Over 6,500 people packed Utah State University’s Spectrum arena for Turning Point USA’s second visit to the state this month, following conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s assassination at Utah Valley University on Sept. 10.
Utah Senator Mike Lee, Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, Arizona Rep. Andy Biggs and former Utah Rep. Jason Chaffetz joined Turning Point Action COO Tyler Bowyer and podcaster Alex Clark to fill in for Kirk.
A panel featuring Cox, Biggs, Chaffetz and Bowyer took up the bulk of the time at the event. They also took questions from the audience.
Clark started the event by reassuring the audience that TPUSA’s mission did not die with Kirk.
“If you came to mourn the death of America, the death of masculinity and femininity, of faith, of truth — you are at the wrong event. It is not over. It is not even close,” she said.
Chaffetz describes his harrowing experience watching Kirk die at UVU
Chaffetz was with his family watching Kirk debate students at UVU’s outdoor amphitheater when his friend was shot. Chaffetz said he watched Kirk fall out of his chair, and then he ran with his family, “because you didn’t know if there were going to be more shots fired.”
That night around 11:30 p.m., President Trump called Chaffetz. Usually when Trump calls, he begins the call, “Hello, Jason, this is your favorite president, Donald Trump,” Chaffetz explained. But this time Trump didn’t begin like that.
“He called and said, ‘How’re you doing? I’ve seen you on TV, and this is hard,’” Chaffetz recalled.
At the end of their conversation, Chaffetz asked Trump how he was doing, and he said Trump responded, “‘I don’t know if I would be the president of the United States without Charlie Kirk.’”
Gov. Cox acknowledges past disagreements with Kirk
Cox’s reception at the event was rocky at first. Leading up the event, several older people walked up and down the line of people waiting holding signs depicting an X post from 2022 of Kirk being critical of the governor. When Cox walked on stage, he was met by boos.
The first question asked during the student-led Q&A portion of the event addressed this tension.
“It’s no secret that you and Kirk did not historically see eye to eye,” the student said. Kirk “even went so far as to say that you should be expelled from the Republican Party... You seem to have changed your tune about Charlie. How has Charlie personally impacted you?” she asked.
Cox responded, “It might surprise you, but I heard a lot from Charlie over the years.”
Kirk’s and Cox’s disagreements sprang from policy differences. In 2022, Cox vetoed legislation that would have banned transgender student-athletes from competing in girls sports in Utah. On stage, he reasoned that this legislation would have “incentivized” more children to transition, and said he wanted to work on a bill that would pass judicial muster with the legislature.
Cox added that he wished he’d had this debate with Kirk three years ago when it happened, “because I think he would have understood me better,” he said. “And I don’t think he would have agreed with me. I think he would have still been upset with me.”
But what has changed for Cox since 2022 is that he said he has refined two important definitions.
“Love and acceptance are two very different things,” he said. Holding people accountable to what we think is wrong is something “we should be very upfront about,” Cox said. “I haven’t always been trying to do that.”
Sen. Mike Lee: ‘Without God, politics is like a ship without a compass’
Lee delivered a recorded message from Washington D.C., amid government shutdown votes Tuesday and Wednesday.
Kirk was just a teenager when he was introduced to Lee, and the two became good friends, Lee said.
The senator said he introduced Kirk to his then-teenage daughter as a future president of the United States of America.
“I still can’t believe he’s gone,” Lee said.
But in Kirk’s 31 years, he understood the power of ideas. “He knew that free speech in a society as diverse as ours is necessarily messy, but he knew that free people given the chance to encounter censorship with the truth can outthink propaganda,” he said.
“Charlie understood that the cure for bad speech is not a ban. Rather, it’s better speech in the marketplace of ideas. Truth does not fear competition,” Lee said.
Kirk’s example “calls on us to confront errors with reason, to meet hostility with courage and to have conversations even when they’re uncomfortable.”
Is political violence really a both-party issue?
Biggs, Chaffetz and Bowyer said they believe the political left is more likely to be violent, while Cox was more hesitant to assign blame.
“If you have a group of people that is constantly demonizing, de-humanizing and using the worst possible rhetoric, you avoid your action and trigger some people to actually engage,” Biggs said.
This kind of rhetoric was seen among progressives attempting to take down President Trump, Biggs said.
Cox responded, “This isn’t just about left and right. This is about good and evil.”
Bowyer asked Cox, “Do you believe it’s a both-sides issue?” Cox said he does think there are violent people on the far right.
But, he said, “The idea that speech is violence and violence is speech is not coming from the right.”
Cox on why he supports capital punishment for Kirk’s accused shooter
Another student asked Cox why he believes Utah should pursue the death penalty for Tyler Robinson, Kirk’s accused assassin.
“I try to be very introspective about the death penalty,” Cox said. He said he supports small, limited government, and the “ultimate power” expressed by the state is the death penalty.
But, Cox said, “there is no more extreme circumstance than what we saw here. This was treason,” he said. “We’re going to follow the law as it exists.”
Students who witnessed Kirk’s death at UVU made the drive up to Utah State
Parker Beagley, a junior at Utah Valley University, was about twenty feet from Kirk when he saw the 31-year-old get shot.
Waiting in line with his little sister ahead of the Turning Point event, Beagley said the whole experience has made him feel more courageous about sharing his religious and political beliefs.
“Just talking, even disagreeing peacefully about things, and being unified together is what is going to save our country,” Beagley told the Deseret News.
Karli Pilling, also a junior at Utah Valley University, also made the drive up to Logan to attend Utah State’s TPUSA event.
“You have to keep going, pick up the torch and keep moving on in life,” she said. “There’s like a weird sense of just being like, you don’t know what what’s going to happen anymore.”
She added, “I feel like the bubble in Utah is definitely popped over the last month. Utah bubble? Come on, that bubble is gone.”
What did the university do to secure the event?
Bags and backpacks larger than 6½ inches by 4½ inches were prohibited. Bags smaller than that were searched, and all attendees were required to go through metal detectors.
No outside signs were allowed in, and there was no reentry.
University officials said security for the event would be similar to sporting events to ensure the safety of the speakers and all those attending.
Non-threatening ‘suspicious package’ heightened tension ahead of event
Several hours before the event, Utah State officials issued an emergency alert evacuating the Old Main building on campus, but a couple of hours later they issued the “all clear.”
Less than an hour after the alert was sent out, social media accounts from those on campus said officials appeared to possibly detonate something.
A short time later, a new alert indicated the Old Main building was clear and safe. A suspicious package was found, but after university and local law enforcement detonated the non-explosive device it was found to be harmless.
Who will fill in for Kirk on other tour stops?
Three of the 11 upcoming stops on Kirk’s “American Comeback Tour” are yet to be filled. The other seven will be covered by the following politicians and political commentators:
- Vivek Ramaswamy and Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte at Montana State on Oct. 7.
- Glenn Beck at the University of North Dakota on Oct. 9.
- TBD at the University of Oklahoma on Oct. 16.
- Tucker Carlson at Indiana University Bloomington on Oct. 21.
- Allie Beth Stuckey and Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry at Louisiana State University on Oct. 27.
- TBD at Ole Miss on Oct. 29.
- TBD at Auburn University on Nov. 5.
- Rob Schneider and Frank Turek at UC Berkeley on Nov. 10