Verdict with Ted Cruz - Charlie Kirk, Turning Point USA Founder, Dead at 31 after Utah Campus Shooting

00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:00:02.580 Guaranteed human.

00:00:05.260 It is my great dishonor to be the person that says this and breaks this to you on television,

00:00:11.820 but President Donald Trump is announcing on True Social,

00:00:14.900 the great and even legendary Charlie Kirk is dead.

00:00:17.940 No one understood or had the heart of the youth in the United States of America better than Charlie.

00:00:23.680 He was loved and admired by all, especially me, and now he is no longer with us.

00:00:29.120 Melania and my sympathies go out to his beautiful wife, Erica, and his family.

00:00:33.760 Charlie, we love you.

00:00:35.220 This is a 47 Morning Update special edition with Ben Ferguson.

00:00:39.900 It is Thursday morning.

00:00:41.780 It is nice to have you with us on the 47 Morning Update,

00:00:46.400 and there's only one thing we're going to be talking about today,

00:00:48.880 and that is the life and the legacy of an incredible young man,

00:00:54.580 Charlie Kirk, who I've had the honor of knowing for over a decade.

00:00:57.520 Charlie's mission field was college campuses.

00:01:01.680 His mission field was to have grand debates.

00:01:05.540 He understood something that many others didn't,

00:01:09.500 which is the left had taken hold of an entire generation of young people in this country,

00:01:15.360 and they were turning them against God.

00:01:19.260 They were turning them against prayer.

00:01:21.100 They were turning them against pride in this country.

00:01:24.880 They were turning them away from families.

00:01:28.920 They were turning them away from having children.

00:01:31.480 They were turning them away from marriage, being a husband or a wife, a mother or a father.

00:01:38.860 And he decided he was going to do something about it,

00:01:42.560 and he started an organization called Turning Point.

00:01:45.460 I remember meeting Charlie for the very first time,

00:01:48.160 and we had breakfast together when he was trying to start Turning Point.

00:01:53.660 There was people like myself and Ben Shapiro and others that had done kind of the college campus thing

00:02:01.860 and had been the young generation of conservatives,

00:02:05.500 and he wanted to be that next generation, and my oh my was he.

00:02:10.440 He's had more of an impact on the younger generation for conservatives than anyone I've ever met.

00:02:15.960 And I don't say that because he was assassinated by a cold-blooded killer.

00:02:21.660 I say that because it's the truth.

00:02:24.080 Charlie Kirk was a hero whose legacy will live on for, I think, the rest of my life and probably then after that.

00:02:36.420 People are going to remember Charlie Kirk.

00:02:38.920 They're going to remember where they were when they found out that he was shot.

00:02:41.600 They're going to remember where they were when it was announced by the President of the United States.

00:02:45.740 America on True Social that he had died.

00:02:48.840 This is so hard.

00:02:50.180 I've been talking about this all day.

00:02:52.420 I'm recording this at basically midnight Eastern,

00:02:55.840 and I've been talking to friends and colleagues who know him,

00:03:01.340 and all of us are so sad because we all knew him well.

00:03:07.120 I think the hardest part for me is the fact that I know that this is a man that loved this country

00:03:13.040 but also loved his family.

00:03:14.660 He was so proud of his kids.

00:03:16.760 He was so proud to be a dad.

00:03:19.780 He loved being a dad.

00:03:22.300 He loved celebrating what a family is.

00:03:25.040 He loved celebrating that he was going back to traditional way of life with a mom and a dad and children.

00:03:33.820 I am so sad tonight for his family, for his wife, who is so sweet, for his children that are going to grow up without their father.

00:03:43.540 They're going to have videos for years that they can watch, and they can be proud of him,

00:03:47.920 and that may be the one blessing is that they so much of his life over the last five, six, seven years was put on tape.

00:03:54.860 I also get sad for this country because we lost someone that was so dear to us,

00:04:02.400 and I get sad that we've gone off this path so far to where the radical left,

00:04:07.920 and a part of it is a terrorist organization now, make no mistake about that,

00:04:14.180 is celebrating the killing of a man whose only crime was wanting to bring people together for a grand debate.

00:04:22.880 That's what he did wrong.

00:04:25.680 He wanted to debate the most important issues of our day,

00:04:29.580 and he wanted to sit down with people that disagreed with him,

00:04:32.720 and he wanted to have that conversation,

00:04:35.260 and that's why they killed him,

00:04:37.500 because he was so effective and so powerful by bringing facts to a conversation,

00:04:45.340 and by the way, being kind to those on the left,

00:04:48.660 those that disagreed with him.

00:04:50.080 He wanted them to come to his events.

00:04:52.060 He wanted to talk to them.

00:04:53.700 He gave them a microphone.

00:04:55.520 It's exactly what he was doing in Utah.

00:04:58.220 Trump's assassination attempt in Butler is that we were worried that they were going to do it again.

00:05:04.440 Whether I was on stage doing an event and so many others that do what Charlie does in the conservative movement,

00:05:12.620 it has become a very real thing in our minds,

00:05:17.020 and what they wanted to happen to Donald Trump and Butler

00:05:21.480 is exactly what happened in Utah to Charlie Kirk.

00:05:26.820 They wanted that video.

00:05:29.400 They wanted to put fear in the hearts and the minds of other conservative fighters,

00:05:34.000 other conservative warriors,

00:05:35.940 because they want to silence us.

00:05:38.120 I have talked to some of the most influential conservative leaders today on the phone and in text messages,

00:05:47.320 my mentors,

00:05:48.860 people that I've mentored,

00:05:50.400 and one thing I can assure you from all this is,

00:05:53.900 yes,

00:05:54.060 we're going to take more precautions.

00:05:56.140 Yes,

00:05:56.340 we're going to do more,

00:05:57.260 but we're not stopping.

00:06:00.200 Charlie was asked recently

00:06:02.140 about what he does

00:06:05.260 and what he thinks before he goes on college campuses,

00:06:08.460 and I want you to listen to what he said.

00:06:11.480 It's only 47,

00:06:12.880 48 seconds long,

00:06:14.260 but I want you to listen to what he says.

00:06:17.600 Before I go on a college campus,

00:06:19.140 my prayer is very simple.

00:06:20.280 God,

00:06:20.560 use me for your will.

00:06:21.760 Amen.

00:06:22.040 Because there's a plan above us all.

00:06:23.500 God is sovereign above all.

00:06:24.860 So,

00:06:25.240 what is God's plan when I go on a college campus?

00:06:27.060 I just believe I will only tell truth,

00:06:29.120 I will not compromise,

00:06:30.580 and I'll love on the lost.

00:06:31.920 The specific teachings of Christ is go make disciples of all nations.

00:06:34.680 I'm trying my best to do that,

00:06:36.140 and I'm trying to do it first in this nation,

00:06:38.000 because this nation impacts every other nation on the planet.

00:06:40.800 You cannot impact the world without impacting America.

00:06:43.060 Period.

00:06:43.260 That's the way that God has designed the universe in this particular being,

00:06:47.360 that as America goes,

00:06:48.760 the world goes.

00:06:49.440 Jesus called us to love children.

00:06:51.120 Jesus called us to tell truth.

00:06:52.680 Jesus called us to contest in the public square for his purposes.

00:06:57.520 I'm far more interested in what God wants of me than what I want from God.

00:07:02.520 And what God wants from me is a life fighting for truth.

00:07:05.540 That is going to be a large part of Charlie Kirk's legacy.

00:07:10.880 The president of the United States of America,

00:07:12.800 also put out a video from the Oval Office.

00:07:16.220 Hours after he announced that Charlie Kirk had gone to see his Lord and Savior in heaven,

00:07:23.160 Donald Trump decided to address the nation.

00:07:26.160 And I want you to hear what the president had to say about Charlie Kirk and his legacy.

00:07:30.680 To my great fellow Americans, I am filled with grief and anger at the heinous assassination of Charlie Kirk on a college campus in Utah.

00:07:41.480 Charlie inspired millions.

00:07:43.580 And tonight, all who knew him and loved him are united in shock and horror.

00:07:49.920 Charlie was a patriot who devoted his life to the cause of open debate and the country that he loved so much,

00:07:57.660 the United States of America.

00:07:59.260 He fought for liberty, democracy, justice, and the American people.

00:08:04.360 He's a martyr for truth and freedom.

00:08:06.900 And there's never been anyone who was so respected by youth.

00:08:11.520 Charlie was also a man of deep, deep faith.

00:08:15.240 And we take comfort in the knowledge that he is now at peace with God in heaven.

00:08:21.540 Our prayers are with his wife, Erica, the two young, beloved children,

00:08:27.400 and his entire family who he loved more than anything in the world.

00:08:32.020 We ask God to watch over them in this terrible hour of heartache and pain.

00:08:36.940 This is a dark moment for America.

00:08:41.100 Charlie Kirk traveled the nation, joyfully engaging with everyone interested in good faith debate.

00:08:48.600 His mission was to bring young people into the political process, which he did better than anybody ever,

00:08:56.400 to share his love of country and to spread the simple words of common sense.

00:09:02.260 On campuses nationwide, he championed his ideas with courage, logic, humor, and grace.

00:09:09.580 It's long past time for all Americans and the media to confront the fact that violence and murder

00:09:16.720 are the tragic consequence of demonizing those with whom you disagree day after day, year after year,

00:09:24.660 in the most hateful and despicable way possible.

00:09:27.860 For years, those on the radical left have compared wonderful Americans like Charlie to Nazis 0.95

00:09:35.140 and the world's worst mass murderers and criminals.

00:09:39.420 This kind of rhetoric is directly responsible for the terrorism that we're seeing in our country today,

00:09:47.220 and it must stop right now.

00:09:50.080 My administration will find each and every one of those who contributed to this atrocity

00:09:56.620 and to other political violence, including the organizations that fund it and support it,

00:10:02.480 as well as those who go after our judges, law enforcement officials,

00:10:07.780 and everyone else who brings order to our country.

00:10:11.860 From the attack on my life in Butler, Pennsylvania last year,

00:10:15.480 which killed a husband and father to the attacks on ICE agents,

00:10:19.920 to the vicious murder of a health care executive in the streets of New York,

00:10:24.700 to the shooting of House Majority Leader Steve Scalise and three others,

00:10:30.140 radical left political violence has hurt too many innocent people and taken too many lives.

00:10:36.960 Tonight, I ask all Americans to commit themselves to the American values for which Charlie Kirk lived and died,

00:10:43.820 the values of free speech, citizenship, the rule of law, and the patriotic devotion and love of God.

00:10:52.960 Charlie was the best of America, and the monster who attacked him was attacking our whole country.

00:10:59.840 An assassin tried to silence him with a bullet, but he failed,

00:11:04.080 because together we will ensure that his voice, his message, and his legacy

00:11:08.700 will live on for countless generations to come.

00:11:12.200 Today, because of this heinous act, Charlie's voice has become bigger and grander than ever before,

00:11:20.800 and it's not even close.

00:11:22.920 May God bless his memory, may God watch over his family,

00:11:27.040 and may God bless the United States of America.

00:11:30.580 Thank you.

00:11:31.840 I want to just end by saying two things.

00:11:35.320 One, I am so sad.

00:11:37.720 I am so sad for Charlie's family and his colleagues and his friends.

00:11:44.120 I'm also incredibly angry.

00:11:46.480 I'm angry that the left has gotten to the point where they're inspiring people to do this with no accountability.

00:11:53.700 I'm angry that they have normalized this type of political violence.

00:11:59.320 There will be more to be said about that moving forward, I can promise you.

00:12:05.740 But what I'll say right now is this.

00:12:08.500 Pray for Charlie's wife. 0.98

00:12:10.780 Pray for Charlie's children.

00:12:14.220 Pray for all of them.

00:12:16.060 I'll see you back here tomorrow.

00:12:17.200 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:12:20.800 Guaranteed Human.

Verdict with Ted Cruz - September 11, 2025

Charlie Kirk, Turning Point USA Founder, Dead at 31 after Utah Campus Shooting

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