Charlie Kirk memorial: Trump arrives in Arizona as tens of thousands attend service – latest updates | Charlie Kirk shooting

Alaina Demopoulos

Within the days after his killing, Charlie Kirk was remembered by his allies as a fantastic debater. A quote taken from a broadly shared video of Kirk discussing his life’s work – “when individuals cease speaking, that’s when violence occurs” – emblematized such eulogies.

Kirk toured American school campuses along with his rightwing non-profit Turning Level USA, the place he would arrange a tent, desk and microphone, and debate with undergrads. The aim, he said, was to “save western civilization”, and remembrances after his dying positioned him as a budding statesman – a conservative hero who strode throughout the political divide for the sake of open dialogue.

Kirk utilized fundamental guidelines of civility to his debate type, asking opponents their identify and saying it was good to fulfill them. He engaged younger individuals in political discourse at a time when society has been cut up into bitterly antagonistic camps. However his critics are taking concern with any model of his legacy that doesn’t account for the bigoted nature of his arguments. They’re additionally intently analyzing his very type of debate.

“I don’t suppose Charlie entered debates to return to a standard consensus or to find the reality,” mentioned Mason, a 26-year-old graduate pupil who debated with Kirk on the YouTube present Surrounded final fall. “I feel Charlie got here to debates to verbally beat his opponents.”

Donald Trump has arrived on Air Drive One in Arizona for Charlie Kirk’s memorial service.

Trump, alongside different high-profile cupboard members together with JD Vance and protection secretary Pete Hegseth, are set to ship remarks on Kirk.

Lauren Gambino

on the State Farm stadium in Glendale, Arizona

Many individuals traveled far and extensive to pay tribute to Charlie Kirk in Glendale on Sunday. Amongst them was Eddie Wallin, a 30-year-old from Sweden who crossed the Atlantic to honor the slain organizer.

His journey took him from Sweden to Texas, the place he rented a automotive and mentioned he drove 17 hours straight to make it to Glendale in time for the memorial. He subsisted on bananas and different sugary provisions to maintain him alert.

Wallin, sporting a white shirt emblazoned with “Freedom,” mentioned he had first met Kirk in 2019, throughout a visit to Texas. He recalled that Kirk, smiling, informed him he’d by no means thought he’d meet a Swedish conservative. Six years later, Wallin mentioned he encountered Kirk once more throughout the 2024 presidential election and was stunned when the organizer, by then a vastly outstanding determine in Maga politics, remembered him.

“After so a few years he remembered me,” Wallin mentioned. “I’ll bear in mind him for my entire life.”

Lauren Gambino

on the State Farm stadium in Glendale, Arizona

For a lot of the morning, attendees within the packed stadium have been listening to Christian worship music.

Many sang together with the lyrics, whereas some raised their arms and swayed. It’s a putting distinction from a Trump rally the place the play checklist usually options Lee Greenwood’s God Bless the USA, the Village Individuals’s YMCA and Luciano Pavarotti’s“Ave Maria”.

The occasion, like Turning Factors itself, has blended religion and politics for a brand new era of conservatives.

Chris Tomlin, a Christian music singer, is singing now together with the viewers, which joins him for the chorus: “You’ll at all times be holy / holy perpetually.”

Robert Mackey

As he left the White Home for Phoenix this morning, Donald Trump praised Charlie Kirk’s mobilization of faculty college students by means of Turning Level USA, the group that he based as a substitute of going to varsity himself.

“For a younger man, he did a fantastic job, an incredible job,” Trump mentioned. “He had a maintain on youth as a result of they beloved him. They revered him. And should you return 10 years, these schools have been harmful locations for conservatives. And now they’re scorching. They’re extremely popular. Similar to this nation is scorching.”

As our colleague Alice Speri reported, TPUSA has over 900 chapters on school campuses and claims to have “incubated” greater than 350 rightwing influencers over time.

Kirk himself, nevertheless, was broadly unpopular amongst school college students, in keeping with polling after his dying. Analysis completed for Puck final week revealed that 70% of scholars surveyed, at group schools, technical schools, commerce colleges, and private and non-private four-year establishments, mentioned that they disagreed with Kirk’s views. Simply 30% mentioned they agreed with what he needed to say.

Lauren Gambino

on the State Farm stadium in Glendale, Arizona

Throughout the world are black and white images of Charlie Kirk, along with his spouse, Erika, and their kids. One reveals him tossing a Maga hat into the gang and several other of him talking.

Feelings have been uncooked within the stadium, because the band performed a prolonged instrumental interlude and the digital camera panned the gang, which rose to its ft, holding crimson, black and white indicators that mentioned “Turning Factors.” One group held a poster with a sketch of Kirk and the biblical verse, “Right here I’m Lord. Ship me.”

Loud applause rang out when the monitor confirmed a picture of Kirk. An announcer referred to as Kirk a “our good friend and hero”.

Lauren Gambino

on the State Farm stadium in Glendale, Arizona

Officers and outstanding Maga world influencers are filling the world.

Congresswoman Lauren Boebert was amongst those that have arrived. Conservative activist Scott Presler posed for images and Steve Bannon was noticed being escorted round into the venue. Elon Musk mentioned on X he was in attendance.

Credentialed alongside the normal press corps are a number of new media podcast hosts, YouTubers and younger influencers, together with some kids – a testomony to his huge affect on younger conservatives.

Robert Mackey

Within the days main as much as at present’s memorial service, AI-generated tributes to Charlie Kirk, which appeared to current his personal commentary from past the grave, stuffed the web and have been even performed throughout companies at megachurches.

One of many first to seem was a reassuring message in an AI clone of Kirk’s voice that was created inside hours of Kirk’s dying after which performed final Sunday at Dream Metropolis church, the Phoenix megachurch the place Kirk worshipped, and held political occasions, together with a Trump rally in 2020.

One of many many AI-generated messages created instantly after Kirk’s dying was a video shared by a far-right English nationalist that pictured him with an angel’s wings, urging his supporters to double down on assist for Israel, and vilifying supporters of Palestine, together with an AI-generated picture of a scowling Greta Thunberg.

Within the emotionally and politically charged days because the killing of Charlie Kirk, the rightwing youth activist who was an in depth ally of Donald Trump, one assertion has loomed giant. On Monday, the US lawyer normal – the official in control of the rule of legislation in America – mentioned that the Trump administration would “completely goal” those that espouse “hate speech” about Kirk.

Not like in lots of different nations, hate speech is protected by US legislation except it incites imminent violence or constitutes a real menace. However that didn’t deter the nation’s prime legislation enforcement officer, who additionally suggested that – for instance – a print store worker who refused to print flyers memorializing Kirk may very well be “prosecuted”.

Since Kirk was shot to dying whereas talking to varsity college students in Utah earlier this month, the US has been gripped by a bitter debate in regards to the relation between political speech and violence. Bondi later walked again a few of her remarks, partially due to criticism from different conservatives anxious in regards to the reframing of “free speech” as “hate speech”. However Trump, JD Vance, White Home adviser Stephen Miller and different prime Republicans have framed Kirk’s dying because the consequence of what they declare is unchecked and violent rhetoric, which they blame on the left wing alone.

It’s a outstanding flip from outstanding American conservatives, who till Trump’s return to energy in January had lengthy complained of a censorious leftwing “cancel tradition” however now appear blissful to reframe that, too, as “consequence tradition”.

Lauren Gambino

on the State Farm stadium in Glendale, Arizona

Christina Sawick, sporting a “Trump was proper about every little thing” hat, mentioned she has been watching and listening to Kirk since 2016. This morning, she left her residence in Mesa at 3am to attend his memorial service.

She mentioned she appreciated Kirk’s willingness to debate anybody no matter their politics or background. “He didn’t sugarcoat something,” she mentioned. “He simply needed to be heard and he needed all people to be heard.”

Sawick mentioned going ahead she hoped extra People would settle for – even when they don’t assist – the president and his message. “I need individuals to get behind our president,” she mentioned. “There’s nothing flawed with making America nice once more.”

The FBI has restricted the airspace surrounding State Farm stadium in Glendale, Arizona, forward of Charlie Kirk’s funeral service.

In a publish on X, the FBI mentioned:

“All plane operators are reminded to test and confirm FAA Notices to Airmen (NOTAMs) earlier than each flight. Drone operators who enter the restricted areas with out permission might face drone confiscation, fines and potential felony prosecution.

Pursuant to federal legislation, the FBI and/or different federal companions could take safety motion that ends in the interference, disruption, seizure, harm to or destruction of any drone deemed to pose a reputable security or safety menace.”

Lauren Gambino

on the State Farm stadium in Glendale, Arizona

Jeffrey Barke, a doctor with a big on-line following, got here with a gaggle of buddies from Orange county on what he referred to as a “pilgrimage of types” to honor Charlie Kirk’s life and legacy.

“What you’re seeing right here is not only a tribute to his motion, you’re seeing a revival of his message: religion, household, freedom,” Barke mentioned, gesturing to the swelling crowd of supporters. Although solely 31, Kirk left a long-lasting religious and political legacy, Barke mentioned.

“I feel each one in every of us must be a bit extra uncomfortable than we’re used to in spreading Charlie’s message,” he mentioned, pledging to make use of his personal platform and social media presence to take action.

Charlie Kirk was shot whereas talking on the campus of Utah Valley College, close to Salt Lake Metropolis, as a part of the American Comeback tour, which is hosted by the college’s Turning Level USA (TPUSA) chapter and was attended by as many as 3,000 individuals, in keeping with Jeffrey Lengthy, the police chief on the college.

Kirk had pioneered a method of ideological warfare in opposition to what he considered as bastions of leftism, serving to flip campuses into cultural battlefields and paving the way in which for Donald Trump’s unprecedented marketing campaign to weaken American universities and topic them to his motion’s ideological agenda.

“Charlie Kirk can be remembered as one of many foremost architects of the political technique of treating college and college students with whom he disagrees as enemies to be defeated,” mentioned Isaac Kamola, a political science professor at Trinity School whose analysis focuses on conservative efforts to undermine greater schooling.

Lauren Gambino

on the State Farm stadium in Glendale, Arizona

1000’s of individuals sporting crimson, white and blue are pouring into State Farm Stadium in Glendale, a suburb of Phoenix. Traces snaked a number of blocks earlier this morning earlier than dawn within the desert, the place temperatures have been anticipated to close 100 this afternoon.

Inside, many followers of Kirk, the huge stadium was dotted with crimson MAGA hats and American flags. Seats started to fill hours earlier than the official program was as a result of start. Some supporters have been already in tears as they listened to a Christian rock group that was acting on stage.