.
“The great, even legendary, Charlie Kirk is dead. No one understood or had the hearts of the youth of the United States better than Charlie. He was loved and admired by all, especially me, and now he is no longer with us. My heart goes out to his beautiful wife Erika and his family. Charlie, we love you!” Trump initially wrote in a post on his social media platform Truth. Immediately after the news of the attack, he asked his followers to “everyone pray” for Kirk, calling him “a great guy, from head to toe.” Vice President J.D. Vance also chimed in on X, resharing Trump’s post: “O Lord, grant him eternal rest,” he wrote.
