The leader who galvanized young conservatives leaves big shoes to fill and a hard path ahead as they disavow violence and embrace civil discourse.
Charlie Kirk leaves behind big shoes to fill and a hard path ahead, those he inspired say, a legacy that will challenge them in making his life and his shocking death an enduring legacy where civil debate and discourse, not violence, define the democracy they love.
“I don’t think anyone will be able to fill his shoes, but I hope he will be able to inspire an entire generation of people to live more boldly for their faith, for their families, and for their freedom because, right now, our country needs that more than ever,” said Gunnar Thorderson, a former Turning Point USA organizer at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah, who was among the 3,000 on campus when Kirk, 31, was assassinated on Sept. 10.
“I hope he inspires an entire generation to become more like him and actually live boldly in their beliefs and in their faith,” he told The Epoch Times.
Kirk is remembered not only as the face and voice of a generational movement, but as a preternatural organizer who could cite facts about congressional districts across the country in middle school and who, as an 18-year-old high school student in suburban Chicago, co-founded Turning Point USA (TPUSA) in 2012.
TPUSA now has more than 250,000 student members and chapters on nearly 900 campuses across the United States. It includes a media division, hosts large-scale conferences, and has fostered a shift in political demographics that President Donald Trump acknowledges was key in his winning a second term in November 2024.
“I can’t think of anybody who’s built anything so incredible in so little time at that young age,” First Liberty Institute President/CEO Kelly Shackelford said.
“Maybe somebody can do some history research, but nobody I’ve ever heard of … starting an organization at age 18 and accomplishing what he did in those 13 years,” the Baylor University Law School professor and constitutional scholar told The Epoch Times.
“It’s just beyond the imagination to have a $100-and-something million organization and to spawn off other organizations and other stars who come through his network and go to other places, to change a whole generation, just start a whole movement again—all between 18 and 31 years old.
“It’s, maybe, unprecedented.”
TPUSA’s Phoenix-area headquarters was closed Sept. 10, its staffers not engaging with media and the many who came to memorialize Kirk milling about. But in a statement posted to his X page, which remains online, those who must sustain what he started pledged they would do so.
“Although Charlie is gone, his legacy will endure,” their statement read. “He shall not grow old; age shall not weary him. For all time, he will remain the brave young man who inspired tens of millions of Americans to better themselves and take action to better America. All of us will miss Charlie.
“None of us will ever forget him.”
It will be a challenge for TPUSA to find its footing with the loss of its charismatic leader, Shackelford said.
“He was obviously a brilliant organizer, in addition to being an intellect who could argue and debate in public, and yet, at the same time, be very personable and care for people and be very strong in his faith,” he said. There were “just so many different aspects to him that normally you would see separated into a lot of different people in order to build an organization like that.”
From One, Many
It may take more than one to fill Kirk’s shoes, Shackelford said.
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“There’s a lot of talented people underneath him, and they’re going to immediately begin looking at that talent,“ he said. ”Maybe it’s not one person who could be who Charlie was, but maybe there’s two or three people that fill a lot of his gifts and, between those people, they can continue doing what they’re doing. That’s my guess because Charlie was such a once-in-a-lifetime type person.”
Trump is among those who believe TPUSA will continue on the path Kirk blazed.
“He was a great man,” and “they have great people at Turning Point,” he told reporters before leaving for 9/11 memorial services in Manhattan. “I think they’re going to carry it forward.”
Shackelford said he’s “praying they have the exact combination they need because [he] really do think that what Charlie started is going to only grow.”
“I think Charlie’s death is going to energize and bring many, many, many more people who are going to come. I just think it’s going to only increase the movement he started,” he said.
That movement has fostered “all kinds of anomalies” among young Americans, he said.
“Number one, I mean, [youth] didn’t vote Republican. They were heavily Democrat, yet they voted for Donald Trump. Before Charlie Kirk, none of that happened,” Shackelford said.
Young Americans are attending church in numbers he can’t find a historical precedent for, citing a study documenting “a 300 percent increase in Gen Z’s church attendance. Gen Zs and millennials have now higher church attendance than all the other age groups, all the older people,” he said. “For the first time in the history of our country, we have more young men going to church than young women.”
That’s “very different” from the past “and, you know, it’s partly because of Charlie, and partly because God put Charlie where he was at the right time because he knew this massive change was going to start occurring,” Shackelford said.
“I’ve had dozens of people reach out to me already asking how they can get involved, with some even saying specifically that it was Charlie’s death that has galvanized them and motivated them to kind of keep up that legacy and they feel this personal need to do more,” said Kai Schwemmer, 22, a Brigham Young University student and Utah Federation of College Republicans member.
“People are realizing it’s not enough to have people speak for you. You have to, eventually—like, we have to create a thousand more Charlie Kirks,” he told The Epoch Times. “We have to galvanize people in that direction. And if we don’t do so, well, we would be betraying his memory.”
David Leatherwood, 37, of St. Petersburg, Florida, a self-described gay conservative who works in communications for Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.), didn’t see Kirk as someone who attacked others, but as someone who defended those who felt attacked for being conservative and Christian.
“He touched people in a personal way. It was not like he was an enigmatic figure that was unreachable or unattainable,” he told The Epoch Times. “I mean, he would just talk to you, directly to your face, and inspire you and encourage you.
“And that is really a remarkable quality and a leader, to be able to have that type of impact. And, you know, it is a shame that this life was cut short because he had an extremely promising future, and would probably be president one day.”
A Standout Who Stood Up
Leatherwood noted Kirk had an innate understanding of media. “He was prolific, right? He was almost like, omniscient. He was everywhere. Every single person felt personally touched and inspired by him. I mean, you can see it online, in the response.”
That’s how Isaac Jeter, who will be 27 next week, recalled becoming aware of Kirk and finding his place as a confident young Christian conservative.
“He was one of those people that I often encountered when COVID really ramped up the online presence of a lot of influencers from all kinds of backgrounds and persuasions,” he told The Epoch Times. “I definitely saw a rise in it being OK [to] be conservative and young.”
Candace Owens, Ben Shapiro, Andrew Tate, and Jordan Peterson were among others he was introduced to online during the lockdowns.
“But Charlie Kirk was definitely a standout person that gave a lot of people a voice,” said Jeter, a graduate student at Southeastern University in Lakeland, Florida, seeking a master’s degree in divinity. “I’ve been largely apolitical, but I am definitely conservative leaning, and so I began to listen, and I wouldn’t say I cherry-picked, but he had some good stuff to say.”
What impressed him most about Kirk was not just his media presence, but his—and others in Turning Point USA’s—willingness “to go onto very liberal college campuses and other environments like that and say, ‘Hey, let’s have a discussion.’ He went into ‘their territory,’ so to speak.”
Jeter, who does not have “a political affiliation,” said he does not agree with everything Kirk said. He could be “a little more aggressive than I would have liked as a Christian and, so, that’s what I mainly disagreed with. He did a lot of arguing, which I respected, because I respected his opinions, but he was a little too aggressive and didn’t listen as much as I would have.”
He sensed Kirk was gravitating more into the spiritual than the overtly political.
“I am really, really heartbroken that he’s dead, because more than a political voice, to me he was becoming a stronger religious voice,” Jeter said. “And had he lived long enough, in the coming years I think he could have leaned into that a lot more. I’m really sad that he’s gone.”
He is among many who fear Kirk’s assassination will give license for more violence, and that would be a perversion of his legacy.
“I want us to calm down. Seeing how horrible it is to see a young man who now leaves behind a widow and two fatherless children, it makes me rethink political violence as a whole, and reminds me that these people are just human beings,” Jeter said, calling out social media influencers and television commentators who he said “make money off making people mad.”
Kirk was young, still learning, evolving in thought and faith. Just like him, Jeter said.
“I considered him a brother in the faith and a voice I think we needed. He just needed a little more guidance and time to figure himself out, right?”
Ryan Morgan contributed to this report.
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