He is unlikely to survive, but whether he does or not, it is not a coincidence that there have been assassination attempts on Kirk and Donald Trump while the Democratic Party and “the resistance” has claimed and is claiming that conservatives now place democracy at risk, with Democratic leaders calling for violent opposition, and large swathes of the political Left cheered the assassination of an insurance executive.
If this is not what the Left really wants, it is still what they have encouraged with their irresponsible fear-mongering and reckless rhetoric.
Ethics Alarms 
Fox is already reporting that Kirk has died.
By Any Means Necessary, right?
Yup, he’s gone down for the dirt nap. Hateful comments to start in 3…2… oh wait, they’ve already started.
Fortunately, I’ve not seen many of those hateful comments. Most of them lament the toxic divisiveness that makes people believe that violence is justified when people disagree. I did, however, see one comment that consisted only of a quote by Kirk, “I think it’s worth to have a cost of unfortunately some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second Amendment.”
Very gruesome. I don’t think he survived long enough to even rest on the ground. Ironically very similar injury to the other senseless murder Kirk and many others, EA included, had recently been commented on.
The usual suspects and DNC “influencers” already trotting out the “gun control” distraction.
And fuckhead Kamala Harris anticipating, assuming someone on the right will retaliate. Almost the first thing out of her mouth. What an asshole. And Gavin Newsome deploring political violence while saying people need to be punched in the mouth.
VP Harris is one of the dimmest bulbs on the planet. She should file suit against her brain for non-support.
I’m tempted to go John Brown and now say someone on the left must die, but that’s nuts.
Just to be clear, John Brown was not nuts, just under resourced. His conviction, as I understand it, was not to overthrow the government but to abolish the slavery for the institutionalizing of evil that it represents.
We eventually did have the adjustment he was after, just not from insurrection.
Depends on what you mean by “overthrow”. He intended to start a slave rebellion (Harpers Ferry raid to arm them), seize territory in the Appalachians from which to operate and gather slaves to his cause, and then invade the south to set up a free black republic. Ironically, a certain Lt. Col. Lee thwarted his plans.
John Brown was an extremist. His views on slavery were correct; his methods were not. The South believed that all abolitionists were like John Brown It was the praise heaped upon Brown posthumously by the North that pushed us further along to Civil War.
We can’t know what would have happened to our country if there had been no Civil War or when slavery would have eventually ended. We do know that 650,000 lives ended because the South assumed the worst about an elected President who had specifically stated he was not interested in doing what they claimed he would do. And part of that fearmongering was because of John Brown.
“If this is not what the Left really wants,”
You just need to read the comments to know it’s what at least some of them want. However, that tells you all you need to know about whoever says things like that. Yes, I admit, I tried the same thing 16 years ago with the death of Ted Kennedy, but it didn’t work, nor did it bring me a lot of plaudits.
He was only 31 years old…with two young children… Iryna was 23… more young lives cut short. And shortly after Kirk was shot there was another school shooting at Evergreen HS in Colorado (three students are in critical condition).
The tragedies just keep coming.
A quick review of recent news suggested that LE detained someone right after Kirk was shot but later determined he was not the shooter. Fingers crossed they catch who did this soon. Didn’t see anything about whether the shooter in Colorado was apprehended or not..
The Colorado shooter was shot. The reports I saw didn’t know if it was self-inflicted or not. If he/she/singular they wake up, they’re going to be so mad that they picked today. When I look at X, the Colorado shooting is barely being mentioned.
What’s… This whole thing is so tragic.
The hard pill to swallow here is that Charlie was largely a moderate Republican, with mainstream Republican views, and he was by and large well spoken and respectful. They didn’t kill him because he was egregious, they killed him because he was effective.
He was also killed to send a message…”if you say conservative/Republican/Christian things in a public venue, you risk being next.”
stealing your last sentence
very accurate
-Jut
According to the Daily Signal the Southern Poverty Law Center listed Turning Point and Charlie Kirk on their hate map that came out last Thursday. I recall that the SPLC was referenced by the shooter who attacked the Family Research Council. It seems to me that there could be some civil culpability of the SPLC. I also believe that this was a well trained sniper financed by some group. The shooters ability to accurately get a kill shot off at a considerable distance and escape law enforcement indicates a well planned assassination
They have the shooter?
I saw 200 yards mentioned as the distance. 200 yards isn’t that far for an experienced shooter — my partner hits the center circle at 600 yards for most of his shots and he is completely self-taught.
The shooter was prone on a rooftop (like Crooks, who shot at Trump in Butler from about 150 yards) — high ground makes the shot easier — and because Kirk was standing up speaking he was not a moving target. So I don’t think there’s a shortage of not-specially-trained people who spend a decent amount of time at the rifle range who could make that shot.
Escape LE (so far): The shooter was spotted on the rooftop by some people attending the rally, but the fact that LE detained someone else almost immediately (he was released after questioning) probably give the shooter extra time to escape. May the real shooter be found soon!
When I wrote the comment there was no indication of the shooters location. I have not heard anyone mention distance except in vague terms. What was said was that it was from a long gun at great distance. Police used the term sniper as well and no weapon or shell casings have been recovered to my knowledge which suggests that the person in question had some training. This was in response to reporters questioning the efficacy of Kirk’s and school security to allow someone getting close up to him. Utah has open carry laws that MSNBC quickly trotted out but I am unware of any college campus that permits such open carry on their campus given the history of campus shootings.
I believe this was a planned attack and not just some nut job with a gun. He had an escape plan that up to know has worked. As for witnesses who said they saw the shooter on a roof that has yet to be confirmed. One witness who found her way onto national media kept saying she saw him get shot in the heart and blood spurted from his heart and she added emphasis to the word heart despite the fact that he was shot in the neck.
I don’t think we should rule out anything at this point but Kirk was effectively communicating to young voters and GenZ are moving toward the conservative side. This is an existential threat to the committed leftists who want to see the US in civil strife so they can assume power.
It wasn’t even 200 yards, it was 125 yards. A typical deer hunter would not have any difficulty in connecting at that distance.
200 yds isn’t that tough; a hunter with a traditional cartridge like the over 120 yr old .30-06 would have no problem with it. The longest standard range at the CMP park at Talladega, AL is 600 yds (have a story about that).
Hey, how did you know it would be an old 30-06?
https://nypost.com/2025/09/11/us-news/gun-charlie-kirk-shot-with-revealed/
It also was only a bit over 100 yards. I created this image myself with Google Earth.
https://postimg.cc/Z9QpdrDQ
Looks like Mauser 30-06 bolt action comes in a takedown version, which could be stored in a backpack. He’s wearing a backpack when he jumps from the roof.
Went back and looked again at the still images re the discussion about where’s the gun? I didn’t notice this before (black on black) but on closer inspection it looks like he does maybe have the backpack on in these pictures which would explain the position of his shoulders that jumped out at me before.
He died. requiescant in pace!
Jack, calm down. Conservatives are the violent ones.
And as long as conservative speech is violence and progressive violence is speech-
All you need to know and progressives will always think of this assassination as:
Charlie Kirk’s violence was ended by an exercise of protest and speech.
If only that was satire.
I just wish tgt, Barry, or Chris were here to say “we condemn this violence, but…”
Kirk’s assassination is the expected end result of the Left’s relentless screed that people who think and speak like he did are “existential threats.” When one says that, he/she is explicitly suggesting that either Kirk lives and you die, or Kirk dies and you live.
Today, someone took that to its logical conclusion and decided Charlie Kirk had to die.
The Left – no matter how hard they try to huminahumina their way around it – is completely, totally, 100%, and in all other ways responsible for Kirk’s death.
Meanwhile, Charlie Kirk, who was a born-again Christian, is in the presence of the Lord. His new reality is no more sorrow, no more tears, and no more pain. His family, friends, and supporters are suffering terribly (my wife has shed tears for them), but Kirk is now living his very best life.
Joel M wrote: His new reality is no more sorrow, no more tears, and no more pain. His family, friends, and supporters are suffering terribly (my wife has shed tears for them), but Kirk is now living his very best life.
May it be so, and may this (in time) provide some comfort for all who loved this young man …..
We have no information on who the killer was. It could be a leftist. It could be a mentally disturbed individual, like the guy who took the shot at Trump in PA. Those seem the most likely possibilities at this point, but even those two are not exhaustive of the possibilities.
And no, it isn’t the fault of all leftists, even if it turns out to be an extremist on the left. When a deranged right-winger used a hammer to nearly kill Pelosi’s husband, it was not the fault of the entire rightwing. I agree that the rhetoric on both extremes has gotten incredibly toxic, dehumanizing, and dangerous. Let’s remember that, whatever you think of Kirk, he had an unusual level of commitment to discourse. Let’s make that his legacy–not violence. We don’t have to spiral further into hatred. Every leftist crowing about his death with satisfaction, either because he had said what they believe to be terrible things about Jews or the CRA, or trans or whatever, or because he opposed gun control and was killed by a gun, are doing a terrible disservice to their nation. We should listen to the voices of reason like GW Bush in his statement, or Barrack Obama in his. They grieve this loss, express solidarity with his suffering family, and call on us all to never choose violence, and to listen to each other. Self-government and violence are antithetical.
Except the party Kirk opposed so effectively campaigned in 2022 and 2024 on the lie that Republicans and Trump were fascists, that Trump is Hitler, and an existential threat to democracy itself. You can’t use whataboutism to spin your way out of this. The nutcase who attacked Pelosi’s husband with a hammer hadn’t been told by Republican that Pelosi was a threat to democracy and had to be “stopped” at all costs.
I unfollowed someone on Facebook who wrote that we can’t talk about violent Leftist when a Republican shot the people in Minnesota a few months ago. My TDS-suffering sister mimicked this both-sides-ism and whataboutism that the Left regularly condemns in the Right. If the Left didn’t have double standards, they’d have no standards at all.
And, also, the MSM absolutely made sure to publicize any ties to the Right when it came to this attacker, as they do with any attacker/shooter. Remember when it decided that it was the news that the mother of a mass killer had read Trump’s “The Art of the Deal”?
And Trump campaigned by saying that if Harris won, we would no longer have a country. Both political parties have engaged in existential rhetoric that suggests the end of the world if the other side wins. They do it because it works. There are no longer enough moderate voters in the middle who will punish someone for appealing to the extremists. The belief is you get elected by turnout of your base, and the way you do that is whipping up fear and outrage. Also–there has been PLENTY of violence on the right, encouraged by radicalizing rhetoric. On this PAGE, you refer to the MSM as the “Axis” media–ie, fascist. CNN is not Der Sturmer. The guy who used a hammer on Paul Pelosi was both mentally ill and a Trump supporter. And Kirk called for a “hero” to bail him out of jail. That’s encouraging violence by a leading rightwing voice, right? It’s quite common. And it needs to stop, from all sides. We need to listen to each other, treat each other with compassion and respect, and give up violent rhetoric and violence itself. I got all kinds of grief for criticizing a few lefties on FB who said something like “a couple inches to the left!” when Trump was shot. We can all do more to police our own side, and ourselves. Kirk was more committed than most to engaging with those he disagreed with. Let’s emulate that example.
Your attempts at false equivalency are telling. The context of Trump’s statement is clear: a nation with no borders had no sovereignty and is NOT a country. You appear to be an apologist for totalitarians. I’m disappointed.
You’re calling the other side totalitarians, and then saying that they use extreme rhetoric.
The Democrats are not totalitarians. Calling them such an extreme thing will encourage the weak-minded to pursue violence. If someone is a totalitarian, a Hitler, a Mao, a Pol Pot, then extreme measures against them are justified.
Res Ipsa loguitur. Whatever side secretly runs the government with a figurehead leader while unelected apparatchiks are really making decisions, attempts to imprison its political opponents, suppresses dissent, holds show trials (like the J-6 hearings), bypasses established institutional means of selecting candidates for the presidency, encourages political indoctrination in the schools and is backed by state-supporting news media is using the methods of totalitarianism. What would you call it?
I disagree with most of your interpretations of Democratic actions:
Whatever side secretly runs the government with a figurehead leader while unelected apparatchiks are really making decisions
Biden’s decline was not a cabal plan for domination.
, attempts to imprison its political opponents,
I agree with most of the Trump prosecutions. He tried to subvert a legitimate election. The main mistake Merrick Garland made was moving too slowly.
suppresses dissent
Again, I don’t think the covid decisions are fairly described that way, if that is what you are referring to. There were excesses, but they were trying to prevent misinformation in what could have been a terrible pandemic, and was in the end quite a serious one.
, holds show trials (like the J-6 hearings) Those were not trials, by definition. Hearings at which no one was sent to jail are not trials. J6 was an attempted coup, an attempt to stop the count of a legitimate election. Investigation was warranted.
, bypasses established institutional means of selecting candidates for the presidency
The way they selected Harris was a mistake, I agree. I don’t it shows totalitarianism but stupidity. I was in print calling for a rapid open primary.
, encourages political indoctrination in the schools
Uh…right.
and is backed by state-supporting news media
And more bombast in place of fact.
is using the methods of totalitarianism.
Calling the Democrats totalitarian is inaccurate, inflammatory, and hurts the nation. Be better. Both sides need to see each other as opponents, not enemies. Only through civil discourse can our republic be preserved.
The Left lost the high ground on civil discourse years ago. The return to it begins when they decide to dig themselves out of the muck, shower off, and make themselves presentable.
We’re waiting (though we aren’t holding our breath)…
Too much misinformation here to deal with in the time I have, later, Gator. I will say that if you know your Soviet history, the pattern of recruiting ancient figureheads while the government was run by the Politburo is unedeniable. And that is what biden was: it was obvious that he was mentally fading in 2020. The Democrats nominated him because the alternatives would have lost to Trump, and then they took advnatage of Biden’s dementia, which, again, was obvious. “His” policies didn’t even match his career-long beliefs and statements. Denying this is just that: denial. The autopen scandal is just the tip of the iceberg.
Not comparable at all, and it’s obvious in the way people speak about the two options we had in November.
Have you ever heard anyone claim that a Harris win would result in no future elections, in Handmaid’s Tale-style slavery, or the end of democracy?
Yet even my in-laws, who would vociferously deny being lefties, regularly claim that they wonder whether we’ll have another presidential election. A good third of the country is either being performative, a la those who claim support for men playing in women’s sports for fear of being ejected from their friend groups, or they have been convinced that Donald Trump is, by definition, an existential threat to the country.
Yes, we know Trump says a lot of really dumb things. Why those on the left continue to think that his supporters take him seriously all the time is confusing, and this is a perfect example of that. There is simply no equivalence between the right, who sees Harris as incompetent and/or corrupt for willing to let Biden fake being president, and the left, who sees Trump as a threat to everything they hold dear about their world.
I don’t see it as a false equivalency. If we “don’t have a country” that’s very serious, isn’t it? And Trump is not the only one who engages in extreme rhetoric about what will happen if the Democrats win. The whole Great Replacement idea that moved from Charlottesville marchers into the mouths of members of Congress is a very dangerous depiction of Democrats (and often Jews) as facilitating the destruction of good America by immigration. The tragedy is that there is no one on the right saying “hey, maybe don’t talk like that, Donald” because 1) they’re afraid of him and 2) the base would reject any effort at moderation, and a similar process is on the left. There’s very little reason for a leader to try to tame the rhetoric.
But we have to try, as individuals, to do what we can, to appeal to what Lincoln called the angels of our better nature. As he put it, on the brink of Civil War, in his first inaugural “We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.” He failed to cool the sentiments of hatred and distrust, but I think we have a better chance. For one thing, the divide today is not regional. It’s not North South, or East West. It’s more rural vs. Urban, with the suburbs divided whether they are inner or outer. But what that means is most people have relatives and friends on the other side. Yes, families are breaking over politics, and so are friendships, but I don’t think it’s 1861 yet. We can each take steps out of this spiral of hatred.
If we don’t have borders we don’t have a country. It IS serious, and the solution to it is a change of leadership nd policy, which is what has happened. If a national figure is literally another Hitler and a party an existential threat to democracy, the solution s to imprison or kill its leaders, and that’s exactly what the Democrats attempted to do
jdkazoo123 wrote: We can each take steps out of this spiral of hatred.
Yes.
What it takes (and I know this will be a difficult step for some) is the will to do so, to pull back from the spiral of grievances and remember (if indeed we want it to be so) that this is still one country, and being at war with our neighbors weakens us more than any external enemy could. People who voted for him hoped that Obama would heal the racial divide. Didn’t happen. People who voted for Biden might have believed his words about healing division. Didn’t happen. Don’t recall if Trump promised unity across political divides but obviously that is not happening. This is not something a leader can accomplish with words.
It is up to us to pull back from the brink. Some (I know people who are genuinely bonkers partisans on both sides) will not do so. But those of us who have family and friends we care about on both sides of the divide (Hi Mom! Hi little brother!) have perhaps a clearer and more compelling incentive to be part of this solution.
After he won his Congressional election by styling the sitting rep he defeated as a communist. He destroyed the guys reputation and ruined his political career. Later, Nixon said, “Oh, I knew he wasn’t a communist, but people don’t understand: you have to win.” I’m sure the Axis knows Trump isn’t Hitler or a threat to democracy, but if that’s the only narrative they think ca win for them, I don’t see what else they can default to.
Thank you for speaking the truth. The left are clearly not the ones condoning violence. The right has to have someone to blame bc they are unable to look at their selves in the mirror. Charlie Kirk had his free speech in this country unfortunately it was to feed a a whole new generation who grew up on a steady social media diet of permission to hate, division, gun violence,and white supremacy. All under the guise of Christianity. He died by the very gun violence he defended “as the price we pay for liberty.” I will never condone violence or hate. My heart goes out to the grief his family must be going through. The way I see it, it’s all about choices. We have a president of our country that has a choice and a responsibility to take this moment to bring this nation together. Instead he chooses to keep picking at old wounds that could be healing, just to fan the flames, to give oxygen to ideas of division and hate. Americans cannot count on this man for leadership in any way, shape or form. Whenever Trump has a chance to rise above his worst moments, he chooses to just shoot himself in the foot. We as Americans, all have a choice, to lead ourselves to a better place, in spite of not having a leader.
Charlie Kirk had his free speech in this country unfortunately it was to feed a a whole new generation who grew up on a steady social media diet of permission to hate, division, gun violence,and white supremacy. All under the guise of Christianity. He died by the very gun violence he defended “as the price we pay for liberty.”
This is what EA refers to as “a tell” or signature significance.
When this is the kind of support you get, JD, doesn’t it make you ponder whether you somehow ended up on the wrong side of th line?
I just wonder what is going on in the House of Representatives? This assassination is clearly not a moment of unity for the nation.
I’m not sure that’s the whole story. According to Politico, there was already a moment of silence, Boebert asked for spoken prayers DURING the moment of silence, Democrats objected to the interruption of the moment of silence honoring Kirk, and Luna erupted accusing the Democrats of causing the shooting.
https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2025/09/10/congress/shouting-erupts-amid-moment-of-silence-for-kirk-00556280
Congress has been broken more and more by complete polarization, but being unable to manage of a moment of silence in the aftermath of a national tragedy is a new low.
There is a lot of anger and grief right now about the death of Charlie Kirk, and in my opinion the expressions of both feelings is totally appropriate. Anger is a normal human and necessary response to evil.
The event also calls for courage, let’s no cower down and allow the forces of evil to cancel and silence us; let’s not follow the example of France after the Charlie Hebdo massacre.
I do not want to add to the anger right now, and write things I will regret later. The scene in the House worries me. My source is Townhall, I am sure that we will soon know more from many other sources about what transpired in the House. This is not how such an august group of Representatives should act when remembering somebody’s death at the floor.
I am pretty sure that Ethics Alarms will have a lot of posts tomorrow about the reactions to Charlie Kirk’s death.
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2025/09/10/house-gop-wanted-to-hold-a-moment-of-silence-for-charlie-kirk-how-the-dems-responded-was-appalling-n2663101
Let me nominate an ethics dunce: Matthew Dowd.
MSNBC fired Matthew Dowd for he comments. Matthew Dowd effectively blamed Charlie Kirk for his own death. I am glad that the left wing media is aware that certain lines should not be crossed.
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2025/09/10/msnbc-guest-charlie-kirk-was-asking-for-it-n2663097
Hosts on MSNBC cross worse lines all the time. Dowd must have been on the outs anyway.
That is absolutely true, or Dowd wouldn’t taken the perceived liberty to speak thusly. It speaks volumes about where MSNBC levels out in the pig-sty that he felt the freedom.
The Left labels those who disagree with them “Hitler, Stalin, Nazis, fascists, racists, misogynists, and existential threats,”…labels that all but openly endorse a violent response…then has the unmitigated gall to say, “well, he asked for it” when a nut loads up a rifle and drills a bullet through someone’s throat.
Then their next words are, “Everyone on both sides need to take it down a notch.
Wrong.
Legal Insurrection has an article with many links of terrible commentary on the death of Charlie Kirk.
I am holding off on commenting on these for now. The firing of Matthew Dowd is still the only “light point” I see know; I will leave to others on how to interpret that firing.
https://legalinsurrection.com/2025/09/the-left-wastes-no-time-expressing-vile-cruel-reactions-after-charlie-kirk-shooting/
Here us another nice fat target for being an ethics dunces: Governor Pritzker.
We will probably have a discussion about the apologies by MSNBC and Matthew Dowd for the remarks made last night on the assassination of Charlie Kirk; I have these at the bottom of the comment.
In my opinion these apologies, plus the subsequent firing of Matthew Dowd matter as much as the apology of a defendant during the sentencing phase of a murder trial, namely not at all. The main stream media helped foster a climate of hatred against conservatives by demonizing them as Nazi, fascist, racist, etc. I do not think we should accept any apology; congressional hearings on the role of the media in the assassination of Charlie Kirk are more in order.
I have also seen TikTok video’s with gleeful reactions of the radical left on Charlie Kirk’s death, and recommend that you skip these as these are sickening. The comments on the mainstream media and the social media gives sufficient evidence that the left has become evil.
Matthew Dowd’s apology is below:
“On an earlier appearance on MSNBC I was asked a question on the environment we are in. I apologize for my tone and words. Let me be clear, I in no way intended for my comments to blame Kirk for this horrendous attack. Let us all come together and condemn violence of any kind”
Expect to see a tsunamic cacophony of Schrödinger’s Douchebag comments from Lefty.
PWS
Senator Chris Murphy, on Tuesday:“We’re in a war right now to save this country. And so you have to be willing to do whatever is necessary in order to save the country.”
Of course, he’s now decrying political violence, but he can’t unsay what he has already said.
Also, the lockstep talk about “gun violence” has kicked in, as though there are rogue firearms roaming the land and assaulting people.
I am embarrassed to live in Illinois and have our governor spin every incident as a way to blame Trump and conservatives. Since the wife and I have retired, we are actively looking for places to relocate, and I guarantee it will be in a red state. That’s not just rhetoric, we WILL be leaving this state within the next 6 months.
That being said, I had to turn off the Utah governor’s press conference yesterday. He starts out by thanking everyone for coming there, thanking first responders, thanking….
After spewing a volume of profanity that is probably still floating over Lake Michigan, I had to turn it off. Governor, you did not win an academy award, there was no need for ‘thanks’ to start your press conference.
Guess I’m just an old curmudgeon.