Donald Trump claimed Charlie Kirk only wanted “the best” for his political opponents during his speech at the right-wing pundit’s memorial service.
The US president branded the murdered Turning Point USA co-founder an “American hero” during a speech at the Sunday (21 September) service in his memory, saying he “did not hate” his opponents, despite all evidence pointing to the contrary.
Kirk, 31, was shot in the neck during a crowded open-air debate earlier this month. He died in hospital.
“[Charlie Kirk] did not hate his opponents. He wanted the best for them,” Trump said during Kirk’s memorial service.
The 74-year-old’s speech quickly derailed into political touting, with Trump saying that, conversely, he does hate his opponents and does not want what’s best for them.
“I hate my opponents and I don’t want the best for them,” Trump declared. “I’m sorry. And maybe they can convince me that that’s not right. But I can’t stand my opponents.”
While Trump claimed his opinions stood in contrast to Kirk’s views on his political rivals, the right-wing activist’s historical comments suggest this is likely not the case.
Charlie Kirk did not want ‘the best’ for his opponents
Earlier this month, a journalist who was put on Charlie Kirk’s “hit list” spoke out about the impact it had on her.
US-based speaker, commentator, and college professor, Stacey Patton, posted a statement to Facebook, days after the 31-year-old right-wing pundit was shot dead in Utah, highlighting the “venom” she faced from his supporters in 2024.
Patton claimed that Kirk, whom she called a “hateful racist,” was responsible for weeks of abuse and death threats she received in 2024 after he placed her on Turning Points’ so-called “Professor Watchlist.”
The website, created in 2016, lists academic staff, journalists, and activists which the right-wing organisation claimed “discriminate against conservative students” and promote “anti-American values” by advancing what it calls “leftist propaganda.“
Patton says she was placed on the list in 2024 after writing a column, which she said “inflamed the MAGA faithful,” adding: “Once my name went up, the harassment machine roared to life.
“For weeks, my inbox and voicemail were deluged,” Patton continued. “Mostly white men spat venom through the phone: ‘B***h,’ ‘c**t,’ ‘n****r.’ They threatened all manner of violence.
“They overwhelmed the university’s PR lines and the [university] president’s office with calls demanding that I be fired. The flood was so relentless that the head of campus security reached out to offer me an escort, because they feared one of these keyboard soldiers might step out of his basement and come do me harm.”
Also, Charlie Kirk infamously said he couldn’t “stand the word empathy” during a 2022 broadcast of The Charlie Kirk Show, adding that he believed it to be a “made-up, new age term.
“I can’t stand the word empathy, actually,” he said. “I think empathy is a made-up, new age term that – it does a lot of damage. But, it is very effective when it comes to politics.”
Just seconds before he was shot, Kirk, who was known for his anti-LGBTQ+ views, was attempting to push a false conspiracy theory that “too many” mass shootings in the US were committed by transgender people.
Fact-checking website, Snopes, noted that the claim is completely false, arguing that “social media personalities on the right have repeatedly stirred up false claims about the gender identities of past mass shooters.”
The pundit also regularly made racist comments which specifically targeted the “brain processing power” of Black people, particularly Black women.
He called Martin Luther King Jr “awful” and said the US had made a “huge a mistake” by passing the Civil Rights Act, which outlawed discrimination based on race, religion, sex, and national origin.
In another tirade, Kirk said: “If I see a Black pilot, I’m going to be like, ‘Boy, I hope he’s qualified.’”
Kirk also believed the overwhelming number of gun-related deaths in the US were “worth it” for the Second Amendment, saying in 2023: “I think it’s worth it. 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 to protect our other God-given rights.”
He regularly called LGBTQ+ people “groomers” while opposing same-sex marriage, telling a gay Wisconsin college student last year that he didn’t like him purely based on his sexuality.
In the same year, he invoked a Bible verse recommending to stone gay people “to death,” calling it “God’s perfect law.”
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