Charlie Kirk, the architect of Turning Point USA, a political powerhouse that combined influencing, fundraising and grassroots organizing for a new generation of conservatives, is dead.
Kirk, 31, was killed by a sniper’s bullet at a political event in Orem, Utah, on Sept. 10. He was shot on the campus of Utah Valley University, one of many colleges where he had spent time working to bring young people into the conservative fold.
He was a major figure on the political right and an influential figure in President Donald Trump’s orbit. Kirk was credited with boosting turnout for Trump’s successful 2024 campaign.
In the past decade, the Arizona-based organization that Kirk built from scratch as a teenager became a political force.
In an Oval Office address, Trump said, “This is a dark moment for America.”
“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. He fought for liberty, democracy, justice and the American people,” Trump said. “He’s a martyr for truth and freedom, and there’s never been anyone who was so respected by youth.”
Kirk was married to Arizona native Erika Frantzve Kirk, a winner of the Miss Arizona USA pageant. The couple have two young children, a daughter born in 2022 and a son born in 2024.
A right-wing provocateur, Kirk was known to push the envelope. He thrived online as a fiery debater eager to defend his conservative views.
His reach was remarkable ― Kirk’s talk show reached an audience of more than 1 million people per day, according to Turning Point. He had 5.4 million followers on X and nearly 3.9 million subscribers on YouTube. His podcast was downloaded more than 120 million times last year, the organization said.
Kirk was answering a question about mass shootings during an outdoor Turning Point USA event when he was shot in the neck, according to Utah Valley University officials. A suspect had not been identified as of the evening of Sept. 10, according to FBI Director Kash Patel.
Political leaders on both sides of the aisle condemned the shooting and encouraged prayers for Kirk and his family. Utah GOP Gov. Spencer Cox called the attack a political assassination, and Trump cast blame on the media and the “radical left.”
“It is with a heavy heart that we confirm that Charles James Kirk has been murdered by a gunshot,” Turning Point said in a written statement. “May he be received into the merciful arms of our loving Savior, who suffered and died for Charlie. We ask that everyone keep his family and loved ones in your prayers.”
‘Behind closed doors, he is Daddy’
Months before his death, Erika Kirk described her husband as a devoted father who loved the work he did.
“It’s not a career to him. It’s a calling,” she said during a Turning Point Action speech that she posted to Instagram in June.
“Behind the podium, he’s a fighter. But behind closed doors, he is Daddy,” she said. “He is the love of my life, and I find it so incredible that my children, our children, get to watch him be the man who God has called him to be so fearlessly and so boldly.”
Erika Kirk often posted photos and videos of her husband playing with their kids, showing him on the beach, attending baseball games and skipping rocks with them. In one clip, Kirk’s 3-year-old daughter ran into his arms when he came backstage after speaking at a Turning Point event.
Kirk, too, spoke often about the importance of being married and having children.
“Having a family will change your life in the best ways, so get married and have kids. You won’t regret it,” he wrote on his daughter’s third birthday.
Kirk founded Turning Point USA as a teenager
Kirk, who grew up in Prospect Heights, Illinois, was the son of a father who was an architect and a mother who was a mental health counselor. He grew interested in politics when a teacher criticized President George W. Bush, which led him to read economist Milton Friedman and become a conservative, according to the Chicago Tribune.
One of Kirk’s early forays into politics was over the price of cookies at Wheeling High School, where he was a student, according to the Tribune. Kirk organized a successful boycott after the school cafeteria raised the price of cookies.
He also volunteered for the campaign of former Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Illinois. (They were not related, despite their shared last name.) From there, Kirk and his friends formed a group to highlight the national debt.
Kirk was 18 when he founded Turning Point USA with the late Tea Party activist Bill Montgomery in 2012. The group received early funding from the late GOP donor Foster Friess, among others.
Montgomery heard Kirk speak in April 2012 and encouraged him to forgo college and spend his time reaching out to young people about conservative politics instead.
Kirk, a high school athlete, dreamed of going to the United States Military Academy at West Point. When he didn’t get accepted, he briefly attended Harper College and then dropped out to pursue his political ambitions.
Montgomery helped Kirk raise the money to grow Turning Point USA, which now has a presence on more than 3,500 high school and college campuses and counts 650,000 lifetime student members among its ranks.
In 2019, Kirk founded the affiliated group Turning Point Action to help elect conservatives.
Kirk began to appear as a pundit on networks including Fox News and CNBC, and his profile started to rise.
Over the years, Kirk entered Trump circles. He became close with the president’s son, Donald Trump Jr., during the 2016 presidential campaign.
Kirk was a speaker at the 2016 Republican National Convention and spoke again at the conventions in 2020 and 2024.
Turning Point Action was a major player in Trump’s get-out-the-vote operation in the 2024 presidential election. Kirk and Donald Trump Jr. were among those who advocated for the president to select now-Vice President JD Vance as his running mate in 2024.
“Charlie wasn’t just a friend — he was like a little brother to me — and to millions of people around the world — he was a true inspiration. He was one of the most courageous, principled men I’ve ever known, and he lived every day with purpose,” Donald Trump Jr. said on X. “His faith in God was unshakable, his love for Erika was inspiring, and the way he adored and cared for his two beautiful kids showed the kind of man he truly was.”
Kirk hosted Trump at a Turning Point conference in Phoenix in December, where the president praised his role in turning out voters in the November election.
In Arizona, Turning Point and Kirk have been credited with helping to shift Arizona’s state Republican Party to the right. Kirk and his organization faced criticism for repeating false claims the 2020 election was stolen and for stances he took during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Kirk authored several books, including “Time for a Turning Point: Setting a Course Toward Free Markets and Limited Government for Future Generations,” which he co-wrote with Brent Hamachek in 2016.
His most recent book, “Right Wing Revolution: How to Beat the Woke and Save the West,” was published in 2024.
‘You don’t think someone could have that sort of impact at 31’
Turning Point donor Patty Chandler first met Kirk in 2021, when he was passing through Chicago, where Chandler lived at the time. He invited her to dinner with a small group.
Kirk didn’t come with an agenda, Chandler said. Instead, he let her guide the conversation about the issues that mattered to her.
It was a tactic he would use on camera, often letting his interlocutor make the first assertion in his viral debate videos. It was also his behind-the-scenes approach to building relationships with politicians and donors, Chandler said.
“That has been so much of his effectiveness,” she said.
Chandler remembered Kirk as someone who cherished his wife and relished being a father to two young kids.
Turning Point’s political fundraising wing was a risk for Kirk — it marked a new approach outside on-the-ground organizing — but it would go on to become a core part of Republicans’ 2024 campaign apparatus.
“Rather than wait for someone else to fill it, he took the step to move it forward,” Chandler said. “You don’t think someone could have that sort of impact at 31.”
Young people mourn loss outside Turning Point headquarters
Outside the Turning Point movement’s Phoenix headquarters, solemn individuals and young families with children dropped off flowers, shed tears and embraced one another in the hours after Kirk’s slaying.
Strangers called each other “brother” and “sister” and knelt to pray, asking God to heal and comfort Kirk’s wife and their children.
They shared how Kirk’s unapologetic willingness to speak his mind gave them the confidence to stand proudly in their faith and morals. Many of them said they had seen Kirk speak, or caught one of the hats he had tossed and felt like they had known him.
Former Republican Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio recalled meeting Kirk when he was a teenager.
“I will never forget my first encounter with Charlie when I spoke before the San Diego Republican Club years ago when he was 18 years old at the time. I invited him to join me in confronting the large group of demonstrators against me present at the event. He did not hesitate!” Arpaio said in a news release offering condolences to Kirk’s family and supporters.
Conservative commentator Ben Shapiro mourned Kirk’s death on social media, noting that he, too, was impressed when he met an 18-year-old Kirk. The longtime allies appeared together at the conference in December.
“It was a privilege to watch this principled man stand up for his beliefs and create the single most important conservative political organization in America. But more importantly, Charlie was a good man, a man who believed in right and wrong, who stood by his Biblical values. All of us will miss him, and I can’t imagine the pain of his beautiful young family, and we must all pray for them,” Shapiro said.
Shapiro said he would fight for an America where people can speak and debate without fearing political violence.
“We must pick up the baton where Charlie left it, fighting for the things he believed in so passionately. And we must fight for a better America ― an America where good people can speak truth and debate passionately without fear of a bullet. I weep for Charlie’s family, and I weep for my country today. Most of all, I weep for Charlie,” Shapiro said.
“Charlie. My friend. I’m heartbroken,” Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Arizona, said in a statement. “Rest now.”
Fatally shot: Charlie Kirk, Turning Point USA founder, dead after shooting in Utah
Republic reporter Taylor Seely contributed to this article.
Stephanie Murray covers national politics and the Trump administration for The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com. Reach her via email at stephanie.murray@gannett.com and on X, Bluesky, TikTok and Threads @stephanie_murr.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Charlie Kirk, killed on Utah college campus, was political powerhouse