Sign up for the daily Inside Washington email for exclusive US coverage and analysis sent to your inboxGet our free Inside Washington emailGet our free Inside Washington emailMAGA activist Charlie Kirk, who was shot dead while speaking at a university campus in Utah on Wednesday, was well known for his outspoken opinions on a number of hot-button political issues.The 31-year-old founder of Turning Point USA, a key ally of President Donald Trump, was shot in the neck by a sniper’s bullet at an event at Utah Valley University in Orem on Wednesday and was rushed to a local hospital, where he was pronounced dead. A police manhunt for the gunman is ongoing.A Chicago-born son of an architect, Kirk founded Turning Point when he was just 18 years old with the aim of promoting conservative values in America’s universities and colleges. He rose to prominence during the first Trump administration through his podcast, cable news appearances and campus speaking tours.His views were often viewed as controversial. As a pro-life Christian, he routinely debated progressive liberals, Muslims, and the LGBT+ community, resulting in allegations of misogyny, Islamophobia, and homophobia. open image in galleryCharlie Kirk was just 18 when he founded Turning Point USA but quickly became one of the most influential voices on the American right (Getty)During the COVID-19 pandemic, he denounced mask mandates. He referred to vaccine requirements as “medical apartheid” and also promoted Trump’s false claim that the 2020 presidential election was “rigged” against him by a vast Democratic conspiracy.Kirk frequently adopted Trumpian talking points, blaming DEI hiring practices for flooding in Texas earlier this year, calling New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani “a parasite” and attempting to steer the national conversation away from Jeffrey Epstein by announcing he was “done” with the subject.Here is a closer look at where he stood on some of the most pivotal issues of the day.Gun controlThe Turning Point founder was addressing the subject of gun violence when he was fatally shot in Utah.Kirk was known to be a gun owner himself and regularly spoke out on the issue, including on behalf of the National Rifle Association in the aftermath of the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, in February 2018. At a Turning Point event in Salt Lake City in April 2023, he said, “It’s worth it to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second Amendment.” LGBT+ rightsopen image in galleryKirk with his wife, Erika Frantzve, celebrating Trump’s inauguration in Washington, D.C., in January (Getty)Kirk adopted a traditional Christian conservative stance in his approach to many contemporary issues, telling an audience at a Trump election rally in Georgia last fall that Democrats “stand for everything God hates” and adding: “This is a Christian state. I’d like to see it stay that way.”He also lashed out at the gay community, denouncing what he called the “LGBTQ agenda,” expressing opposition to same-sex marriage and suggesting that the Bible verse Leviticus 20:13, which endorses the execution of homosexuals, serves as “God’s perfect law when it comes to sexual matters.” “I don’t agree with your lifestyle,” Kirk told a gay Wisconsin college student last September. “I don’t think you should introduce yourself just based on your sexuality because that’s not who you are.”He also argued against gender-affirming care for transgender people and insisted there are only two genders, sporting a T-shirt at one Arizona rally last year that read: “xy = man.”More recently, he discussed the burning of Pride flags, writing on X: “We should work to overturn every conviction for those arrested, fined, or otherwise harassed for the ‘hate crime’ of doing donuts over Pride flags painted on public streets. “It should be legal to burn a rainbow or [Black Lives Matter] flag in public.”The future of the countryopen image in galleryKirk was a key ally of President Donald Trump (AFP/Getty)Kirk was a firm believer in Trump’s “America First” message, and the president paid solemn tribute to him on Wednesday, ordering flags at the White House lowered to half-staff in his memory and saying: “No one understood or had the Heart of the Youth in the United States of America better than Charlie.” Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr were just some of the senior administration figures to join him in expressing their grief, revealing how highly they thought of Kirk and how entwined his values were with theirs.Kirk was uncomfortable with U.S. intervention in foreign wars, notably dismissing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as a “border dispute,” but remained a vocal supporter of Israel.He did not always slavishly follow the president’s line, however, breaking with him in June over the bombing of Iran’s nuclear facilities and reminding him on Newsmax: “Not even the Romans conquered Persia.” Generally though Kirk was loyal to Trump, whom he saw as key to establishing the conservative Christian America he wanted to help realize, one in which abortion is heavily restricted to cases of medical emergency in which the mother’s life cannot be saved by any other means, women enter higher education to find husbands and “woke” ideologies play no part in public life.Donald Trump Jr, a friend with whom he visited Greenland in January, said the MAGA movement will deeply miss Charlie Kirk as one of its most influential young voices.
Source link
Where Charlie Kirk stood on guns, the LGBTQ+ community and the future of the United States
