Assassination of Charlie Kirk strips Maga of the man who brought the youth vote to Trump

Days before he was set to accept the Republican presidential nomination for the third time, Donald Trump had barely escaped with his life, grazed by an assassin’s bullet at a rally in Pennsylvania.

The former president’s deliverance leant a miraculous air to the week. After Trump swaggered into the arena in Milwaukee sporting a dressing over his wounded right ear, imitation bandages appeared on the ears of scores of supporters. T-shirts sporting the iconic image of Trump’s bloodied face and his clenched fist in the air were the most sought-after item on the merch stands surrounding the venue.

One of the first to lay his hands on one was Charlie Kirk. While Trump and his family watched from the VIP box each evening, the Turning Point USA co-founder remained on the floor of the convention centre, soaking up the atmosphere and fielding good wishes from a stream of supporters and Maga grandees.

One delegate from Kirk’s home state of Arizona approached the conservative activist, gesturing to his bandaged ear. “It’s the latest fashion trend,” the delegate said. “I’m wearing this to honour President Trump and the sacrifices he made for us to save our country.”

“I love it,” Kirk grinned, shaking his hand and posing for a selfie. He echoed a line that became a mantra throughout the week: “God still has plans for Donald Trump.”

No wonder, then, that the death of Kirk, who was killed by a bullet to the throat in Utah last week, is mourned inside the Trump White House as a death in the family. In a Maga movement riven by factions, some united only by their loyalty to the president, Kirk was the rare figure who was liked by all, Trump included.

“There are so many people around Trump who are there for the ride. Charlie was not in this for the money,” one White House insider said.

“Trump recognised the quality of Charlie's work and the integrity, and kept him close.”

Turning Point was pivotal to Trump’s successful pitch to young voters in the final stretch of the election campaign. Kirk was the bridge to young conservatives, helping turn out voters in the swing states that would decide the 2024 race.

Everyone in Trump’s inner circle admired the operation that Kirk had built up since 2012 at the age of 18, launching a meteoric rise to Maga stardom. By the time of his death, Kirk’s “prove me wrong” debates on university campuses, like the one he was leading at Utah Valley University when he was killed, drew crowds on a scale that only Trump himself could top.

A teenage fan of the incendiary radio host Rush Limbaugh, Kirk recognised the same freewheeling shock tactics in Trump when the real estate mogul and reality TV star announced his first White House bid in 2015.

After working his way on to the 2016 campaign as an aide to Donald Trump Jr, Kirk swiftly earned the respect of Trump himself with his slick social media outreach to young voters. Introduced to the president at Mar-a-Lago in 2017, he became a fixture in Trump’s orbit. With the president as the headline act, Turning Point events became the hottest dates on the conservative calendar.

Kirk’s legions of fans saw a passionate conservative who conducted politics “the right way”, engaging opponents in debate. But his critics saw a Christian nationalist whose rhetoric tilted sharply to the right as Maga evolved to embrace conspiracy theories and naked racism.

Taking cues from Limbaugh, Kirk used his own radio show to rail against gay marriage, and women’s rights, and warn of the “great replacement strategy… to replace white rural America”. He claimed that “prowling blacks” were stalking cities “to target white people” and argued that black women “do not have the brain processing power” to succeed without profiting from diversity schemes at the expense of white people. When Taylor Swift announced her engagement to NFL star Travis Kelce last month, Kirk urged the billionaire musician: “Reject feminism. Submit to your husband, Taylor. You’re not in charge.”

Days before his death, Kirk denounced Islam as “the sword the left is using to slit the throat of America”. He infamously claimed that gun deaths were “worth it” to preserve the right to carry firearms.

Above all, Kirk’s loyalty to Trump was absolute. He boasted of sending 80 buses full of supporters to Washington DC on 6 January 2021 as Trump’s attempt to overturn his election defeat by Joe Biden climaxed in a deadly riot at the US Capitol. Summoned before the congressional investigation into the attack, Kirk declined to testify, invoking his Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate himself.

When the administration faced a furious backlash from Maga hardliners over its handling of files related to the late paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein earlier this summer, Kirk was initially critical of the Justice Department. Following a call from Trump, with the White House floundering in its response to the scandal, Kirk announced that he was “done talking about Epstein”. Kirk drew closer to Trump after that 2020 election defeat, when the former president’s political survival hung in the balance.

“Those were the dark days for Maga,” said Ian Wilson, a New Jersey gym owner who became a conservative star after defying lockdown orders during the Covid pandemic. Ever watchful for the next culture war hero, Kirk invited Wilson to speak at Turning Point events.

“We felt very deflated after the election, but Charlie maintained the mission when it would have been easy to just tuck your head and run,” Wilson said. “When I heard him speak in those days, it was like, ‘Hey, we’re not done. This war is far from over’.”

By the time Trump trounced his rivals in the Republican primary last year, Kirk was a key campaign strategist. When the former president was pondering his choice of running mate, Kirk and Donald Trump Jr lobbied hard for a young Ohio senator,JD Vance.

“Kirk introduced me to some of the people who would run my [Senate] campaign and also to Donald Trump Jr,” the vice-president wrote after Kirk’s death last week. “Don took a call from me because Charlie asked him.”

With the second Trump administration, Kirk amassed even greater power. Turning Point supplied scores of young staffers to agencies across the government and Kirk vetted officials for their loyalty to Trump.

“He didn't just help us win in 2024, he helped us staff the entire government,” Vance wrote. Within the White House, grief has turned swiftly to calls for vengeance. Among some around the administration, there has been talk that Tyler Robinson, the 22-year-old suspect in Kirk’s murder, who was arrested on Friday, should face public execution.

“It’s a tinderbox,” another White House insider said. “The next steps are critical, but there's so much rage.”

Echoing the White House mood, on Friday Kirk’s widow issued her first statement since the shooting night. Her voice shaking with rage and grief, Erika Kirk gave tearful thanks to Trump before turning on the “evil-doers” responsible for the murder.

“You have no idea the fire that you have ignited within this wife, the cries of this widow will echo around the world like a battle cry,” she said.

“They should all know this: if you thought that my husband’s mission was powerful before, you have no idea – you have no idea what you just have unleashed across this entire country and this world.”

Trump himself has pointedly declined to appeal for unity in the wake of Kirk’s murder, lashing out at the “radical left”. In the eyes of many, the time for debate is over.

“The same thought is going through everyone’s heads: these people would kill me too,” another Maga strategist close to the White House added. “And we must make sure that they never take power again, for our own survival.

Photographs by Vincent Alban/Bloomberg via Getty Images, EPN/Newscom/Avalon and YouTube