Charlie Kirk was a tireless champion of the First Amendment and the sacred right to free speech it protects. He led the charge for every American to speak freely, believe openly, and challenge authority without fear. In standing up to a ruthless faction that despised those freedoms, Charlie paid the ultimate price. He became a martyr for the first protection in the Bill of Rights.
To honor his courage and his life’s work, the Media Research Center (MRC) is proud to award the annual MRC Free Speech Award exclusively to Charlie Kirk.
In 2024, the MRC recognized 35 individuals and groups for their defense of free expression. There are again many worthy champions this year. But Charlie’s leadership, clarity, and sacrifice deserve singular recognition.
The MRC presents this award during Free Speech Week, a national celebration that reminds Americans what separates us from every other nation on earth. Without the right to speak freely, there can be no democracy, no Republic, no America. Yet we now live in a time when many citizens no longer believe in that right. Some even view the First Amendment as a danger to the nation itself.
Charlie saw that storm coming. He warned that the Left’s growing intolerance would not stop at censorship, but would escalate into the criminalization of “wrongthink.” He said, “Leftists in the Western world want to criminalize wrongthink&#8230; This can only end badly if we don’t stop it first.” Those words were not rhetoric. They were prophecy.
Charlie understood the connection between speech and civilization. He knew that free expression is not a privilege granted by government but a moral necessity that allows truth to prevail over power. He also recognized that the modern threat did not come from a single politician or newsroom, but from a coordinated network of tech companies, bureaucrats, and cultural elites seeking to control the flow of information.
Through MRC’s Free Speech America division, we exposed 57 censorship programs operating across 93 federal agencies during the Biden years. Some of those programs targeted Charlie and Turning Point USA directly. He fought back not with anger, but with reason and courage. He saw that Big Tech platforms such as Google, YouTube, Facebook, and X were no longer neutral conduits but ideological gatekeepers. He demanded that these corporations be treated as the publishers they had become, accountable for their choices and stripped of the immunity that shields their censorship.
Charlie was not motivated by partisanship. He was motivated by principle. As a man of faith, he saw free speech as an extension of free will — the God-given ability to think, speak, and act according to conscience. He knew that once a society loses the right to express truth, it soon loses the capacity to recognize it.
There are many who have continued this fight. President Donald Trump deserves special credit for reversing the Biden administration’s censorship directives and appointing officials who are restoring the First Amendment within government. Members of Congress, judges, and state leaders are carrying that same torch. But this year, one name stands above them all.
Charlie’s example must inspire our next steps. Congress should define the limits of Section 230 and end Big Tech’s abuse of it. The Trump administration should complete the work of dismantling every remaining censorship initiative. And states should act to protect consumers and elections from the tyranny of information control.
Charlie’s voice may be gone, but his conviction endures. The cause he gave his life for remains the cornerstone of the American experiment. It will only end if we fail to defend it.
Let’s not disappoint him.
* * *
David Bozell is president of the Media Research Center.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.
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Presidential Candidate Donald Trump Addresses Turning Point USA Summit

Why MRC’s Free Speech Award Belongs To Charlie Kirk Alone

Awards

Censorship

Charlie Kirk

First Amendment

Free Speech

Media Research Center

University of Maryland administrators told its Turning Point USA chapter that it may not be able to host a Daily Wire journalist on Wednesday, unless the chapter pays for extensive additional security.
The event, featuring Daily Wire Senior Editor Cabot Phillips, is virtually identical to the classes that occur every day on college campuses — except with an affable, center-right journalist at the head of the room instead of a cantankerous leftist professor.
That The Daily Wire has exposed not one, but two University of Maryland presidents for plagiarism — including the president of its flagship College Park campus, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/university-of-maryland-president-copied-rocket-science-paper-from-aussie-student" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Darryll Pines</a>, whose capitulation to Hamas supporters this publication has also chronicled — suggests that the college’s motives for the security requirement may be less than honorable.
Turning Point isn&#8217;t being charged for security because its members might be unruly. It&#8217;s because the university believes that its own students will commit ideologically motivated violence — and, instead of addressing that, it&#8217;s punishing their prospective victims. The group&#8217;s founder, Charlie Kirk, was assassinated on a college campus six weeks ago, ending a career dedicated to facilitating ideological diversity and open debate at universities.
Maryland has taken the wrong lesson from that assassination.
Conservatives make up the majority of the voting public, as evidenced by the most recent national popular vote. If being exposed to center-right ideas is so unusual for college students that it would trigger violent rage, that&#8217;s the issue. Coming across someone like Phillips on campus shouldn&#8217;t be cause for violence. It should be just another Wednesday.
The move continues a pattern of selective commitment to free speech for Pines, who vociferously defended an anti-Israel group&#8217;s right to mark the first anniversary of Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel, then threatened to<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/university-of-maryland-president-copied-rocket-science-paper-from-aussie-student" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> call the police</a> on a Jewish woman for complaining about it.
Jewish parents asked Pines, who is Black, to engage in a thought experiment: would he be as supportive if the KKK were burning crosses on campus? The analogy went right over his head, and in a twist of unfathomable irony, Pines banned all events that day because of what he suggested were anti-black threats and the prospect of violence by Jews. Then he paid the school&#8217;s Students for Justice in Palestine chapter, which proudly says it supports &#8220;armed struggle,&#8221; a<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/university-will-pay-100000-to-anti-israel-group-that-held-campus-rally-on-october-7" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> $100,000 settlement</a> when they filed suit over the cancellation.
His latest move suggests that it was a payoff to his allies, not a recognition of the need to preserve free speech.
Campus police told TPUSA that because of an &#8220;increase in threats related to Turning Point events,&#8221; police would staff the event, while TPUSA would be required to hire a security firm at its own expense to &#8220;conduct metal/weapons detection and bags checks upon entry.&#8221;
Lawyers from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) told the university that if increased security is required, &#8220;the law does not allow public institutions to shift this increased burden to the targeted group.&#8221;
“Doing so gives those most willing to engage in political violence the ability to silence or burden their opponents through the agency of the state. Raising costs on TPUSA in the wake of its leader&#8217;s assassination is a stark reminder of how literally deadly such a perverse incentive can be.&#8221;
In other words, UMD would be carrying water for terrorists.
&#8220;With the precedent UMD has set here, any student or community member could announce plans to disrupt a group&#8217;s campus event, and encourage others to do so, in the hope that UMD would respond by financially burdening the group,&#8221; FIRE wrote.
University of Maryland Associate General Counsel Christopher Lord replied with a denial that the fee was based on viewpoint. He said one of the factors the university uses to determine required security is &#8220;the history of similar events and/or of performer/speakers at other locations,&#8221; and invoked &#8220;the tragic assassination of Mr. Kirk.&#8221;
Lord also acknowledged that earlier this month, on October 7, the university bore the cost for hundreds of thousands of dollars for a &#8220;Boycott Israel fest,&#8221; as well as pro-Israel counter-protesters.
He said the university is more likely to cover costs for outdoor events due to a Fourth Circuit Court ruling deeming outdoor spaces &#8220;limited public forums.&#8221; That suggests that if the university has a commitment to free speech, it&#8217;s to the extent that a court forced it to, and that, ironically, it doesn&#8217;t apply in classrooms themselves. If a group like Turning Point wants to avoid fees, it can hold an event outdoors — like the sort at which Kirk was assassinated.
Making the situation all the more outlandish is that the Daily Wire personality at the center of this controversy, Cabot Phillips, is unaccustomed to being the center of controversy. Phillips is not an opinion commentator like Ben Shapiro or Michael Knowles; he is the genial and cheery personality at the center of news broadcasts like Morning Wire.
As Conor Clayton of the Maryland Turning Point chapter told us, Phillips is “not controversial.”
“It&#8217;s very strange that they would make this determination that there would be massive protests or threats,&#8221; Clayton said. Representatives for the University of Maryland and its parent organization didn&#8217;t respond when we asked if they could identify a single inflammatory statement by Phillips.
Given that Clayton told us that his chapter hosted another indoor event at a campus chapel, a vigil for Kirk, without being charged for security, that suggests that the Daily Wire’s involvement may be the critical wrinkle in this already sorry state of affairs.
Pines is currently under investigation for blatant plagiarism, which was <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/university-of-maryland-president-copied-rocket-science-paper-from-aussie-student" target="_blank" rel="noopener">exposed</a> by The Daily Wire’s Luke Rosiak. It has been more than a year since Pines admitted <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/university-of-maryland-president-copied-rocket-science-paper-from-aussie-student" target="_blank" rel="noopener">&#8220;recurrent language&#8221;</a> in an academic paper after it was unearthed by what he<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/university-of-maryland-president-acknowledges-recurrent-language-submits-to-plagiarism-review" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> called</a> &#8220;a blogger,&#8221; and he has faced no accountability.
This month, The Daily Wire<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/maryland-college-president-heidi-anderson-plagiarized-dissertation?author=Luke+Rosiak&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=8&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Another+College+President+Plagiarized+Her+Dissertation.+That%E2%80%99s+Just+The+Tip+Of+The+Iceberg." target="_blank" rel="noopener"> exposed a second president</a> of a Maryland campus, University of Maryland Eastern Shore&#8217;s Heidi Anderson, for massive plagiarism. All of this suggests a significant moral rot under the leadership of Jay Perman, the chancellor of the state&#8217;s public university system.
The security fee in question is minimal, just $150. But as Clayton lays out, that’s not the point.
&#8220;It&#8217;s really not about the monetary amount, it&#8217;s about ensuring that the university commits itself to the First Amendment,” Clayton told us. “This is a prior restraint on our free speech, because if we don&#8217;t pay this fee we can&#8217;t have the event.&#8221;
&#8220;It&#8217;s really a slap in the face. Charlie Kirk, literally all he did is talk with people and share a conservative message, and they killed him for it. The university sees that and instead of trying to encourage conservative speech, they&#8217;re doing everything they can to restrict our speech.”

Charlie Kirk and UMD President Darryll Pines

Revenge Of The Plagiarists? University Of Maryland Interferes With Turning Point USA Event

Education

Maryland

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Universities

Daily Wire host Michael Knowles will testify before the United States Senate next week on the rise of political violence in America.
Knowles will appear before the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution Monday at the invitation of subcommittee chairman Eric Schmitt for a hearing titled Politically Violent Attacks: A Threat to Our Constitutional Order.
Knowles, who frequently speaks on college campuses and faced the threat of Antifa violence during a 2023 speech, says the hearing could not come at a more crucial time.
“This recent uptick in left-wing violence is the culmination of years—really decades—of consistent assaults on their opponents,” Knowles said.
“A ‘free marketplace of ideas’ simply cannot exist when ideological bandits keep shooting up the marketplace. I’m grateful to Senator Schmitt for convening this important hearing to discuss how Congress can reassert order and hold to account the left-wing ideologues undermining our public square.”
In Pennsylvania, multiple individuals were sentenced to years in jail earlier this year for throwing smoke bombs at Michael during a 2023 speech at the University of Pittsburgh.
The United States has seen a stark increase in political violence in recent years, which includes two assassination attempts on President Donald Trump and the recent assassination of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk.
“The tragic assassination of Charlie Kirk shook the nation to its core, and it was the latest in a long list of examples of left-wing political violence,” Schmitt said in a statement. “The rise of political violence on the left is deeply disturbing and antithetical to American values, disturbs the free exercise of our constitutional rights, and is a threat to our constitutional order,” said Senator Schmitt.
Knowles, host of The Michael Knowles Show, spoke at the first stop of Charlie Kirk’s campus tour in Minnesota the day after the TPUSA founder’s funeral, where activists chanted &#8220;Michael Knowles has got to go&#8221; and displayed signs mocking Kirk’s death.
As one of the most prominent cultural commentators at The Daily Wire, Michael has dedicated significant attention to exposing the conditions that enable left-wing political violence and has urged policymakers to take meaningful steps to safeguard civil discourse.
“As Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, I look forward to getting the American people the answers they deserve about the realities of left-wing political violence,” said Senator Schmitt.
The hearing will take place on Tuesday, October 28, 2025, at 2:30 pm ET.

Turning Point USA’s “American Comeback Tour” Continues In Minnesota After Kirk Assassination

Michael Knowles To Testify Before Senate Committee On The Threat Of Political Violence

Michael Knowles

Political Violence

Senate

The same day that President Donald Trump <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/donald-trump-honors-his-friend-charlie-kirk-with-the-presidential-medal-of-freedom?author=Mary+Margaret+Olohan&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=1&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Donald+Trump+Honors+His+Friend+Charlie+Kirk+With+The+Presidential+Medal+Of+Freedom">honored</a> the late Charlie Kirk with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, hundreds of Utah college students gathered in Salt Lake City for a memorial honoring the Turning Point founder&#8217;s life. 
Students from chapters of Kirk’s Turning Point organization from nearby universities like Brigham Young University and Utah Valley University, where Kirk was assassinated last month, gathered alongside Republican lawmakers at the Utah Capitol building on Tuesday to reflect on Kirk’s life. Rep. Brandon Gill, a Texas Republican, spoke at the event and urged young conservatives in attendance to carry on Kirk’s legacy. 
“One of the things that Charlie talked a lot about during his lifetime was the value of political debate,” Gill said.  “Whenever we win the debate we get to change policy. And whenever we change policy, we can start to take our country back. And we’ve seen that this year.” 
During his speech, Gill issued a warning about the rise of violence committed by the political Left. 
&#8220;It&#8217;s not just Charlie Kirk. Right now there’s an attorney general’s race in Virginia where the leading Democrat candidate just had some of his text messages released where he was saying he would celebrate the death of his political opponents, that he would celebrate the death of his opponents&#8217; young children,” he said, referring to <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/heres-how-jay-jones-text-scandal-may-blow-up-dem-chances-in-virginia">bombshell text messages</a> promoting violence from Democrat attorney general candidate Jay Jones. 
Gill told The Daily Wire that the students at the event were somber but “fired up.” 
“We heard from probably 20 or so student leaders from a few different campuses in the area,” he said. “And they were ready to take back our country. They saw what happened to Charlie. They remember the message that Charlie had been putting out there.”
Gill also praised the students in attendance for continuing Kirk’s legacy of engaging in civic debate. He said that respectful debate among two completely opposing ideologies would be one aspect of Kirk’s legacy that would live on. 
“The other thing that Charlie did was he was able to build a political movement and get young people involved in politics in a way you&#8217;ve never seen before,” he said. “ Charlie made it, and Turning Point has made it cool to be a conservative for a young person who&#8217;s in college.”
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The Texas Republican also said that Kirk’s message of going to church, getting married, and having kids would continue to resonate with young Americans. 
Student leaders who spoke at the event called for young conservatives to carry on Kirk&#8217;s message. 
“Tonight we’re picking up the mic and carrying forward this message louder and bolder than ever before,” <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/president-trump-awards-charlie-kirk-221558652.html">said</a> Turning Point USA Provo chapter president Aubree Farmer. “We were born for such a time as this, and it’s time for people to start listening.”
Other speakers at the event <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/president-trump-awards-charlie-kirk-221558652.html">included</a> Utah Reps. Celeste Maloy and Mike Kennedy, Utah Attorney General Derek Brown, and multiple state lawmakers.

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‘Made It Cool To Be A Conservative’: Charlie Kirk’s Legacy Celebrated At Utah Capitol

Brandon Gill

Turning Point USA

Utah

Daily Wire host Isabel Brown is set to speak at a Turning Point USA event at Colorado State University — an event where the campus organization’s founder, Charlie Kirk, was initially scheduled to appear before his assassination in Utah on Wednesday, September 10.
Brown, an alumna of CSU herself and the former TPUSA president for that campus’ chapter, said that the organization had declined to cancel the planned event in the wake of Kirk’s murder — but had instead booked a larger venue and forged ahead with what quickly became a vigil for their late founder.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Charlie Kirk was scheduled to speak tomorrow at my alma mater, Colorado State University, where in 2018 he came to speak to our <a href="https://twitter.com/TPUSA?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@TPUSA</a> chapter while I was then-chapter president.
He was SO excited to be back in Fort Collins, and two weeks ago was texting me links to local media… <a href="https://t.co/mJt3zd0uCm">pic.twitter.com/mJt3zd0uCm</a>
— Isabel Brown (@theisabelb) <a href="https://twitter.com/theisabelb/status/1968295242110472206?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">September 17, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
“Charlie Kirk was scheduled to speak tomorrow at my alma mater, Colorado State University, where in 2018 he came to speak to our @TPUSA chapter while I was then-chapter president,” Brown posted via X. “He was SO excited to be back in Fort Collins, and two weeks ago was texting me links to local media coverage about his return to campus.”
When Kirk was shot during an appearance at Utah Valley University a week prior, however, Brown said that the expectation was that TPUSA would cancel the Colorado State University event.
“Everyone expected the students to cancel their event,” she continued. “Instead, they moved it — to the largest venue on campus as a place for people across Colorado &amp; the West to mourn Charlie&#8217;s life and honor his legacy. I am humbled and honored to have been asked to return to CSU to speak tomorrow at Charlie&#8217;s vigil.”
“This will be one of the hardest events I’ve ever done, but easily the most important by a mile,” she concluded. “See you tomorrow, Rams. God Bless You.”
Brown offered her thoughts on Kirk’s passing — and his legacy — in a lengthy post still pinned to her X profile.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Words will never be able to convey how devastated we are that Charlie Kirk was taken from us far too soon.
I had the honor and privilege of not just knowing Charlie professionally as a fellow warrior in the conservative movement, but as a close friend and my most influential… <a href="https://t.co/atGBDlfYUs">pic.twitter.com/atGBDlfYUs</a>
— Isabel Brown (@theisabelb) <a href="https://twitter.com/theisabelb/status/1965925470261670305?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">September 10, 2025</a></blockquote>
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“He transformed the world. And we will never be the same without him,” she said at the time.

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Isabel Brown To Speak At TPUSA Event Honoring Charlie Kirk

Isabel Brown To Speak As TPUSA Doubles Down, Turns Planned Event Into Massive Vigil For Charlie Kirk

assassination

Daily Wire

Isabel Brown

Politics

TPUSA

WASHINGTON—FBI Director Kash Patel argued Wednesday that the bureau deals with &#8220;facts&#8221; and not &#8220;conspiracy theories&#8221; as he addressed speculation over the assassination of Turning Point USA Founder Charlie Kirk.
An ideological assassin killed Kirk as he spoke on September 10 at Utah Valley University, and the investigation into the assassination is ongoing. Authorities have identified Tyler Robinson as the killer, a young man who lived with his “transgender partner,” a male attempting to transition to a transgender female. That individual, identified as 22-year-old Lance Twiggs, is reported to be fully cooperating with federal authorities.
Since Kirk&#8217;s death, online commentators and social media users have wildly speculated about theories surrounding Kirk&#8217;s assassination, including the idea that Robinson was not the killer, that foreign nations were involved in killing Kirk, and criticisms of Kirk&#8217;s grieving widow and her decision to carry on Turning Point&#8217;s mission.
In the Oval Office on Wednesday, when asked if he could give an update on the investigation into Kirk&#8217;s death in light of online speculation, Patel told The Daily Wire that the FBI is focused solely on &#8220;facts.&#8221;
<div id="attachment_986729" style="width: 874px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/fbis-kash-patel-shuts-down-conspiracy-theories-about-charlie-kirk-we-only-deal-with-facts/president-trump-and-fbi-director-patel-hold-news-conference" rel="attachment wp-att-986729"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-986729" class="wp-image-986729 size-large" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2240808922-864x576.jpg" alt="" width="864" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2240808922-864x576.jpg 864w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2240808922-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2240808922-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2240808922.jpg 1024w" sizes=" (max-width: 864px) 100vw, 864px" /></a>Photographer: Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA/Bloomberg via Getty Images</div>
&#8220;The only thing we deal with at the FBI and DOJ is facts,&#8221; Patel responded, flanked by President Donald Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi.
&#8220;We delivered in record speed a manhunt to capture Charlie Kirk&#8217;s alleged assassin in 33 hours,&#8221; he explained. &#8220;If you put that in perspective to Luigi Mangione or the Boston bomber, they took them five days, and a police officer lost their life in the manhunt.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
.<a href="https://twitter.com/MaryMargOlohan?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@MaryMargOlohan</a>: Do you have any updates on Charlie Kirk&#8217;s assassination in light of the conspiracy theories circulating online? <a href="https://twitter.com/FBIDirectorKash?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@FBIDirectorKash</a>: &#8220;The only thing we deal with at the FBI and DOJ is facts&#8230;the best thing we can do to honor my friend Charlie Kirk&#8217;s life is to… <a href="https://t.co/erEa5qqdrO">pic.twitter.com/erEa5qqdrO</a>
— Daily Wire (@realDailyWire) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDailyWire/status/1978572572305641484?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 15, 2025</a></blockquote>
&#8220;We are running on absolutely every single lead, and the best thing we can do to honor my friend Charlie Kirk&#8217;s life is to make sure that everyone involved is prosecuted to the full extent of the law,&#8221; Patel said. &#8220;And that&#8217;s what we are focused on, investigating the facts, not trading in conspiracy theories.&#8221;
On Tuesday, President Trump <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/donald-trump-honors-his-friend-charlie-kirk-with-the-presidential-medal-of-freedom?author=Mary+Margaret+Olohan&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=0&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Donald+Trump+Honors+His+Friend+Charlie+Kirk+With+The+Presidential+Medal+Of+Freedom">honored Kirk posthumously</a> with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor. Kirk&#8217;s friends and family gathered Tuesday at the White House in the Rose Garden, newly renovated by the president, to honor Kirk’s memory and to recognize him for his patriotic contributions to the United States of America.
Erika Kirk, Charlie Kirk’s widow, was present and emotional at the event, as were many members of the Turning Point USA organization. The event was purposefully held on Tuesday, October 14, the day that should have been Kirk’s 32nd birthday, and Trump said in his remarks that he cut his historic trip to the Middle East short in order to be home in time to honor Kirk on his birthday.
“Five weeks ago, our nation was robbed of this extraordinary champion. He was a champion in every way — I got to know him so well,” President Trump said.
“It was a horrible, heinous, demonic act of murder. He was assassinated in the prime of his life for boldly speaking the truth, for living his faith, and relentlessly fighting for a better and stronger America. He loved this country, and that’s why this afternoon, it’s my privilege to posthumously award Charles James Kirk our nation’s highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.”

President Trump Holds Press Conference With FBI Director Kash Patel

FBI’s Kash Patel Shuts Down ‘Conspiracy Theories’ About Charlie Kirk: We Only Deal With Facts

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Daily Wire podcast host Isabel Brown on Tuesday put together a tribute episode to honor slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk on what would have been his 32nd birthday. Brown invited big-name country music artists and smaller indie acts to discuss faith, music, and Kirk’s impact on the world.
Legendary country star John Rich also stopped by “The Isabel Brown Show” to pay tribute to Kirk and discuss what it means to stand up for faith and principles in the entertainment industry.
“As an American, you always have this decision to make at some point, especially in today&#8217;s culture, and that is, ‘Am I willing to say what I really think and stand for what I really stand for, knowing I&#8217;m going to take a horrible bloody nose in my career or possibly worse?’” he told Brown, adding that he “wrestled with that for many years.”
“My American dream was to play country music, be on the radio, play the Grand Ole Opry, write hit songs, all of that,” Rich went on. “And so knowing that the industry was so liberal, if I came out swinging as a Christian conservative patriot, I’m probably going to be short-lived from that point forward … And sure enough, that was the case. I’m not on the radio anymore. I don’t get invited to their big fancy parties. But on the other hand, I can say whatever I want to.”
“I can speak the truth,” the singer said. “And, you know, Charlie represented that. I mean, you see a guy who knew that walking into those situations was going to be uncomfortable at the least and potentially dangerous, which now we know it was actually deadly to walk into those situations. But he represents what it means to be a real Christian.”
“Real Christians don&#8217;t just speak the truth when it&#8217;s comfortable,” Rich added. “Matter of fact, quite the opposite.”
The singer also mentioned Kirk’s legacy, with more young people following his example and getting married and having children. 
“It&#8217;s literally the greatest feeling a person can ever have, as you know and as I know,” Rich said of marriage and parenthood. “And I think that that has been downplayed, ridiculed, demonized, even to go out and get married and have kids. I mean, we&#8217;ve seen it in the media.”
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He added, “‘No, you don’t need to do that. You need to be a Kardashian. You need to be a pro athlete. You need to be this, be that.’ What about just being a regular, good dad or a regular, good mom? And they’ve never really talked about the benefits you get back to yourself when you become a good dad or a good mom. There’s nothing in the world that compares.”
Rich said the Christian revival that was set in motion following Kirk’s assassination has been inspiring.  “I do think with Charlie’s death, the mask of shallowness has been pulled back off of our culture … It’s giving people a line of sight into the real deep things of life that really matter.”
The country star also offered advice to anyone seeking to live a better life. 
“Put things into motion that will outlive you,” he said. “That way down the road when you&#8217;re no longer here, whether you die at 31 or 110, somebody somewhere gets to hear or see you do or say something that impacts them long after you&#8217;re gone.”
He went on, “It&#8217;s okay to go be successful, but your focus should be significance in your music, in your art, in what you say, in your speech. In shows like this, say things that will outlast you. That would be my advice.”
<iframe loading="lazy" title="A Life Worth Singing For: Tribute To Charlie Kirk" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/T3OHYX9hR0Q?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Singer Matthew West agreed with all points and also discussed the challenges of being the father of teenagers. He said he’d “been a fan of Charlie’s for a long time” and was always “inspired by his bold stance, but also the way that he exercised his right to free speech in such a respectful way.”
“I have teenage daughters, you know, who need young influencers like Charlie showing them the way and speaking into their lives like Charlie,” West said. He added that in the aftermath of Kirk’s assassination, he felt a “stirring,” which was noticeable when he performed his song “Unashamed” several days later at a stadium in Pennsylvania. 
“I definitely have felt just a stirring taking place and a spiritual awakening, as well as just a cultural awakening of going, ‘What kind of voice am I gonna have in the world? And am I willing to use it even if it comes at a cost?’”
West emphasized the impact Kirk was able to make despite being young. “There’s a verse in the Bible that says, ‘Do not let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers,’” he said, referencing a passage that’s been used in reference to Kirk many times since his death.
The singer said the hatred against Kirk is also very revealing as it’s proof of “the legitimate spiritual warfare that we as Christians do believe is constantly raging on around us at all times.” 
West said his takeaway is to be even bolder in his faith despite the backlash he may experience. “There&#8217;s a line in one of my songs called ‘Unashamed’ and it&#8217;s made me think about Charlie,” he told Brown. “And every time I find myself singing it on stage since Charlie&#8217;s death, I think about him and I think about like, I just, I almost sing it kind of angry. And the line says, ‘I don&#8217;t answer to the crowd/ I answer to a King/ So the louder they shout/ The louder I sing.’” 
West also performed a song he wrote as a tribute to Kirk, which came to him on the night of the assassination. 
“September 10th, after we found out that Charlie had gone home to be with the Lord, I gathered my wife and my two daughters together and we talked about it and we prayed … later that night, I heard a song coming from my daughter’s bedroom and she was just up there, my 19 year old daughter with her guitar and she was singing &#8230; this old hymn  from my childhood.”
He added, “And I went to bed that night and … a Bible verse woke me up early that morning. I don’t want to romanticize it, but literally that’s what happened.”
The singer-songwriter said the idea of God being close, even in the face of a tragedy, inspired the song “Be Close,” which he performed on the tribute episode.
Brown’s tribute episode, “A Life Worth Singing For,” also included insight and reflection from Cole Swindell, Abe Parker, and Anne Wilson.

Isabel Brown and John Rich

John Rich Reflects On Charlie Kirk’s Legacy: ‘Say Things That Will Outlast You’

John Rich Reflects on Charlie Kirk’s Legacy: 'Say Things That Will Outlast You'

Celebrities

Country Music

Country singer

Country Singers

Entertainment

John Rich

The Daily Wire

President Donald Trump awards Charlie Kirk the Presidential Medal of Freedom, New York Attorney General Letitia James&#8217; grandniece may be a fugitive from the law, and the U.K.&#8217;s Labour Party turns to digital ID to curb illegal immigration.
It’s Wednesday, October 15, 2025, and this is the news you need to know to start your day.
Morning Wire is available on video! You can watch today’s episode here:
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<h2 style="text-align: center;">Trump Awards Charlie Kirk The Highest Civilian Honor</h2>
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-986115" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Honoring-A-Patriot-300x169.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="169" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Honoring-A-Patriot-300x169.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Honoring-A-Patriot-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Honoring-A-Patriot-768x432.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Honoring-A-Patriot-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Honoring-A-Patriot.jpg 1920w" sizes=" (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
Topline: President Trump posthumously honored Charlie Kirk on Tuesday, on what would have been Kirk’s 32nd birthday, with the country’s highest civilian award: the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
In front of a large audience in the Rose Garden, the president presented the award to Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk. The event was attended by many family members, friends, and acquaintances of Kirk from within the administration, Kirk’s conservative youth organization Turning Point USA, and elsewhere.
“Five weeks ago, our nation was robbed of this extraordinary champion. He was a champion in every way — I got to know him so well,” said Trump. “It was a horrible, heinous, demonic act of murder. He was assassinated in the prime of his life for boldly speaking the truth, for living his faith, and relentlessly fighting for a better and stronger America. He loved this country, and that’s why this afternoon, it’s my privilege to posthumously award Charles James Kirk our nation’s highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.”
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Erika Kirk also spoke at the event.
“Today, we’re gathered not only to celebrate Charlie’s birthday, but to honor a truth that he gave his entire life to defend, and that’s freedom. The very existence of the Presidential Medal of Freedom reminds us that the national interest of the United States has always been freedom,” she said.
“Our founders etched it into the preamble of our Constitution, and those words are not relics on parchment; they are a living covenant. The blessings of liberty are not man’s invention, they are God’s endowment. Charlie lived for those blessings, not as abstract words, but as sacred promises,” she added.
<h2 style="text-align: center;">Letitia James’s Fugitive Family Member</h2>
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-986113" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Letitia-Shelters-Fugitive-300x169.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="169" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Letitia-Shelters-Fugitive-300x169.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Letitia-Shelters-Fugitive-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Letitia-Shelters-Fugitive-768x432.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Letitia-Shelters-Fugitive-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Letitia-Shelters-Fugitive.jpg 1920w" sizes=" (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
Topline: New York Attorney General Letitia James may have sheltered a fugitive in her Virginia home for the past five years. 
James was charged with bank fraud last week for allegedly lying on mortgage papers to get a lower interest rate on a house in Virginia. While James owns the home, the current tenant is her grandniece, Nakia Thompson, and her three children, who have lived in the house since 2020. 
Thompson is officially listed as an “absconder” in the database of North Carolina’s Department of Adult Correction, according to the <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15187603/letitia-james-niece-virginia-home-fugitive.html">Daily Mail</a>. She’s wanted by authorities in Forsyth County for skipping out on her probation.
A spokesman for the North Carolina Department of Corrections said Thompson was “sentenced to probation for misdemeanor convictions for assault and battery and trespassing.” He confirmed that she is considered a fugitive from the state, but he added that because her crimes are considered low-level, she is “non-extraditable.”
Won’t stay silent: In opposition to the standard legal advice to keep quiet after being charged with a crime, James is loudly speaking out against the Department of Justice, claiming to be a victim of a political prosecution.
“We see powerful voices trying to silence truth and punish dissent and, yes, weaponize justice for political gain. We are witnessing the fraying of our democracy, the erosion of our system of government,” said James at a rally for New York City mayoral hopeful Zohran Mamdani on Monday evening.
Limiting her ability to attract supporters to her cause, James is perceived widely on the right to be guilty of pushing the same kind of political prosecutions she is now denouncing. James campaigned for New York attorney general on a platform of investigating President Trump.
After winning her election, James eventually pursued Trump on a civil charge related to defrauding banks, though no banks claimed to have ever been defrauded by Trump. James won the case in a bench trial, and Trump was hit with a civil penalty of nearly half a billion dollars. That penalty was later thrown out by an appeals court in a major victory for the president.
<h2 style="text-align: center;">U.K.’s Labour Turns To Digital ID To Curb Illegal Immigration</h2>
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-986111" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Britain-Tries-Digital-ID-300x169.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="169" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Britain-Tries-Digital-ID-300x169.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Britain-Tries-Digital-ID-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Britain-Tries-Digital-ID-768x432.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Britain-Tries-Digital-ID-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Britain-Tries-Digital-ID.jpg 1920w" sizes=" (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
Topline: The U.K. recently approved a controversial new law that mandates a digital ID as a way to curb illegal immigration. Morning Wire spoke with Guy Dampier, senior researcher on nationhood at the Prosperity Institute, about the new law. (The following transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.)
Morning Wire: So, Guy, a lot of frustration boiling over in the U.K. right now over immigration, and now we have this heated debate over digital ID. Let’s start with Prime Minister Starmer – he’s defending his party’s immigration policies and accusing the conservative Reform party of pushing supposedly “racist” policies. Catch us up, what’s the story here?
Dampier: The issue is Reform’s policy on residency for immigrants. &#8220;Indefinite Leave to Remain&#8221; means that an immigrant can, after five years, get access to the same welfare benefits as a British citizen. The vast majority of people who get ILR will stay forever. That matters because in the last few years, there was an immigration wave of around 4 million people. Most of those were low-skilled and will be a drain on the taxpayer. One estimate said that it would cost around £80 billion, another said over £200 billion. Whatever the true figure is, it will be a huge cost at a time when the British economy is doing very badly. Reform have announced that they will abolish ILR, forcing those who have come to apply for new visas, which will include new checks on their qualifications and language skills. That also matters because the current rules are incredibly lax. The language test only requires that you have B1 English, which is enough to struggle through a book for small children, but nowhere near enough what you need just to read a newspaper. As most of these 4 million migrants come from Africa and the Indian subcontinent, Labour have branded it “racist.” 
Morning Wire: Now, the Labour Party has actually also admitted that this &#8220;Indefinite Leave to Remain&#8221; law needs to be reformed. What are they suggesting?
Dampier: This is why it is so incoherent. They were calling Nigel Farage racist. On Monday, they announced policies that were not a million miles away. The Home Secretary, Shababa Mahmood, has said that immigrants who want residency will now need better English skills, no criminal record, and evidence that they have volunteered in the community to show that they are integrating. The problem for Labour is that while they want to win over voters who are upset about immigration, they don’t really believe in reducing immigration. So they end up promising things they won’t deliver, and then when they get called out, they lash out. The problem for Britain is very simple: the country has become rapidly more foreign, with over 16% of people born overseas. Most of those came in the last few decades or even the last few years. This is changing the face of the country: around 38% of school children are now from an ethnic minority group. At the same time the economy has ground to a halt. And there is increasing evidence that migrants are overrepresented when it comes to accessing welfare and committing crime. So people are asking a simple question: if we want fewer immigrants, and if immigration isn’t good for the economy, then why are politicians refusing to seriously reduce the numbers?
Morning Wire: As we mentioned at the top, we also have this new digital ID that’s supposed to help crack down on illegal workers. But that has been very controversial. How would that work?
Dampier: This is the so-called Brit card. Labour have long been advocates for digital ID. In fact, the last Labour government, over a decade ago actually introduced ID cards. But they were immediately scrapped by the conservative government which followed them. Labour are now arguing that it would stop illegal immigrants from being able to work and rent. But there is already a digital Visa verification system which is supposed to do this. It just isn’t adhered to. There’s no reason to think that this would be any different. In fact, there are many European countries which already have ID cards and still have a major problem with illegal immigration. In Germany, for example, you are supposed to carry your ID card with you everywhere. But the country has one of the highest numbers of illegal immigrants in all of Europe. This won’t really fix the problem. What it will do is add on another layer of bureaucracy and further reduce the freedom of native British people. There is also another potential danger. Paul Mason, a well-known Labour activist who is close to the senior leadership of the party, suggested that digital ID could be used to help regularise the illegal immigrants who are already here. That is somewhere between 3/4 of 1 million and 2 million people. Instead of discouraging illegal immigration, it could end up being used to reward it.

MRN_251015_V1

Morning Brief: Trump Honors Kirk, Letitia James Accused Of Housing Fugitive, UK Advances Digital ID

Morning Brief: Trump Honors Charlie Kirk, Letitia James’ Crime Family, And UK Digital ID

Donald Trump

Keir Starmer

Letitia James

Media

Morning Wire

New York

United Kingdom

Virginia

White House

The Trump administration revoked the visas of visa-holders who celebrated the assassination of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk, The Daily Wire has learned.
Last month, Secretary of State Marco Rubio pledged to revoke and deny visas to foreigners who celebrate Kirk&#8217;s killing. Delivering on the promise, the State Department shared the alarming statements of some of those immigrants who were stripped of legal status.
&#8220;The United States has no obligation to host foreigners who wish death on Americans. The State Department continues to identify visa holders who celebrated the heinous assassination of Charlie Kirk,&#8221; a State Department official told The Daily Wire.
&#8220;President Trump and Secretary Rubio will defend our borders, our culture, and our citizens by enforcing our immigration laws. Aliens who take advantage of America’s hospitality while celebrating the assassination of our citizens will be removed,&#8221; the official added.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter wp-image-986017 size-full" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Untitled-design-41.jpg" alt="" width="1390" height="540" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Untitled-design-41.jpg 1390w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Untitled-design-41-300x117.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Untitled-design-41-1024x398.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Untitled-design-41-768x298.jpg 768w" sizes=" (max-width: 1390px) 100vw, 1390px" />An Argentine national said that Kirk “devoted his entire life spreading racist, xenophobic, misogynistic rhetoric” and deserves to burn in hell. That individual, along with the following immigrants, lost their visas over their statements, the State Department told The Daily Wire.
A South African national said that Kirk&#8217;s mourners are “hurt that the racist rally ended in attempted martyrdom” and alleged that “he was used to astroturf a movement of white nationalist trailer trash.”
A Mexican national said that Kirk “died being a racist, he died being a misogynist,&#8221; adding that “there are people who deserve to die. There are people who would make the world better off dead.”
A Brazilian national charged that “Charlie Kirk was the reason for a Nazi rally where they marched in homage to him” and that Kirk “DIED TOO LATE.”
A German national wrote of Kirk&#8217;s death that “when fascists die, democrats don’t complain.”
A Paraguayan national said that “Charlie Kirk was a son of a b**** and he died by his own rules.”
<div class="image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter wp-image-986037 size-full" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Untitled-design-42.jpg" alt="" width="1174" height="594" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Untitled-design-42.jpg 1174w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Untitled-design-42-300x152.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Untitled-design-42-1024x518.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/Untitled-design-42-768x389.jpg 768w" sizes=" (max-width: 1174px) 100vw, 1174px" /></div>
Kirk, 31, was fatally shot at a Turning Point USA event last month while hosting one of his open <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/rubio-promises-to-block-visas-of-foreigners-who-cheer-charlie-kirks-death">debates</a> on the campus of Utah Valley University.
President Donald Trump honored Kirk by posthumously awarding him the Presidential Medal of Freedom on Tuesday, which would have been his 32nd birthday.
Rubio’s State Department has sought to review and revoke visas for foreigners engaged in anti-American activity, including foreigners who have expressed support for terror groups or who have close <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/rubio-promises-to-aggesively-target-students-tied-to-chinese-communist-party" target="_blank" rel="noopener">ties</a> to the Chinese Communist Party.
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Rubio also recently revoked the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-admin-pulls-visas-from-50-mexican-officials-over-cartel-ties?author=Jennie+Taer&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=1&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Trump+Admin+Pulls+Visas+From+50+Mexican+Officials+Over+Cartel+Ties">visas</a> of at least 50 Mexican politicians over possible ties to drug cartels, Reuters reported Tuesday.
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Marco Rubio

Trump Admin Revokes Visas Of Foreigners Who Celebrated Charlie Kirk’s Assassination

Executive

State Department

U.S.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump honored his late friend, Charlie Kirk, with the nation&#8217;s highest civilian honor: the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Friends of Kirk gathered Tuesday at the White House in the Rose Garden, newly renovated by the president, to honor Kirk&#8217;s memory and to recognize him for his patriotic contributions to the United States of America. Erika Kirk, Charlie Kirk&#8217;s widow, was present and emotional at the event, as were many members of the Turning Point USA organization.
The event was purposefully held on Tuesday, October 14, the day that should have been Kirk&#8217;s thirty-second birthday.
The president spoke first as Erika Kirk stood by.
&#8220;Five weeks ago, our nation was robbed of this extraordinary champion. He was a champion in every way — I got to know him so well,&#8221; President Trump said. &#8220;It was a horrible, heinous, demonic act of murder. He was assassinated in the prime of his life for boldly speaking the truth, for living his faith, and relentlessly fighting for a better and stronger America. He loved this country, and that&#8217;s why this afternoon, it&#8217;s my privilege to posthumously award Charles James Kirk our nation&#8217;s highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.&#8221;
<a href="https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R47639">Created</a> by President Harry Truman in 1945 as the &#8220;Medal of Freedom,&#8221; the medal was renamed by President John F. Kennedy in 1963 as the &#8220;Presidential Medal of Freedom,&#8221; and under Executive Order 11085, it can be presented to &#8220;any person who has made an especially meritorious contribution to (1) the security or national interests of the United States, or (2) world peace, or (3) cultural or other significant public or private endeavors.&#8221;
The medal features a white star over a red pentagon that is surrounded by five gold eagles, and in the center of the star, there is a blue circle with 13 more gold stars.
Following the president, Erika Kirk spoke about her husband.
&#8220;Today, we&#8217;re gathered not only to celebrate Charlie&#8217;s birthday, but to honor a truth that he gave his entire life to defend, and that&#8217;s freedom. The very existence of the Presidential Medal of Freedom reminds us that the national interest of the United States has always been freedom,&#8221; Kirk said.
&#8220;Our founders etched it into the preamble of our Constitution, and those words are not relics on parchment; they are a living covenant. The blessings of liberty are not man&#8217;s invention, they are God&#8217;s endowment. Charlie lived for those blessings, not as abstract words, but as sacred promises,&#8221; she continued.
&#8220;He used to love to journal about this topic all the time, and with such a heart postured of gratitude, and he believed that liberty was both a right and a responsibility. And he used to say freedom is the ability to do what is right without fear, and that&#8217;s how he lived. He was free from fear.&#8221;
Kirk founded Turning Point USA, the national student movement focused on empowering young people to &#8220;promote the principles of free markets and limited government.&#8221; By the time of his death, TPUSA had reached more than 3,000 high school and college campuses nationwide and had accumulated 650,000 lifetime student members, earning the organization the title of &#8220;the largest and fastest-growing conservative youth activist organization in America.&#8221;
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Kirk himself spent his time organizing TPUSA, gathering talented young people and promoting them, writing books, doing thousands of media appearances, garnering support for President Donald Trump, and perhaps most notably, engaging in respectful debate and dialogue on college campuses. Clips of his debates with liberal college students accumulated millions of views on social media, his social media platforms reached over 100 million people per month, and he was named one of the &#8220;top 10 most engaged accounts&#8221; in the world.
He is considered the driving force behind the president&#8217;s selection of JD Vance as his vice president: Vance himself said “if it weren’t for Charlie Kirk, I would not be vice president of the United States.&#8221;
An ideological assassin killed Kirk as he spoke on September 10 at Utah Valley University, and the investigation into the assassination is ongoing. Authorities have identified Tyler Robinson as the killer, a young man who lived with his &#8220;transgender partner,&#8221; a male attempting to transition to a transgender female. That individual, identified as 22-year-old Lance Twiggs, is reported to be fully cooperating with federal authorities.
In the last moments before he was murdered, Charlie Kirk was answering questions from a student about transgender violence.
“Do you know how many transgender Americans have been mass shooters over the last 10 years?” asked Hunter Kozak, a Utah Valley University mathematics student.
<div id="attachment_985767" style="width: 874px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/donald-trump-honors-his-friend-charlie-kirk-with-the-presidential-medal-of-freedom/political-activist-charlie-kirk-shot-dead-at-utah-valley-university-18" rel="attachment wp-att-985767"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-985767" class="wp-image-985767 size-large" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2234173687-1-864x576.jpg" alt="" width="864" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2234173687-1-864x576.jpg 864w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2234173687-1-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2234173687-1-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2234173687-1.jpg 1024w" sizes=" (max-width: 864px) 100vw, 864px" /></a>Charlie Kirk throws hats to the crowd after arriving at Utah Valley University on September 10, 2025 in Orem, Utah.  (Photo by Trent Nelson/The Salt Lake Tribune/Getty Images)</div>
&#8220;Too many,&#8221; responded the 31-year-old TPUSA founder, who was seated under a small tent in the midst of a large crowd of bystanders. It was only two weeks after the Annunciation school shooting, in which a trans-identifying killer had killed two children and injured many others when he opened fire on a Catholic mass.
The crowd applauded at Kirk&#8217;s response, but Kozak pressed on, saying that there had been five trans-identifying mass shooters in recent history.
&#8220;Now five is a lot,&#8221; Kozak conceded, &#8220;I&#8217;m gonna give you some credit. Do you know how many mass shooters there have been in America over the last 10 years?”
“Counting or not counting gang violence?” Kirk asked.
At that moment a shot rang out. Kirk&#8217;s shooter had fired, fatally hitting the TPUSA founder where he sat.
Kozak, who did not immediately respond to The Daily Wire&#8217;s request for comment, has condemned Kirk&#8217;s murder in interviews since the tragic event occurred. Simultaneously, he has called Kirk &#8220;a bigot&#8221; for believing that it is dangerous for trans-identifying people to own guns and said that &#8220;Charlie also made the world a worse off place.&#8221;
<div id="attachment_985761" style="width: 874px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/donald-trump-honors-his-friend-charlie-kirk-with-the-presidential-medal-of-freedom/memorial-service-held-for-slain-conservative-activist-charlie-kirk-at-state-farm-stadium-6" rel="attachment wp-att-985761"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-985761" class="wp-image-985761 size-large" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2236636833-864x576.jpg" alt="" width="864" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2236636833-864x576.jpg 864w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2236636833-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2236636833-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-2236636833.jpg 1024w" sizes=" (max-width: 864px) 100vw, 864px" /></a>Mrs. Erika Kirk joins U.S. President Donald Trump onstage during the memorial service for her husband at State Farm Stadium on September 21, 2025 in Glendale, Arizona.  (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)</div>
In the weeks since Kirk&#8217;s assassination, social media has been flooded with stories of Americans growing closer to their faith, spurred on by Kirk&#8217;s witness as a Christian.
&#8220;Charlie’s passing marked a turning point for the movement he sparked,&#8221; Turning Point&#8217;s website shares. &#8220;In the weeks that followed, more than 120,000 students reached out seeking to launch new high school and college chapters, determined to carry forward what he built. His passing also sparked a wave of Christian revival that spread far beyond the United States, igniting prayer gatherings, worship events, and renewed faith commitments. In cities across America and in countries around the world, hundreds of vigils and memorials were held in his honor—spontaneous expressions of gratitude for a life that emboldened young people, challenged cultural norms, and called a generation to courage. His influence did not end with his life; it accelerated.&#8221;
Additionally, over 200,000 people registered for Turning Point&#8217;s memorial honoring Kirk at a massive event held in Phoenix, Arizona, in late September.
That memorial was attended by the top administration officials in Donald Trump&#8217;s White House, including the president himself. Vice President JD Vance, Donald Trump Jr., Stephen Miller, Marco Rubio, Pete Hegseth, Susie Wiles, and many other friends of Kirk spoke from the stage to the thousands gathered in person, and online, eulogizing their friend and urging Americans to pick up where Kirk left off.
&#8220;My husband, Charlie, he wanted to save young men just like the one who took his life,&#8221; an emotional Erika Kirk told the thousands gathered at State Farm Stadium that day.
In a stunning moment, Kirk&#8217;s widow tearfully gathered herself before forgiving her husband&#8217;s killer, saying: &#8220;On the cross, our Savior said, &#8216;Father, forgive them for they not know what they do.&#8217; That man, that young man, I forgive him. I forgive him, because it was what Christ did, and is what Charlie would do.&#8221;
Her words resonated throughout the country, drawing compassion and admiration from many. And at the very end of the memorial, she joined Trump on stage, where the two shared an emotional, vulnerable moment before the crowd, before Erika Kirk signed &#8220;I love you,&#8221; to the massive image of her husband hanging across the stadium.
&#8220;Charlie&#8217;s life was a turning point for this country,&#8221; she said that day. &#8220;It was a miracle. Let that miracle that was Charlie&#8217;s life be your turning point as well. Choose prayer, choose courage, choose beauty, choose adventure, choose family. Choose a life of faith. Most importantly, choose Christ.&#8221;

Donald Trump & Erika Kirk

Donald Trump Honors His Friend Charlie Kirk With The Presidential Medal Of Freedom

Daily Wire podcast host Isabel Brown released a special tribute episode in honor of Charlie Kirk’s birthday on October 14, which included interviews with some of the best voices in country music, including recording artist Cole Swindell.
The 42-year-old Grammy Award nominee says he’s never been the same since learning about the tragic loss of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. The “She Had Me at Heads Carolina” singer opened up to Brown about how the news inspired a soul-searching look at his own life and ultimately led him to write the emotional song, “Make Heaven Crowded.”
“I was getting ready to go on the road,” Swindell said, recalling the moment he found out Kirk had been assassinated. “Me and [my wife] Courtney and our brand new baby girl, we were just laying around and talking and we had the news on and all of a sudden she got a text from a friend that told us the news. We’re like, no way, no way. And so we flipped on the news and we&#8217;re following it and it&#8217;s just the feelings … I don&#8217;t know that you can actually put what you were feeling into words other than just couldn&#8217;t believe it. It was just a shock and sad, scared, mad, just a lot of it.”
“We just celebrated our first wedding anniversary as a husband. Just had our first kid as a father. I think it hit everybody a little different,” Swindell added.
For many, Charlie Kirk’s death marked a cultural moment &#8212; but Swindell said for him, it served as a spiritual reckoning.
“I hate that something like this had to happen,” he told Brown. “I feel like bad things happen and it brings us all together and then we slowly drift back apart, and this is just something that I think a lot of us drew the line. This is it. I mean, a guy just got assassinated for believing how I believe, except for he was a little more bold about it. And I think that’s what got me.”
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Swindell described feeling convicted about how he was living his own life, including how much he talked about his beliefs.
“It made me look in the mirror. Somebody that&#8217;s living like I should be living and spreading the word as a Christian, what I should be doing with the platform that I have,” he said. “I just think a lot of us are fed up with feeling like we can&#8217;t say how we believe. I mean, there’s no harm in that. And like I said, I&#8217;m a loving person, I&#8217;m not judgmental. I kind of stay out of the way and do my own thing and try to be good to people, and that&#8217;s just not good enough anymore. I have to influence other people to be good to people.”
Swindell said he never met Charlie Kirk personally, but said he’s been learning more about him every day.
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“Even this song … I happened to run across a clip of Erika [Kirk] the first time she spoke after, and that really is what hit me the hardest. I’d heard ‘make heaven crowded,’ I’d seen the phrase, but it never hit me like when I watched her say that. ‘Charlie, you alongside Jesus, doing what you always wanted to do, ‘make heaven crowded.’”
For Swindell, those words turned into a tribute. “You keep seeing the word &#8216;revival,'&#8221; he said. “And I believe it. I’ve never seen anything like it in my life. If there’s ever a chance for us to stand up and to keep this going, we cannot lose this feeling right now. It just feels like everybody knows that we’ve gotta do something. And Charlie is a huge part of that.”
Swindell reflected on Kirk’s well-known passion for strong families, something that has taken on new meaning for him since becoming a husband and father. “I have chills, because that is something I see him talk about: get married, have kids,” he said. “And I don&#8217;t know that until you do that, you really understand. Now I understand why he was saying that. Even just the getting married part for me, that took me a little longer. But once I&#8217;ve done it, it&#8217;s like, man, I wish I would have found this sooner.”
He went on, “Then you have kids, and we just had our first little daughter two months ago, and just, my gosh. I mean, now you wanna go tell people you have to do that. There&#8217;s nothing else like it. No matter what you do for a living, what you&#8217;ve accomplished, it does not, I mean, looking into her eyes, knowing that nothing else matters. Why would you not want to share that with people? Why would you not want people to feel that?”
That conviction became the heart of his new song, a spontaneous release that wasn’t planned, but felt led by God.
“I just put out an album in June,” Swindell went on. “I had no plans of putting music out, but obviously nobody had any plans of this happening. Just to write a song that was something that was on my heart.”
He continued, “I’ve literally been praying and praying about just personally, do I still need to do this? Can I, should I hang it up, be a dad? And like I said, the song, the reaction, I think it was the Lord telling me, look, your career is not over, you&#8217;re just not going any further without me. My wife told me that, and I believe it.”
Swindell described how the song’s impact has gone far beyond what he expected. “To play it live and to see the reaction now, to see the American flags, the freedom shirts start showing up in the crowd, it’s just, it’s real. And man, like I said, this song is, if it helps one person, if it changes one person’s heart, then it’s done its job, I feel like.”
For Swindell, the song isn’t about career milestones or chart performance. It’s a mission statement. “This literally is to honor Charlie and to spread Jesus everywhere we can,” he said. “That’s why I do believe I have a platform, and just people that do … just use it for good.”
He hopes others will take that challenge seriously.
“Anytime I’ve ever taken a chance and written something I was scared to maybe put out there, you find out there’s so many other people that feel just like you. And until you take that step and put that out there, you may never know,” he said. “There’s so many people out there hurting that need it, and they may look up to you. And the fact that, you know, if you can ever let them know, like, hey, I’ve been through stuff, too. That’s all we’re trying to do. We’re trying to connect through music.”
“I think that’s what I’m called to do from here on out,” Swindell added.
Brown&#8217;s tribute episode on what would have been Kirk&#8217;s 32nd birthday, titled &#8220;A Life Worth Singing For,&#8221; also included insight and reflection from country star John Rich, Matthew West, Abe Parker, and Anne Wilson.

Isabel Brown and Cole Swindell

Singer Cole Swindell Tells Isabel Brown How Charlie Kirk’s Death Changed His Life

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Michigan Republican state senators introduced a resolution Tuesday to honor the late Charlie Kirk on his birthday, but Democrats who control the chamber chose to ignore it.
The resolution, introduced by Michigan Senate minority leader Aric Nesbitt, along with a dozen of his fellow GOP state senators, offered a tribute to Kirk and condemned &#8220;all forms of political violence.&#8221; Democrats, however, referred the resolution to the Senate Committee on Government Operations, a move often used to table issues for an unspecified amount of time, Nesbitt told The Daily Wire.
Kirk, who was assassinated last month while speaking to students at Utah Valley University, would have turned 32 on Tuesday.
&#8220;It&#8217;s unfortunate that Senate Democrats could not even be bothered to take a moment to acknowledge the tragedy that took place in Utah last month and condemn political violence as our nation pauses to remember Charlie Kirk,&#8221; said Nesbitt, who&#8217;s also running for Michigan governor in 2026. &#8220;It is sad how Democrats can turn anything, even common human decency, into political division.&#8221;
In a social media post, Nesbitt went a step further in his criticism of the Democrats in his state legislature, <a href="https://x.com/aricnesbitt/status/1978135627603304856">writing</a>, &#8220;Instead of rejecting political violence and domestic terrorism, Senate Democrats are embracing it.&#8221;
Michigan Democratic Sen. Jeremy Moss, the President Pro Tempore of the state Senate, did not respond to a request to comment.
Michigan <a href="https://www.legislature.mi.gov/documents/2025-2026/resolutionintroduced/Senate/pdf/2025-SIR-0077.pdf">Senate Resolution 77</a> recognized Kirk as &#8220;a devoted Christian,&#8221; &#8220;dedicated husband,&#8221; &#8220;loving father,&#8221; and &#8220;fierce defender of the American founding and its timeless principles of life, liberty, limited government, and individual responsibility.&#8221;
The resolution added, &#8220;Resolved by the Senate, That the members of this legislative body offer this expression of our highest tribute to honor the memory of Charles &#8216;Charlie&#8217; James Kirk; and be it further Resolved, That we condemn in the strongest possible terms the assassination of Charles &#8216;Charlie&#8217; James Kirk, and all forms of political violence.&#8221;
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The Michigan state House, which is controlled by Republicans, passed a <a href="https://legiscan.com/MI/text/HR0174/2025">resolution</a> honoring Kirk on September 17, just one week after he was assassinated. The U.S. House and Senate also passed resolutions honoring Kirk. Two Michigan Democrats, Reps. Rashida Tlaib and Shri Thanedar, <a href="https://www.freep.com/story/news/politics/2025/09/19/thanedar-tlaib-vote-house-resolution-honoring-charlie-kirk/86247046007/?gnt-cfr=1&amp;gca-cat=p&amp;gca-uir=true&amp;gca-epti=z116628p117250c117250e003800v116628b0063xxd006365&amp;gca-ft=126&amp;gca-ds=sophi">joined</a> 56 other U.S. House Democrats in voting against the resolution on September 19. The U.S. Senate&#8217;s resolution designated October 14 as &#8220;National Day of Remembrance for Charlie Kirk.&#8221;
While state Senate Democrats in Michigan blocked an effort to pay tribute to Kirk, the influential conservative commentator will be honored by President Donald Trump, who is set to posthumously award Kirk the Presidential Medal of Freedom on Tuesday.
&#8220;At least we know President Trump is doing the right thing and acknowledging this great man&#8217;s contribution to our country and our freedoms,&#8221; Nesbitt added in a phone call with The Daily Wire. &#8220;God bless Charlie, God bless our First Amendment, and God bless this great country.&#8221;

Michigan Dems Ignore Resolution Honoring Charlie Kirk On His Birthday

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