Charlie's Empty Chair — In His Honor, Never in His Place

Summary

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The Charlie Kirk Show

Episode: Charlie’s Empty Chair — In His Honor, Never in His Place

Date: September 12, 2025
Host: Andrew Colvitt (filling in), with Jack Posobiec, Tyler Bowyer, Blake Neff
In Memoriam: Charlie Kirk

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Main Theme & Purpose

This episode is an emotional, unscripted memorial and tribute to Charlie Kirk—the late founder of Turning Point USA, conservative activist, and host of this program. With the "empty chair" left intentionally unoccupied, the show honors Charlie’s legacy, reflecting on his monumental influence, faith, personal relationships, and the outpouring of grief and support following his tragic and untimely death.

The episode features Charlie’s closest collaborators—Andrew, Jack, Tyler, and Blake—sharing personal stories, behind-the-scenes memories, and discussing how Kirk’s life and message changed countless lives. The tone is reverent, unguarded, and filled with both sorrow and celebration of the man they loved.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Remembering Charlie: The Man and the Mission

• The episode opens with Andrew and the team commemorating the empty chair ("nobody could ever hope to" fill it, [06:14]), stating their purpose: to honor Charlie’s legacy and ensure listeners "know him like we knew him" ([06:30]).
• The group recalls Turning Point USA's humble beginnings to becoming a massive grassroots movement, with Charlie at the helm.

2. Personal Reflections and Grief

• Each guest takes turns expressing raw grief, gratitude, and awe at having known Charlie so closely.
  • Jack: "The seat looks empty, but it's not... Charlie is the only thing we're all thinking about right now." ([09:21])
  • Tyler: Urges all who knew Charlie to write their memories down, mentioning the diversity and power of those stories ([11:24]).
  • Blake: Describes Charlie as someone who "gave me my life back" and always stood up for what was right and good for the country ([16:01]).

3. Charlie’s Faith and Family

• Faith is described as Charlie’s foundation, permeating everything about his work and leadership.
  • "It was always God that got us here. There were so many times where our backs were so against the wall... we got through it, and it was God." – Andrew ([13:39])
  • Blake and others recount how Charlie’s openness about his Christian faith intensified after meeting his wife, Erica, whom he deeply loved and admired ([19:18]).

4. Origins of Charlie’s Relationship with Erica

• Tyler tells the story of inadvertently connecting Charlie with his future wife, Erica, at a Trump rally in Arizona: "Charlie was immediately in love. Absolutely in love." ([28:33])
• The panel jokes about “pre-Erica” Charlie’s fashion and how his relationship and faith only strengthened with Erica as a partner and equal.

5. Charlie’s Humility, Discipline, and Humor

• Anecdotes abound: disciplined habits (limited food choices), quirky travel hacks (compression socks), and his nonchalance toward fame.
  • "He was a very humble person... He didn't want the spotlight. He just wanted to tell the truth." – Tyler ([42:26])
  • “You could build a religion around this,”—a favorite Charlie food phrase ([60:06])
  • Charlie’s delight in Seinfeld and how he found parallels between sitcom humor and cultural battles ([87:28]).

6. Charlie’s Grassroots Spirit & Listener Engagement

• The hosts emphasize how Charlie kept close to the grassroots, personally answering emails during live shows and incorporating listener arguments into real-time debates ([34:37], [128:11]).
  • "He never lost sight of the grassroots" ([35:38]).
  • "He could be talking, giving a monologue, and writing a separate argument to an email" ([128:39]).

7. Legacy and Mission Continuity

• Erica Kirk urged the team to ensure Turning Point and the show not only continue but "grow even bigger" ([48:57]).
  • The hosts stress, "There isn’t a next Charlie Kirk, but Charlie, if you asked him, he’d say, 'You.'... Take that Charlie Kirk spirit and go and be the next one." – Jack ([50:29])
• Tributes and stories pour in from around the world (vigils in Australia, Europe, US), demonstrating Charlie’s global influence ([122:49]).

8. Impact on Young People and Families

• Tyler and others share how youth first discovered Charlie and introduced him to their parents, highlighting his rare breakthrough across generations ([72:27]).
• Many listeners and past staff remark that their deepest life changes, including marriages and families, were inspired by Turning Point and Charlie’s message ([108:27]).

9. Charlie’s “Assignment from God”

• Multiple times, the discussion circles around the idea that Charlie was always “on assignment from God” ([15:28]), with contributors expressing spiritual gratitude and hope that his work leads many to faith in Christ.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

On Charlie’s Influence & Humility

• "Charlie is the only thing we're all thinking about right now... Because he’s here." – Jack ([09:21])
• "Nobody will ever fill [his chair]. Nobody could ever hope to." – Andrew ([06:14])
• "He saw greatness in you and he brought it out by first being great himself." – Daisy (read by Andrew, [95:24])
• "He always told young people, be a part of something bigger than yourself. And he is the most iconic example of that that I think any of us can imagine." – Andrew ([43:26])

On Faith, Family, and Courage

• "It was always God...and God has not pulled his hand away from Charlie Kirk." – Andrew ([13:39])
• "He loved Erica, their children, how much he cared for them and how it really demonstrates the power of that...family love." – Blake ([19:18])
• "He wasn't fearless. He was courageous. He looked fear right in the eye and overcame it again and again." – Andrew ([157:56])

On Listener Engagement & Grassroots

• "He could be talking, giving a monologue, and writing a separate argument to an email." – Jack ([128:39])
• "Charlie never let [isolation] happen. That's why he went to college campuses, because he learned and he knew and he saw what kids were really thinking." – Andrew ([35:38])

Charlie’s Humor & Relatability

• "You could build a religion around this," (on finding a new favorite food)—a quintessential Charlieism ([60:06])
• "Is it good?" (on memes and culture) – the recurring phrase Charlie would use ([156:23])

On Continuing the Mission

• "Erica looked at me yesterday and she said the show has to keep going and Turning Point has to grow even bigger." – Andrew ([48:57])
• "The only way to honor Charlie is for everything to get bigger...activate as many human beings as possible to do the Lord’s work and to save the Republic." – Tyler ([49:23])

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Important Segments & Timestamps

| Segment | Timestamp | |----------------------------------------|---------------| | Opening tributes and empty chair | 06:00–09:30 | | Reflections on Charlie’s character | 09:21–13:39 | | Charlie’s faith and his "assignment" | 13:39–15:28 | | Impact of meeting Erica & family focus | 19:15–25:00 | | Story of how Charlie met Erica | 26:21–31:36 | | On humility and spotlight aversion | 42:04–43:26 | | Listener engagement/argument culture | 34:37 & 128:11| | Worldwide vigils/impact | 122:43–124:21 | | Seinfeld humor and meme explanations | 87:28–89:00, 152:55–156:43| | Rush Limbaugh’s praise | 90:36–92:09 | | Caller remembrances and prayer | 114:18–118:03 | | Reflections on faith and mission | 118:03–121:29 | | Reading of Daisy’s tribute | 95:23–97:53 |

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The Spirit and the Future

• The team promises to keep Charlie’s legacy alive: "There isn’t a next Charlie Kirk—but you must carry this spirit into your life."
• The future of Turning Point USA and the Charlie Kirk Show will press on, honoring Charlie’s vision and fighting for faith, family, and country.

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Final Note

This episode serves not only as a memorial but as a call to action—urging listeners to step up, write their memories, become active in their communities, and carry Charlie Kirk’s mission forward. Its spirit is one of humility, faith, and relentless pursuit of truth in the public square.

"We love you, Charlie. You are our hero and always will be." ([159:28])

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Transcript

[Evan]

Satan. Sam.

[Charlie Kirk]

I talk to a lot of young people on campuses at our events, on my radio show, podcast and social media. Social media said differently. I visit college campuses so you don't have to. We're talking to so many voters that know it is time for change. They know that something is wrong. America's future is a series of choices. Our current state of slow motion national decline is a choice. Today is our two year old's birthday and I look at my daughter and that is my why. For those that are parents, you know exactly what I mean.

[Tyler]

There is no mountain that stands tall as your faithfulness. There is no river that runs wide as your goodness.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Man, Charlie, I, I remember when we were starting these out and it was.

[Charlie Kirk]

That, like that, you know, it was.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Like this, it was like, it was.

[Charlie Kirk]

Like your average three rows.

[Andrew Colvitt]

It was like your average political meeting where there was like 12 people in a room. And this is, this is awesome.

[Charlie Kirk]

This, in my personal opinion, was the.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Most over the top Trump event that I've ever covered.

[Charlie Kirk]

This is the number one boots on the ground operation in the country. We're working directly in harmony with the Trump campaign. It's been vetted, it's been cleared, it's been blessed, as you can see there. And we're going to try to win this thing. No guarantees. It's what we do that matters. Mr. President, I can tell you this room is 100% with you and we have your back. God bless you.

[Evan]

Thank you.

[Charlie Kirk]

As you know, we are heading on campus here momentarily at the University of South Florida, throwing it down with the students. It's going to be a lot of fun. We are excited to continue this cultural movement that we have started at Turning Point usa. More high school chapters, more college chapters and disagreement is not just welcome, it is invited. We want to have those tough conversations. That's what it's all about. Because you're not supposed to be involved in this. You're supposed to just kind of be on the vote for me every four years, give me more political power and stay out of my business. And what has happened is we are seeing an explosion in citizen participation.

[Andrew Colvitt]

All of my days, your mercy follow me.

[Tyler]

Oh, there is nothing else I'll ever need.

[Charlie Kirk]

Knock on that extra door, go that extra mile, talk to that extra friend. Because throughout voting month and culminating on the 5th of November, I believe it will go down as a day that people remember, as a day that is written about history books, as the final battle. From the golden escalator on down from defeating Hillary Clinton, from the nonsense of 2020 from Butler, Pennsylvania. November 5th at all commonings, where we restore the promise that the founders gave us. And they said, hey, if the people want it, the people get it. And we the people, take back America. God bless Arizona and thank you so much. Every day, the American people demand certain accomplishments and victories. Disagreement is what keeps a movement alive, keeps a movement fun. Here in this country, we are a country of flourishing. We're a country of risk taking. We're a country of building. We will achieve American greatness. And we are just getting started.

[Andrew Colvitt]

All my days, your mercy. Follow me. Welcome to the Charlie Kirk show. This is Andrew Colvett filling in for the one and only Charlie Kirk. Nobody. And we wanted so badly to do this show for all of you today. And I wanted the friends of this show and of Charlie that knew him best, the thought crime crew, to be here in the studio to commemorate our friend, our dear brother, for this sacred and solemn moment, this occasion none of us ever dreamed we would have to do. And here we are. Because Charlie would want us to be here. He would be upset if we weren't here. And we, of course, have left his chair open and empty because nobody will ever fill it. Nobody could ever hope to. But by all of us together, we want to honor him and we want to be more like him and we want to be inspired by him. And we want you in the audience to know him like we knew him and to be up close and personal to the front row seat, to history, to a legend, to an American icon that we got every single day. And I don't know why we were so fortunate and blessed to be those people, those few that got to see it so up close. He touched millions. He personally knew tens of thousands. And somehow we were the blessed ones that got to be close to him. And in the chats, we got yelled at by him. We got pushed to more and to be better because of Charlie and by Charlie. And so we have to my right, Jack Bosobic, Blake Neff and Tyler Bowyer and myself, Andrew Colvitt, the executive producer of the Charlie Kirk show. And we are so honored to share what we know about Charlie and to do it on a day where the authorities tell us that his killer has been brought into custody. And I want to say personally, thank you to Kash Patel and Dan Bongino. Governor Cox, you told us you would not stop until you got him. And I admit that my faith wavered at times as the hour stretched on. But you appear to have the suspect in custody, and we're Grateful that you have not slept, you did not rest just like you promised. And you are men of your word, and we are grateful to you. And so with that, I just want to again welcome my friends. And Jack, I'm going to start with you. Tell us what's on your heart right now, brother.

[Jack]

Well, you know, it's like, I know the seat looks empty, but it's not. The seat isn't empty at all. Because in a way, Charlie is the only thing we're all thinking about right now. We can't think of anything else, really. We can't think straight. We can read and we can talk, but at the end of the day, all we're thinking about is Charlie. And we know that Charlie is looking down on us. And I know that when we all gather here, it's like he's here. And that's why no one wants to sit there, because he is there. We were saying thank yous just there. And the only thing that I guess I would add is, you know, we're hearing these reports that family members of the suspect were involved, particularly the father, in bringing him to the police, bringing him to the authorities. And if that's true, I'd just like to extend a sincere thank you and gratitude to something like that. As a father, I can't even imagine. I just can't even imagine what that must be like. But to have done that is just shows the ultimate goodness and the ultimate righteousness that still does exist in this country. And the fact that people are willing to step up and do the right thing, even in impossible odds, and that's the Charlie Kirk spirit that's always been the Charlie Kirk spirit, is to stare down impossible odds and say, I'm going to do it anyway when everybody told him he couldn't. And that's. That's the Charlie Kirk. I know that when you told him he couldn't do it, he'd say, figure it out, Tyler. I'm sure he told you that more times than you can count.

[Tyler]

I've just. It's been really hard. I mean, we've been able to lean on each other, I think, talking a lot to one another about the memories. And that's probably, I think, the most. The most important thing that we can do today is share those memories. I've been telling everybody that's reached out on our staff. I mean, we've hired thousands of people in Turning Point, and it hasn't been easy. That's been part of the battle on Charlie. It's like, I'm gonna miss Those. Right, Tyler? You know, conversations when we are sitting around, because it's. You don't really know the battles unless you've been in them. But there's so many people that have looked at Charlie along the way as. As a mentor that all have different emotions and they have different stories. And I've told people. Write them down. Every single person that's reached out to me. I'm so sorry, Tyler. I was like, please just write down your memories that you had. Because some of these stories are so unbelievably funny. They're so unbelievable in general, because God's hand has been such a big part.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Of.

[Tyler]

Charlie's story and legacy. I'm so sorry.

[Jack]

No, it's. It's. We're all right there. We're all right there.

[Tyler]

And for those of us that have been close, like we've talked about, we've seen, Evan sand is part of that, and that has to be. That has to be accentuated because that's what Charlie wanted. We talked about that all the time with people invested in Attorney Point, all the major stakeholders that. You know, a lot of people look at this as political dynamo, the dynamics of all of that. But all of this has been, you know, even through this tragic. This tragic week, I believe that God has been with Charlie from day one and will continue to be.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Blake, I want to. You're next, buddy, so get ready. But I want to just comment on what you're saying, because one of the last trips that I took with Charlie was a couple weeks ago, and we were flying all over the country, spent hours on the plane, and I said to him, isn't it crazy? Like, you know, we were talking about South Park. We were talking about just everything. Like, we just kind of had a moment, and he's just like, yeah, it's all God. He just instantly goes, yeah, it's all God. It's all God. And as I was driving to the office in the studio this morning, I thought to myself, it was always God, and God has not pulled his hand away from Charlie Kirk that did not pull his hand away from Turning Point. He did not pull his hand away from this country. It was always God that got us here. There were so many times, and I want the audience to know this, there were so many times where we felt like our backs were so against the wall that we were not going to get through whatever it was that this thing happened or, you know, this. It was just so many things. It's impossible right now. Now's not the time to get into the details. There was just so many things. And Charlie and I would feel the weight of the world when we talk to each other. And I know you felt it. I know you felt it, and I know you felt it. And then we got through it, and it was God. And somehow we came out stronger and better, and Charlie had more influence, and our reach and our staff and everything just kept growing time and time again. He knew that it was all God's hand. He knew it was all the blessing of God on him and on this organization. And on the show yesterday, I said.

[Jack]

Charlie'S on assignment for From God, and he always has been.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Every time you filled in for Charlie, you said, well, Charlie's on assignment.

[Jack]

So now he's on assignment from God, and he always was.

[Andrew Colvitt]

All right, Blake, it is your turn. And I want everybody to know that probably nobody traveled with Charlie more than Blake in the last, I'd say 18 months, except maybe Mikey.

[Blake]

Mikey.

[Caleb]

For sure.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Mikey. But you traveled to London with him. You went to Korea with him. Blake, the floor is yours.

[Blake]

Thanks. I feel unworthy to be here. You guys all knew him a lot longer than I did compared to a lot of people here. Charlie entered my life pretty recently. I remember you called me out of the blue almost exactly three years ago, first week of October 22nd. And I don't want to get into the details of it, but I can say Charlie had a drastic impact on my life. He basically gave me my life back.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And.

[Blake]

I don't know how to express how grateful I am for that and.

[Andrew Colvitt]

How.

[Blake]

Just over the past three years, how. How much I came to admire him, not just for how talented of a person he was, but. But how good of a person he was and how everything he fought for was because he believed it would be good for the country and good for every single person in it. And I'll always think one of the. You know, the final things I was doing with him. I mentioned with you, Jack, yesterday, the last speech he gave was in Japan to an audience.

[Jack]

Buddhist?

[Blake]

No Buddhist. Shinto?

[Andrew Colvitt]

No.

[Blake]

No Christians in it. Maybe a handful, but not many. And, you know, it was about immigration, it was about other stuff, but he wanted to include. I should witness to the faith, you know, regardless of where we're going. And we talked about how he could do that, and we put it into the speech five minutes before he went up there and he did it. And because it was that important to him that he do that, it wasn't about just, you know, he wasn't catering to any audience. This is a speech almost nobody in the US Would ever see or watch. And most of the audience in Japan might not even get it. But he wanted to do it because it was important to him.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And.

[Blake]

Just a minute before when it happened, you know, he was witnessing to the gospel there at the college. And.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Blake, it makes me. It gives me some solace and some comfort to know that you were there with him on campus that day. And I was just grateful to be able to call you and know that I at least had somebody that was there and that loved him and that was close, and I could call you. And I'm just glad you were there, man. It's not good. It's not fair to you that you had to be there, but I'm glad that. I'm glad that you were. And you and I and Charlie were texting literally moments before he went out to the crowd, and we were talking about arguments and finer points that he could make. And he Going over, you know, this kind of question, you know, we should.

[Blake]

What it was about. He was, what are the good arguments in favor of. Of marriage.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Marriage.

[Blake]

Monogamy, The Christian version of marriage.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yes.

[Blake]

And it was, you know, that gets back to, you know, one of the other core things. How much she. How much he loved Erica, how much he loved their children, how much and how much he cared for them and how it really demonstrates the power of that, you know, familial love. Because we all talked about how they made him better, too.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And isn't that the truth?

[Jack]

You see Charlie, like, pre Erika and then Charlie post Erica, and it's. And it's. It's still Charlie, but it's like more.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Better. Better clothes. They actually fit him.

[Tyler]

We were just talking about this yesterday. I.

[Jack]

And he's a father, and I, I.

[Tyler]

No, it was like night and day difference. So we used to, like. I used to be worried about Charlie.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Jerrica is legitimately the real mvp.

[Jack]

And I don't just mean the fashion. I don't just mean the fashion.

[Tyler]

We were talking about against Charlie's birth, talking about that. It's rough.

[Andrew Colvitt]

The visible boy.

[Tyler]

Charlie's birthday's in about a month, and. And we used to. I used to buy him clothes on his birthday as an excuse to buy him, like, sneakers, because he wouldn't wear sneakers. He would only wear dress shoes.

[Jack]

That's right.

[Tyler]

And then Erica came, and then he worked. I was, like, so relieved because he would wear clothes that, like, he. He'd look better than anyone. Like.

[Jack]

Like a normal person.

[Tyler]

No, he looked better than everybody because Eric is incredibly stylish and great and just. It was just like he went from like the stone age to like he now had this incredibly well manicured dress.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Let me, let's. I love this, this vein. We want to tell you about Erica and we're gonna. The before and after Erica Kirk story is a really amazing story. And I did.

[Jack]

I was trying to make a point. You were going to go emotional.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I have been basically crying for two and a half days and I was just. I remembering Charlie being. When I first met him. It was like everything was baggy and like the suits didn't fit and like the collars were always like out like this.

[Jack]

I wish they're playing those, those videos now.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yes.

[Jack]

When he's younger.

[Tyler]

And yes, I was showing, I was showing Andrew an image. It was so funny because studio.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Can we get like an OG ck? I can shot with it.

[Tyler]

I'll send one that's like a perfect one.

[Andrew Colvitt]

That's.

[Tyler]

But he was before and after shot it was like a very baggy suit and it just. But you know what?

[Andrew Colvitt]

This is, this is kind of very. This isn't with a suit. But this was like.

[Tyler]

No, no, no, I got it. I've got it. I've got a perfect one. But anyways, the point is, is like. But his, his spirit shine through so brightly.

[Andrew Colvitt]

It didn't matter.

[Tyler]

It didn't matter. No, like of course that's what it was like. I remember being in some of these meetings. I was like, oh my gosh. Like cuz he would carry around the backpack. He had this big black backpack that has his, his initials on it. He had that forever. And he had forever one, one pair of shoes, dress shoes that he wore and then these big. But it didn't matter. Like none of that mattered. Every single person that talked to him, every one of these big time donors early on, like big time. I mean they had. He would just, just be able to break through to every single one of those people and well, it was always special.

[Andrew Colvitt]

It was, it was his unique voice. And this is why Charlie would go viral on campus. He would never pull any punches. The guy would say. He would say the truth with a hundred percent fidelity. Do you know what I mean? It was like men and women like you know, are different. You know, two sexes.

[Jack]

Like, you know, it was like there's no equivocation.

[Andrew Colvitt]

No. There was no like, well, some people feel this. No, it was like, you know it's wrong when people steal. Does it make it okay that they were poor? No, it's wrong. Right. You know, and it was just. He had this moral clarity that he was just blessed by God with. And he would not cut any corners with it. And so, yeah, it didn't matter the suit he was wearing. It didn't matter. His fashion. Although I will tell you.

[Jack]

But Erica.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Erica made his looks much better. And I will also tell you that his friends, Don Jr. Gentry beach, they gave him, like, a gift card at one point, a $10,000 credit at the Trump Taylor in New York City in Manhattan to get him some proper suits. It was like one of these things.

[Jack]

Charlie, you're gonna be around.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. If you're gonna hang around with us, Charlie, we need you to look a little bit more put together.

[Jack]

Take care of that a little bit.

[Tyler]

Yeah, but it was. I mean, it was a. Oh, my gosh.

[Jack]

Tyler, get this. Get this up.

[Tyler]

You have to see. This is the pre. Erica and then Eric and then looked immediately.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I love it.

[Tyler]

I mean. No, immediately better. I mean, I'm not even kidding.

[Jack]

He's like, sorry, we got to.

[Andrew Colvitt]

The real miracle is that Erica went for it. You know what I mean? She's seeing the. You know, the baggy shirt. No, I mean, she knew. He knew.

[Jack]

No, but that's. That's. That's female, right? That's the female. Tanya was the same with me. It's. It's the female. I see the thing, and I want to nurture.

[Blake]

Michelangelo could see. See a block of marble, and he would just bring the David out. He's like, david's already in there. I just have to reveal it.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I want to say it's typically not a good idea to say. I think I. I could change this man or something for the women watching. But you can polish.

[Blake]

They're not. Yeah, they're not changing.

[Jack]

Not the deeper bringing forth. And you could never change Charlie's spirit. Right, but.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Exactly right.

[Jack]

But what she. What she did, I think, if anything, just in terms of this is make it so that the external match the internal.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah, sure. And I will say as well, though, that Charlie's faith became so much stronger as soon as Erica came around and he started vocalizing it more. And for those of you in the audience that don't know Erica Kirk, the woman is a lioness. She is fierce. She is strong. She's obviously, like, distraught and hurting, as we all are, but she is fierce and she is strong. And I want you to know that about her, that I have seen her up close. And, Tyler, you've been there as well with us, and she is so strong, and Charlie wanted to marry her because of how strong she was. And ultimately he knew that she could do this life that he was leading. And Charlie was already leading a crazy life when they met and when they fell in love and when they got married. And he knew that she had the strength in her core. And she was also, she is also such an incredible woman of faith. He knew that she could do this. And he was 100% right about Erica Kirk. She is truly something amazing, and we all love her dearly. Tyler, why don't you tell the story of how you inadvertently connected Charlie with his wife?

[Tyler]

So it's, it's, this is the miracle of the entire thing, which is incredible, and I don't think we can talk about it enough. It's Trump, it's Erica, it's Arizona, it's Turning Point.

[Andrew Colvitt]

It's. You couldn't script this any better. Can I. Let me, let me just set two points.

[Tyler]

I told it a little bit of it yesterday.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Tyler, I think you've told this story a few times on the show. So let's like big picture context here. Tyler pulled off the first Trump rally, the very first one in Arizona, and there's a lot of crazy details that go into it, but the first one, Tyler gets the credit.

[Tyler]

But the most important part of that, truly in the background, is that Erica Kirk is at that rally. And we don't focus on, we've talked about the rally and all that with Trump getting reelected.

[Andrew Colvitt]

She's in the background of the main shot.

[Tyler]

So right behind Trump. People don't know this. We can put it up there. Is right behind Trump on stage. First Trump rally ever. And again, they were expecting this to be a hundred person rally. They were like, wanting to give, like, refreshments.

[Jack]

You didn't even call it a rally.

[Tyler]

Right?

[Andrew Colvitt]

Well, so the original was supposed to be Corey Lewandowski.

[Tyler]

Corey Lewandowski was like, can you get.

[Andrew Colvitt]

100 people in a room?

[Tyler]

We'll provide refreshments, we'll give you money, whatever. And I'm like, no, no, no, we don't, we don't need any of that. We can get lots of people there. And we started doing this and it starts to go bonkers. Right? Because I'll give credit to Jake Hoffman, who is the president of the Freedom Caucus here. He's a state senator. He was my unpaid comms director, who was actually the guy that helped start Charlie's Instagram with me and start all the Turning Point, like all the turning Point assets that we have on social media now, by the way. Too. But we started just going bonkers with all the media. And so then I started fielding calls from everywhere. It was crazy. Everywhere. And one of the calls I got was from Erica. She's like, hey, I was Miss Arizona. I love Donald Trump. Can I be involved? I'm like, absolutely. So I met her and I was like, we've got to put her behind the president. So I had my family behind the president, my grandpa who just passed away just a few months ago, who loved Charlie, loved the show, everything, listened daily. It was my grandpa, my dad in law, Lauren, my wife. And Erica is up there.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

So Erica, after.

[Andrew Colvitt]

We gotta find the picture.

[Tyler]

After this rally, I'll pull it up. After this rally, I meet with Erica and I'm like, there's a way that we can. She's faith based. So this is the funniest part. She's faith based. She's so centered on Christmas. We've got to lean in and involve her here with. Because we were starting the initial talks about Turning Point Faith or Keep USA Faith. And I was trying to recruit her hard to come work for us. And so through all that, I'd introduced her to Charlie. I was like, I think she could be great. She could be wonderful. And Charlie was immediately in love, Absolutely in love. And I was like, charlie going back. And that's where it's like the tee up with. Yeah. The clothes, everything else. I was like, Charlie, I don't know.

[Jack]

Like, this is Miss Arizona a little more. He's.

[Tyler]

Well, this is Miss Arizona. So I was nervous. I'm like, I don't know if we. We don't want to scare her away. Right. Like, we want her to work for us, you know, so. But like, that's great. Let's just feel out. And so Charlie did the right thing. He did everything perfectly, as Charlie always does. Did everything perfectly. I dropped him, I dropped them off. I dropped him off. He was at the office here, which he was rarely at the office because he was always on the plane. And he had set up a date to go meet her at the gym because it's a fancier, nicer gym that's in the North Valley. And I took him over and I dropped him off there. And there was the whole car ride over. There was pep talk. So, all right, this is what you gotta do. This is what you gotta say. Hey, if she says this, don't do that. And he's like, well, what do I do? If. Because Charlie had had a number of dates, but not that many people, he's busy He's a busy guy. He just didn't.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah, yeah.

[Tyler]

And so it went immaculately. And after that, they had met again in New York, where she was living at the time. And he had made a special trip just to go there.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah, he made an excuse. This is what Charlie would do. He would go somewhere and he would make an excuse that was like a formal reason to be there. But there was always kind of like an ulterior motive where, you know, but it was.

[Tyler]

I'll never like. And this, these are the memories. I'm putting out a tweet right now. That saying, just write down these memories. Because I, until this now I just forgot about that was like driving him over in my car, just having that conversation, which was just like. And again, Andrew, I know you've had many of these. All of us have had many of these conversations one on one with Charlie of just like the pep talks. Because, you know, even though Charlie was such a lion of a man, it takes a village. I think of like having those conversations with one another.

[Jack]

Family.

[Tyler]

It takes a family.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. But he, he would position people in places to be able to speak to him and give him like that, like before he took the stage, like, okay, okay, okay, okay.

[Jack]

You know, but he would always, it's like he would always just want that, even though you knew that he didn't need it.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And he. Right. No, but, you know, the other thing is he. You'd think you had a really good idea and you're like, and I give it to him and, and be like, okay, okay. And then he would always take. Chew the meat and spit out the bones. He was always so good at filtering out your bad ideas without like making you feel terrible.

[Tyler]

Well, and that's. To that point Erica became that person. Like you were saying. Erica became the person that would, you know, and it was a two way road. You know, you'd have to filter out some of Charlie's bad ideas too, at times. And Erica is, you know, has become the best at that. She is the go to. And I know that that was the most valuable thing. But to put a pin in it, that, that weird situation though, which was that moment where I was sitting there with Charlie and the Trump rally culminated and Eric was there and then became his wife. Like the entire thing is like, again, you talk about God things. Clearly God has his hand. Had his hand and watching over Charlie constantly.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Well, this is the Charlie Kirk show and I want. We played. Sorry, we played an opening and we put together a Charlie Kirk. Which number is it? Blake do you have it? We put together a. Just a montage of some great Charlie Kirk moments, and I think it is. 443 is the number. We put together a montage for the audience of Charlie in his own words. And he loved this show so much. He loved this show. And he. I remember one time when I talked to him, and I said, who. Who's your greatest hero in this space? You know, obviously, Donald Trump's the president. And, you know, that was the obvious answer, but, like, no, Trump. You know, like, who's. And he said, rush Limbaugh. And Charlie got to know Rush personally. I think we had basically the last big event that. That Rush did was introducing the president. Yeah, the last two.

[Tyler]

Yeah. So he never made public appearances.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. And he's very private person.

[Tyler]

He came to our event at Mar a Lago, so we were one of the first groups to do anything with fundraisers, things like that. At Mar a Lago. People don't. People don't know that we actually did it very small. But Rush had such a personal connection with Charlie. And this is kind of early, too. Before Charlie was kind of a known quantity everywhere. Really leaned in and showed up.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. And Charlie actually went to Rush's house, picked him up in the car and drove him. Drove him there. And we had. Yeah, we gave.

[Jack]

Lived.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He lived right up the street. Yeah. In West Palm beach, or he lived in Palm Beach. So he. Yeah, but Rush was his hero, and he listened to Rush. Rush was so influential in just the way Charlie thought about politics. And if you want to know why Charlie never lost the grassroots, he was always so into the grassroots. It's because you emailed him. It's because he looked at all your emails. He looked at all the comments. He could do 48 things. It seemed like at once the most amazing multitasker I've ever seen.

[Jack]

When I would be here and we'd be on the show during breaks even. I'm going to say it, even sometimes when interviewing people, he'd be looking at the camera and yet somehow also on his computer, switching between tabs, texting, emailing, reading faster than you could even, like, grasp what was going on.

[Blake]

The amount of emails he would share, like in the middle of a show segment, like, right after you came out, or even, like, in between someone else giving an answer.

[Jack]

Oh, Jack, you got to figure out this.

[Blake]

Here's this email I got from.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Look at this. Look.

[Jack]

And you're, like, reading the last three things that he sent you.

[Andrew Colvitt]

No, he's always two steps ahead, and his Annoying was.

[Jack]

I have no idea how he did it. And he's. And these are. And what's crazy, too, is you could see it would be like, oh, hey, I got something from the speaker of the House. Oh, here's the President's son. And then, like, here's a guy I met walking his dog, and he needs a ballot. Tyler, make sure this guy gets a ballot. You know, like, it didn't make any difference to him who he was talking.

[Andrew Colvitt]

To, but he never lost sight of the grassroots and one of the guiding lights for that. And we set up freedomarliekirk.com and please send your tributes to Charlie. Your thoughts, your prayers, anything that's on your mind to freedomarliekirk.com and I will do my best to read them. And Blake, you're going to help read them. And Jack and Tyler, and we want to see what you have to say to Charlie. That's freedomarliekirk.com and Rush always had his email dialogue with his listeners, and Charlie took note of that and that it kept him close to the people because this world can get very insulating, and Charlie never let that happen. That's why he went to college campuses, because he learned and he knew and he saw what kids were really thinking. He always made such a point to stay so close to the public, even though he was so stratospherically, like, famous. We couldn't take him anywhere. And it was really at that point of stardom and fame that we couldn't take Charlie anywhere. But it all started with a love of the spoken word and what Rush Limbaugh told him. And he would take lunch breaks from school just to listen to Rush Limbaugh. And so to have this show and to be behind the microphone was one of the greatest honors of his life. And he did not take it for granted. He loved it, and he saw it as a way to pipe the vanguard of the current thinking on the current debates into the zeitgeist and to keep the base steady and keep the coalition together. So without further ado, I want to play the show tribute that our team put together. I haven't seen it yet, so I can't wait to watch it. This is 4:43. I want to thank my great friend Charlie Kirk. He's done something that is just incredible for somebody really of his age. You need tremendous talent to do what he's done, building one of the most powerful youth organizations ever created, Turning Point usa. And I want to thank you. Really, Charlie, incredible job.

[Tyler]

Amazing grace. How sweet.

[Andrew Colvitt]

The sound.

[Charlie Kirk]

I have the greatest job in the world. I couldn't be happier. Every day I feel as if what I'm saying, what I'm doing is making a difference, giving people meaning.

[Caleb]

Charlie, you should have emotion.

[Andrew Colvitt]

This is a moment. You totally reformed the GOP and look what you guys have done. Let me hear some words here from you, Charlie. You put all this together, my man.

[Jack]

Let's hear it.

[Charlie Kirk]

I am just humbled by God's grace.

[Jack]

It's all God. It's all God. God alone.

[Caleb]

It's done.

[Jack]

It's beginning.

[Charlie Kirk]

We did not earn this. This is God's mercy on our country.

[Tyler]

Yes. You're on the Lord's side.

[Charlie Kirk]

Last week, we welcomed our beautiful daughter into the world. Most important thing that one can do except giving your life to Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. We, Erica and I and our family were celebrating the birth of. Of our son.

[Jack]

I just. I'm finding out how honest you are, Charlie, and so far you're. I think you're doing good.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And I hope I'm doing good with you.

[Charlie Kirk]

Candace Owens, welcome back.

[Jack]

Yes.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Good to be back on the Charlie Kirk Show.

[Charlie Kirk]

So, Megan, there's a lot happening right now and I recently went on the Bill Maher show. I want to get your reaction. Matt, walk us through the decades long journey from 2015 to today on the public opinion battle. Michael, why are people going back to church? People going back to church because the atheism ran out of steam. Ben, thank you for taking the time. I was moved by your podcast on Monday about how we must stare the evil in the face. Pete, you're doing a phenomenal job. I just want to say that from the American people that you don't get the credit that you deserve. Obviously in the mainstream media, we are here with Stephen K. Bannon.

[Rush Limbaugh]

Charlie, I'm sorry.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I never roll through this town without seeing you.

[Charlie Kirk]

It's always the highlight.

[Jack]

It's.

[Charlie Kirk]

That's the advantage of being in Phoenix is that you're like one of the only shows in town. So everyone kind of just comes on by.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I'm sick of people stealing my stick.

[Charlie Kirk]

Wait, so a campus thing I've been doing for 13 years to debate random college kids has now been so important that it gets prominent primetime placement on Comedy Central. I think the whole thing is just awesome. Bobby Kennedy, welcome back to the program, Charlie.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Thanks for having me.

[Charlie Kirk]

They canceled the President of the United.

[Andrew Colvitt]

States, the most powerful man in the.

[Tyler]

World when it was my father. If they can do that to him.

[Andrew Colvitt]

They can do it to anyone.

[Charlie Kirk]

If they can't do it, if we're.

[Tyler]

All banded together and we're fighting one battle.

[Charlie Kirk]

Don Jr. Everybody. Very special. Our episode for you today. My wife joins us. Erica Kirk, the beautiful, legendary Erica.

[Julie]

I love you so much.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I love you.

[Tyler]

You're my best friend.

[Charlie Kirk]

Welcome to the Charlie Kirk Show.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Thanks, baby.

[Charlie Kirk]

Thanks so much for listening, everybody, and God bless.

[Andrew Colvitt]

That's. Great job, guys.

[Tyler]

Really good job.

[Andrew Colvitt]

We miss him.

[Jack]

That last shot.

[Tyler]

I miss my friend. I miss my friend. You know, one of the things that Charlie was kind of interesting early in Charlie's career was he wasn't. He's a prolific speaker. Obviously, he's a genius on stage, but he wasn't really interested in, you know, Spotlight. It's a really interesting piece to him was that he was. It was. I think that's kind of like almost like we were talking with. I was talking with people. And the best analogy to Charlie was that he was very much in the come follow me spirit of Christ. I think that's what the most Christlike thing about him was, was that people wanted to follow him. Sorry, I just can't get through all this. But he didn't want Spotlight, and I think that was part of his. And so when I had suggested with our events team that we do bigger things that we do consider because we have more people who want to show up and we have more kids and all that, it wasn't about that for him. It wasn't. I. People watched these things and they're like, we. I mean, we went rock star. We went full rock star on Charlie Kirk. And a lot of that is thanks to Andrew. I mean, without a doubt, you know, we give. We give Erica. Erica 100 made him rock star.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I give you more credit for that because you forced him to do it. And then eventually he embraced it. But.

[Tyler]

But it was.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He was not the.

[Tyler]

Wasn't interested in that.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He also, like, wasn't your sort of, like, central casting character to do it.

[Tyler]

No.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And you made him enter out and, you know, embark out on a much bigger vision.

[Tyler]

But. But this is the point with Charlie is that he was a. He was a very humble person. And I don't want that to change with, like, how people start to take the memory of Charlie because he's big. His. He wasn't interested in what the states look like or like, who was there, what the spotlight looked like. He just wanted to tell the truth. He just wanted to tell people what was what they needed to hear. And. And he was really good at that. Really good at that. But everything else built around him for the right reasons. I'm so sorry. Like, I'm like spitting like tears everywhere and everything else, it's like splash zone. But he is his, his legacy is going to be what you said, Andrew, is that he was a incredibly humble person that was thrust into something that was so much bigger than all of us, so much bigger than him. But he was the perfect person for the perfect time.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He always told young people, be a part of something bigger than yourself. And he is the, the most iconic example of that that I think any of us can imagine. You know, I wasn't gonna do this, but I think the team was absolutely spot on. People want something to remember Charlie by.

[Jack]

I've been getting message after message, email comment, this huge outpouring of people saying, and because Charlie, as we all know, he loved T shirts, apparel, he was.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Always like, get me one that says that. Give me one that says like, literally the team would screen, press them almost on a two hour turn.

[Jack]

And it's because, it's because he understood that that is a physical, real messaging platform that you can wear in the real world, in the real space.

[Andrew Colvitt]

That would be seen, that would be seen billions of times in Charlie's instance.

[Jack]

And, and he wanted, so whatever the message that he wanted to send or what he was thinking about would usually be what he would wear. And there'd be times where he'd have, you know, a different one on five days a week if you watch the show. And that was all very. I just didn't mean to say it's very deliberate. It was not like some random thing.

[Andrew Colvitt]

No, no, no. He, he loved his different shirts. And so please put them back on screen, guys. So here, here they are. And they are available for purchase. We're gonna. As many as everybody wants. We don't have a maid yet, so please be gracious with us. We're going to get them out as fast as we can. Charliekirkstore.com charliekirkstore.com and I think the team did an amazing job with them. And the, the middle one is I am Charlie Kirk.

[Jack]

I've seen so many people saying that.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. And it's, it's a beautiful testament and I love it. And I want one. And the other one is I'm just humbled by God's grace. And that, of course, was from election night, November 2024, when Charlie got news that Pennsylvania had been called by Fox News for Donald Trump and that he would be the 47th president United States, right in this room that viral Video. It happened right here, right in this chair. And Charlie put his hands up to his face and a man who doesn't cry very often got misty eyed and he gave all the glory to God. And I love that. And I'm so glad that they picked that moment. And then the other one is the freedom shirt and it has the date that it happened and that's the shirt that he was wearing. And we put the Turning Point hook on that sleeve as well. And so if you want to honor Charlie and obviously you want to help the show, that, that would be amazing.

[Tyler]

Can I shout out you guys real quick? I mean, we have so many good people who work for, for Charlie, his show, his. His personal side. People don't talk about this. I, I was careful not to talk about this because Charlie, again, didn't like the spotlight of it all. But part of the reason why this show exists is because Charlie didn't want to do things that would cost money from Turning Point. For years and years and years and years. Charlie didn't take a salary from Turning Point. He paid himself. I know this because I was the one that had to approve payrolls at Turning Point. For seven years. He paid himself like $30,000 a year.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Then A little bit, yeah, he didn't take a wage for the first five years. And then his first wage, I think was like 20.

[Tyler]

It was tiny.

[Andrew Colvitt]

15,000 the first year.

[Tyler]

20. And I know that because mine was tiny too. When I gave over, it was like insane. And then he. The part of the show was that he was able to give back. So it cost Turning Point nothing for Charlie to run Turning Point.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. People don't know this. Charlie gave. There was this stupid AP article. I'll never forget where they tried to give it. I know, but they tried to make it sound like Charlie was somehow taking money from donors or something, or policing the donors. But here's the truth. Charlie paid back his salary and then some back to Turning Point every year he donated back all that. Go ahead, Tyler.

[Tyler]

I was just gonna say this is that he was able to do something beyond anyone else. So there's, I mean, there's great people that people admire a lot. Rush is one of those people. But Rush didn't build in his spare time a Turning Point usa, A Turning Point action and all that. Right. Like Charlie did all that, gave it all back essentially for that. And then we have. The whole point of why I'm saying this is we have so many good people here at the show that have that work here, that produce it to get truth out. Because again, what that Charlie was interested in wasn't Spotlight. It was getting the truth out. It was doing something bigger than himself. And every single person that's here that are back behind the glass right now and that are in this building, that are across campus here at Turning Point headquarters, joined Charlie on that vision and are part of that. And so with that, we talk about the shirts and everything else. Please support this mission to continue Charlie's voice with. With Charlie's show, because there's so many good people here that have done that. And I know Andrew's.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Erica looked at me yesterday and she said the show has to keep going and Turning Point has to grow even bigger. And I hope I'm at liberty to say that. I think she would want me to say that. And so we don't know what the future holds for everything, at least with fine detail. But we know that that will happen, that we will honor that. And I know Charlie would want that to happen.

[Tyler]

That's the only way to honor Charlie is to. For everything to get bigger into again, again, that point, which is that this is bigger than any singular person. But honoring Charlie's memory permanently with making Turning Point bigger. And the mission, which is activate as many human beings as possible to do the work to do the Lord's work and to do the work to save the Republic.

[Andrew Colvitt]

So put those. Those shirts back.

[Jack]

That's where that.

[Andrew Colvitt]

For the radio, if you can, you can go to charliekirkstore.com charliekirkstore.com we have three options. The election night shirt is a drawing of him putting his hands on his face after he found out that Trump was going to be elected the 47th president. And he said, I'm just humbled by God's grace. And that's a beautiful one. As I am Charlie Kirk, and people love that I'm Charlie Kirk. I've been seeing that everywhere. And then we have the shirt, the freedom shirt that he was wearing and with the date on it and the. The Turning Point hook also on that, on that sleeve.

[Jack]

I think that message in the center shirt there, I'm Charlie Kirk, that that speaks to what Tyler's talking about. It's that. It's the Charlie Kirk spirit, right? It's. I was saying this yesterday on Interview. You know, who's the next Charlie Kirk? Like, well, there isn't an ex Charlie Kirk, but Charlie, if you asked him that in public, right, he would say, you, you know, you go get a megaphone or, you know, a chair and go to your local park. And set up a folding table on camp. Whatever it is. Right. Whatever public place you can be and go do this, too. And so it doesn't mean. You know, it doesn't. It's not about him. Right. It's about you take that Charlie Kirk spirit and go and be the next one and go set up your chapter or go set up your thing and go be that person. And that, I think, is. Is the message that's now. And you see this. It's around the world. It's completely.

[Andrew Colvitt]

We'll.

[Jack]

We'll talk about later, but it's. It's totally around the world. I'm getting messages from, like, I don't even want to say, but just countries that you wouldn't even believe had heard of Charlie are doing vigils for Charlie.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I actually do want to talk about that at length, because one of the things that I've realized and I tweeted about this or posted about this last night on X, there was a video of a vigil that was sent to me, and I just. And I said, I've constantly had to recalibrate my internal clock because you kind of know.

[Jack]

I know exactly what you mean.

[Andrew Colvitt]

How famous Charlie is. And then, like, something else would kind of blow your mind and be like, whoa, he's actually way bigger. And Blake, I'm sure you had a bunch of those even in Seoul. You're like, whoa, people know him here. But, yeah, I. I am realizing that as much as I tried to recalibrate, I'm probably two years behind, like, actually how famous he was, like, in my internal clock and I. In his death. And Trump said this beautifully, actually, this morning on Fox. I don't know what clip it is. I'm sure we have it.

[Jack]

We'll play that.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. That he's. Now he's even bigger. He was huge, and now he's a worldwide icon. And before we.

[Jack]

Before we get off the topic, I want to piggyback on Tyler and just say thank you to the staff for being here today.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And, yeah, their hearts are broken, too.

[Jack]

Impossible task.

[Tyler]

We and all of our Turning Point staff right now are at home with families, as expected. But again, for here being part of the show and honoring Charlie, I mean, that's just such a hard thing to ask people to do. And I can't thank you each enough.

[Jack]

Everybody behind the glass, seriously, thank you for being here.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Thank you to our amazing team. They really are amazing, and Charlie loved them dearly. Here we are at the Charlie Kirk show studio. I remember building this studio, and I Remember designing it so Charlie would be here, and then he decided he liked it here better, so we flipped everything. He had to have his Oregon duck thing over there.

[Jack]

The original. Original was a straight line.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah, it was a straight. Well, this desk actually is modular, and so you can kind of fold it so that the two levels fold into one another. And it was just a desk, and it was supposed to be designed so that if you had guests, it could fold out. But he just liked it like this all the time.

[Jack]

Wasn't it? Wasn't it? We did. We did one of the election night streams or something, and we. We set up the V. And he just, like.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He just like, like left it.

[Jack]

He just left it that way.

[Tyler]

Well, this. When we. I remember walking into. So the story of this complex is really interesting because we were in Chicago. We came over here, and we found this. This. This space because we wanted to have a building for Turning Point that was by itself.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

And fast forward to. We had to go through and talk every single one of the people in this complex to sell the buildings. So I. I had to get on the phone with these guys. And luckily we had this incredible kid that was in real estate that helped, and we talked him into it. But I remember walking through this building for the first time, and this is a garage. This was actually a garage. So this was like a shop. Like, they. They had, like, a bunch of machines and stuff in here, and they had. They used to have all this equipment that was, like, hanging off. And we just started going through, just yanking stuff out. We're like, this will be the home for Charlie Kirk Studio.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And I feel bad for the audience because I'm not sitting in Charlie's seat. You're seeing the profile shot of Tyler because he's looking at me when he's talking. So I apologize.

[Tyler]

That's been everything on the show that I'm always.

[Andrew Colvitt]

You're here.

[Jack]

I'm always looking at Charlie because that's Tyler's seat.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I know. And I kept telling the studio. I was like, can we, like, get that camera?

[Jack]

Andrew's pointing out this is a blocking violation for film.

[Andrew Colvitt]

It's worth it. So.

[Jack]

But we've kind of always done it. So.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Blake, you know, I'm gonna ask. Let me ask you this. When radio gets back on, but I was just talking with the. We took a quick bio break, as they call it in the business, and I was asking the team, I was like, what do people want to hear right now? And the whole team is out there in the bays, and they Were like, people want to hear stories about Charlie and they want to see the behind the scenes stuff. And so I want us to share that with him and with the audience, our interactions with him. And I don't want to force you to start when we're going to be welcoming back national radio in about a minute. But that's there. There are. There's that line in the Bible about Jesus where it says, you know, there would be the writing of endless books about all the things that Jesus did. And I feel like not to compare Charlie to Jesus, but his life is like that. Where if you compiled all the little things that he did for all the tens of thousands of people that he interacted with, there would be no end of the books that we could write about his life. And that is. That is a true. It's like so true. Like, I'm not even. That's not Even at like 31 years on this planet. And that's not even a hyperbolic thing to say. That's not me. Exaggerating is a really remarkable feat. And so, Blake, I'm gonna go, like, we're just gonna go around the table. I was just gonna put you on the hot seat first. So it wasn't me. So our team is telling us that people wanna hear more personal stories that you wouldn't have seen if you didn't know Charlie. So, Blake, the floor is yours. Tell us the story about Charlie that you think people would like to hear or that haven't heard yet. Man.

[Blake]

I'm thinking of a few things.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Gosh.

[Blake]

Personal stuff. I think one of the things that always impressed me about Charlie was his immense personal discipline about everything he did. He had, you know, his day was very ordered. Everything he did was very ordered, and he didn't deviate from that. And if you asked him about that, he'd be like, well, this is the smart thing to do. Why would I do something different? And the thing I'd always tease him about is the number of foods he ate, which is about four or five. Yeah, Like, I would joke about this and I would. I'm not exaggerating. The variation of food Charlie ate was like grilled chicken, avocado, hot sauce, like.

[Jack]

Cabbage, lettuce, like that.

[Blake]

Like salmon, I guess. I think he used to have beef, but I think he later, like, decided red meat was probably more bad than.

[Jack]

He started doing that. He said it was like a couple years ago that he. Just because he wanted. He said he wanted to get back in fighting shape or something.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

Charlie, as long as I'VE known Charlie has always been very focused on what he puts inside his body.

[Jack]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

From day one, it was. I remember because I've always. When I was. When I first met Charlie, I was skinny. And then I got, you know. You know, dad fat, less skinny.

[Jack]

Got your road layer.

[Tyler]

I got dad fat. I put on the pregnancy weight a few times throughout that. That cycle campaign.

[Jack]

30.

[Tyler]

But Charlie was always. And he would always kind of yell at me, you know, And Andrew, I'm probably sure you've had some of these situations. Blake probably hasn't, but never got yelled at for what he eats. But he would be like. Cause I would, like, pound sodas. And like. I was like, oh, yeah. And then it caught up with me.

[Blake]

I was like, Charlie's like, sin eater. Cause I eat everything.

[Tyler]

But he would eat, like, piles of singular foods. So it would be like stacks of, like, stacks of broccoli. He would order that, like, steamed broccoli. Or he would order just. Just meat, right? It would just be like, meat. And then. And then he would just. He would pound through it. He would eat, like, as we're talking, like. Like, we didn't have time to waste. As we were going. It would just eat. Later in life, he enjoyed. I think he enjoyed meals a little bit more. But the early was like, we were going, going, going. He's always in the travel ready to go. And he would just eat. And I would just sit there and be like. Because I would order, like, a normal sandwich and, like, drink a drink. But he would just eat to eat, but it was always healthy. And he would always be like, you're gonna eat that. Like, he would look at me like, you're gonna eat that. You're gonna put that.

[Jack]

I actually remember, I think the night. I think. I'm pretty sure we were all there, too. It was the night of the RNC when he gave his speech there. Not the 16 or 20, but the 24. And I think. I want to correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't he have, like, a couple of chicken wings? And he. He, like, made a huge deal. He had a couple.

[Blake]

And we had, like, a huge pile. Huge, fortunately vast pile.

[Jack]

And. But it was like each, as Tyler was saying, like, was a separate food. And then we had a whole bunch of chicken wings that we were all just chowing down on. And he goes, I will allow myself to have a few.

[Tyler]

Well, and that was like. He would find something he liked. And early on, he used to say all the time, he'd be like, you could build A religion around those things.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

Have you ever heard that? Have you ever heard him say that.

[Andrew Colvitt]

We could build a religion around this?

[Tyler]

When he found a food he liked, he'd be like, you could build a religion around this.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

Or that thing or whatever.

[Jack]

But it's like the first time he eating it.

[Tyler]

No, no, it would be. It would be like. It'd be like. I'd be like. I mean, I think these are great, these chicken wings. You can build a religion. I think I heard Charlie say that. No short of like 500 times.

[Jack]

I. Yeah, it. That when you. There's certain set phrases that were just like the Charlie phrases. And you know, when you say him, you could just hear it in his voice because that's. That's the only guy who talks that way.

[Andrew Colvitt]

What about, what about you, Jack? Do you have a. Do you have a fun Charlie story that you think the audience hasn't heard or would like to hear? Oh, man.

[Jack]

You know, look, I mean, there's a lot of stuff that's just private. So that's like, how do you. How do you steep through that? You know, I'll tell the story that in, you know, from last year, though, that I think is just. Just kind of a funny thing. So Charlie works so hard on these campus tours that people don't realize that he worked himself sick last year and there were, I don't know, two, three weeks where he just. He had no voice. He completely lost his voice out there on the campus tours, the campaigns, between everything. He was traveling so much and just picking up whatever germs and bugs and all the rest. And obviously with his health regimen and that he, you know, he did what he could, but, you know, sometimes it just kind of doesn't work that way. And I remember we had, we had talked about. And he was like, hey, Jack, you know, you're Pennsylvania guy. We're doing this Penn State. I think it's going to be big. Do you want to come? And I was like, oh, yeah, you know, we'll see if it works out with the schedule, etc. And. And then a couple days before the event, he sent. Or no, the day before the event, he sends me this text and, and says, jack, we need to talk. So, like, we need to talk. I lost my voice. So then I call him and he immediately hangs up and he texts me back and I said, he said, jack, I can't talk. I lost my voice. I can only text. And so he, he's like, I, I need you up here. And, and. And so we, we I get up to Penn State and the entire time we're there and I'm. I'm with him, we're spending time, and he's like sending me text messages or just writing stuff on his phone.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And you're like, right next to him.

[Jack]

Yeah, he's like showing it and I'm like saying it or tweeting it or whatever it is. And then as we're about to go, you know, we have this whole thing set up and there's thousands of kids. I mean, 5,000 maybe, because I know we brought.

[Andrew Colvitt]

It was insane. I know we brought sea of red hats.

[Jack]

We brought. We brought 30,000 hats. But then we ran out and only about half of the kids had hats. So that's why I know you would.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Not believe the number of hats that Turning Point bought and still managed to run out. And it was insane. And then.

[Jack]

And then the campus end up. Ended up shutting down the speakers.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I mean, that many boxes, I want.

[Jack]

To just throw out hats.

[Andrew Colvitt]

It was so many. Like, the logistics of getting that many hats is actually, to each campus was actually a marvel in and of itself. And you're reminding me of. Go ahead. I don't know if you. You had something you wanted to add, Tyler.

[Tyler]

I was just going to say that the. The miracle of the organization of Turning Point being able to do all those things is what enabled so much of Charlie Kirk. Right. Charlie was. Wanted to be enabled all the time. With every little crazy idea that he had. I would call him Charlie Kirk. Wild goose chases, like, with. With stuff, it would just be like constant stuff. Right. It was just like trying to channel where those things would go. But the enabling of the staff to do the things that needed to be done. Because Charlie was almost always right on these things. He was always right on one.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He was annoyingly almost always right.

[Tyler]

Almost always right.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And when you got one that was right, you were like. You would make a mental note and be like, it was 99 to 1.

[Tyler]

But where he wanted to go with everything was always right. And he knew he had the vision. And the people who helped execute that deserve a ton of credit. Every person, every. I look at the videos from the campus tours. Every one of our activists that is there that's volunteering to help hold microphones to, you know, standing in the gap there. Especially in such scary times as where we're at today. They have been such incredible warriors and that honors Charlie so much.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah, we. We have this. Let's go ahead and play. We have just enough time. This is Charlie eating with Chopsticks in Japan with Blake479 is it like a big thing? Yeah, of course.

[Charlie Kirk]

Am I doing it okay?

[Tyler]

Yeah, perfect.

[Andrew Colvitt]

This is noto. Why is it so good? Soybean. It's very good. It's so gooey. It's very gooey. Why is it so gooey?

[Tyler]

Because it's fermented. I think.

[Andrew Colvitt]

That'S great.

[Tyler]

It's very good for you.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Blake. I remember you and I were on a chat when this was happening or moments after it happened, and he was like, There was literally 11 dishes in this thing. It was amazing. Oh, the Japanese food.

[Tyler]

I mean, the religion around this.

[Andrew Colvitt]

People don't realize, like, how he would just get fixated on.

[Jack]

Yes.

[Blake]

I would just love how he would, you know, he would, like, interrogate me about things because Charlie loved to learn things, loved to pick new things up, and yet he was also so busy all of the time. So he would even just. He would send me on. He's like, blake, you have to learn all about this thing so that you can just tell me about it when I need to learn about it later. So I'll. I'll go read, you know, a 300 page book about this so that I can just be ready.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah.

[Blake]

When Charlie interrogates me, I remember once on a flight, it was like an hour, and he's just like, blake, tell me about the Roman empire. I'm like, the start or the end? He's like, whatever you want. And just started going off about that.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I also asked you about that. Blake is a very good resource if you want to learn about the Roman empire.

[Blake]

And he was. He was very, you know, sometimes just. He would ask Mikey. He would be like, mikey, just ask chatgpt to make some trivia questions, and then let's just see if Blake can get them. And he was very proud that, you know, he's like, okay, Blake, I'm going to lose to you on, you know, history. I'm gonna probably lose to you on geography. But he was very proud that he was. He was competitive with me on, you know, biblical stuff because he was very. He loved to study the Bible, you know, book by book. He was really into that. He was very, very proud of that. And he was right. He was. He was better at Bible trivia than I was.

[Jack]

Actually. That's. That's something I could share, and I'm sure we all could. That, you know, late, you know, late night, whatever it is. People would say, well, what is Charlie like in, you know, off air, he would be constantly going through books of The Bible. And then he would send you, you know, some file or a podcast or something and be like, jack, I just did this five hour course on the book of Deuteronomy. You need to go through all five hours and come back to me with it.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah.

[Jack]

And not even for the show.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I have a story like this actually from recent. We were in Aspen doing an investor summit and it was amazing trip. And we had a Cambridge professor who was actually, we played that the last live. It was a pre record, but it was like the last radio live hour before he started speaking at campus. And it was with Dr. James Orr. He's an amazing Cambridge professor. And he flew back from Aspen and Charlie was like, what are you doing tomorrow? And James was like, well, I don't fly out until Monday. And it was a Sunday. So Charlie was like, well, do you want to have breakfast with us and we'll do our morning worship and then I'll pick you up and can you just like, teach me all day? And James was like, what? You just want to, you know, you just want to do class? And he's like, yeah, like, I just want to do class. And so they sat in a room and Charlie peppered him with questions. And you have to understand, Dr. James Orr not only sees the world similarly the way we do, but he has like a photographic memory of the classical Western canon, of all the texts that make up the Western. He can remember almost page and verse of all of these great books and he can connect them, how they relate to now and where we got this word and how it evolved from this into. And so Charlie was. Was gathering this three dimensional understanding of the Latin and the Greek and how it made up European history, which gave birth to America, obviously, the Western canon. But that was Charlie's idea of a Sunday well spent. And I remember being so jealous.

[Jack]

That's a day off for Charlie.

[Andrew Colvitt]

That was a day off. I remember being so jealous because I had to go back home. I had to catch a flight Sunday morning to get back home. And I mean, I got to be with my family and it was great, but. And that's where I should have been. But Charlie got to spend the day with his family and learning from one of the great minds in Christendom. It was amazing. That was Charlie in a nutshell. I also. It's weird things that I remember right now, Charlie walking around all the time with like. He'd wear shorts on planes with like his tall socks.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Andrew Colvitt]

So he always. The tall socks. The tall socks.

[Blake]

It improves circulation, Andrew.

[Jack]

No, he Would always talk to me about this. He's like, it's a thing for tall people, Jack. It's compression socks. You wear them. You wear them on planes. The pressure. He had it all like, I'm not going to. I'm not going to choice. No joke is made.

[Blake]

A week ago I was getting when I was actually flying out to Korea for a thing, I was like, okay, I've got to see if there's something to this. And I just put on socks and I pulled them all the way up and I wore them that for about half the day. And then I thought, this is way too annoying. And I slid them back down.

[Jack]

Well, he would take. But you're not tall enough.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah, but you probably did have really good circulation. Maybe he was right most of the time. I wanted to read something that Danny on the team, Danny's young guy. Charlie loved Danny so much. And Danny's quiet, doesn't always say a whole lot, but when he speaks, you better listen because he's been thinking about it for a long time. And Danny wanted to. He shared this with me. I hope it's okay. I think it is. He says, charlie story. Last year when I was living out here interning, I was living in the hood off of GCU campus. Charlie found out and, and goes, okay, you're gonna either live at my apartment or at my in laws. And he's like, I convinced him I would be fine and I stayed where I was for a few months. He was one of the kindest people I've ever met. And I love that story because somehow this was true about Charlie. That he was balancing huge organizations, a thousand relationships, donors, friends, the show, politicians, other organizations. He had all these plates spinning in his head all the time. And he would somehow find time to worry about my well being. Or is your wife and kids, are they going to come? Do you need me to set them up with something? Do you want me. Can I get them here? Are you okay? Do you want me to put you at this hotel? Like he would. His brain was just always moving and spinning and he was always thinking about other people and their well being and how many stories I heard of that. Tyler, I mean, right? It's like you saw in the organizational feats of Turning Point how he would think about the speaker coming in and make sure they were all taken care of. And he had it built into the schedule that he had to go backstage to meet so and so at such a time because he wanted to just say thanks for coming. It was the intricacy of his mind and the details he was able to hold all at one time. Truly amazing.

[Tyler]

One of the things that I just keep seeing over and over is everyone telling the stories of how they got introduced to Charlie. And I've received, again, thousands of messages. I can't even respond back. I know Andrew feels the same. All of us probably feel the same. Jack is a savant at keeping up with people. I don't know how he does it, but I just can't even keep up. So I'm not even going to try. So I apologize. But everything I keep seeing over and over is. Tyler, I know you were close to Charlie. I didn't know him personally, but I want you to know how I was introduced to Charlie. And nine times out of 10, you know what the answer is? One of my kids turned me on to Charlie. They show me Charlie and this is like. And this kind of goes hand in hand a little bit with what you're talking about. It's just. It's always shocking to me how, again, the Charlie Kirk phenomenon, how he led his life, how everything just ultimately ended up, you know, in front of people and for so many young people again. And that's the mission of Turning Point. Turning Point, we always were. We're trying to get young people involved and engaged, but to not only see young people getting involved and engaged and loving Charlie and being interested in his content, whether it's TikToks all the way through long form podcast, is that they were taking their parents, in most cases old Gen Xers or baby boomers and saying, you need to listen to this, or grandparents. And it's so interesting to me, and this is the legacy that has to carry on in such a profound way, is that young people can be the spur, they can be the dynamics, they can be the activating element. And Charlie was right. No one believed this, by the way, when we started, there was no one. And Charlie would get that face, you know, when he would tell you, he'd get excited because he'd be like, I'm gonna prove you wrong. And he'd get that voice in his.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He literally took on the hardest. I can't. The hardest job. At the time, it was unfathomable. And it was like, you have chosen potentially the dumbest career mission imaginable.

[Tyler]

Obama era college campuses, guys, you don't understand. That is the definition of the belly of the beast. And where we are today is where young people are carrying on their shoulders the Charlie Kirk voice to the older generation in a lot of cases. And I'M so that I never have really spent time thinking about that. I mean, I know it and we're really excited about it because I do that with my parents and grandparents. But it's. It's been so rewarding to see. And if Charlie could sit here and read all these messages that I'm receiving that are saying that exact thing, he would be ecstatic. And we used to send those in the chat all the time. But I actually have some breaking news. I don't know if I should share it or not, but I'm going to. It looks like the Cubs are going to be recognizing Charlie today, God bless him.

[Andrew Colvitt]

So I don't even want to tell that story. I. I can't tell that story.

[Tyler]

But they should have, they should have a. It's very important to Charlie and, and, and I.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He loved the Cubs. His grandma was a lifelong Cubs fan and she got to see the Cubs win the World Series and then passed away. And Charlie was like, that was. She lived and she lived to see like that. The greatest thing as a sports fan for her. And that meant a lot because no.

[Tyler]

One thought it was ever going to happen.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah, Charlie loved the Cubs. Love the Bears too. But it was a little bit harder to be a Bears fan.

[Jack]

I actually was.

[Andrew Colvitt]

It was hard to be a Cubs fan a lot of the time.

[Jack]

Do you remember one. One of the last chats that we had, we were. We were just, you know, cuz on, on.

[Andrew Colvitt]

By the way, that picture right there, that's up on screen, that was really recent. A couple weeks ago. Right. I was with him. Yeah. And we went to that game and there's a great. Yeah, it's a picture with the Cubs team. And then those, you know, all these haters online tried to like shame that player. I forget his name, but he lives in Phoenix as well. And it's the third baseman hit a home run that day, I think, just for Charlie, which was like amazing. And I actually have a couple pictures from that day. So. Go ahead, Jack. I.

[Jack]

No, no, I was just gonna say on, on Sundays especially, you know, people don't realize how big of a sports fan Charlie was. And on Sundays, you know, the, the group chat would turn into basically whatever game he was watching and just, you know.

[Blake]

Yeah, one of our last things was just busting his balls about the Bears.

[Jack]

And the Bears joking away. Yeah, that's what I was saying. I was scrolling through.

[Blake]

That's a story people would like.

[Jack]

I was scrolling through and Charlie was.

[Blake]

So focused and it was always that we'd have you know, America Fest is right before Christmas, and that's when the bowl games are ramping up. And I think even maybe some of the playoff games were going on this last year. I can't remember what the schedule was, but he wanted to see what was going on.

[Jack]

He was. No, he was mad. He was mad that he wouldn't be able to watch a game in real time because. But we would literally something that we.

[Blake]

Have the big stage at amfest and then behind it is our kind of command center, green room, there's table. And Charlie had a place he could sit and he had a TV monitor set up to be showing one of these football games. And he's just sitting there, like watching it during his literal two minutes of downtime before the next thing at AM Fest. And he'd have his bowl with his chicken and lettuce that he was able to eat. Watching it really intensely. And, you know, I'd walk by, he's like, blake, come here, come here. Come on, let's watch a game, Blake.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Okay, Charlie, please put this B roll up. Just don't play the sound on it because I haven't reviewed it for anything. I never shared this. But this was just from a couple weeks ago. That's me filming and Charlie and Erica and we went out. That was the first time Charlie got to walk out onto. Into Wrigley Field. Onto the field right there. It was before the game and it was so awesome. And the Ivy right there. And this is Charlie, of course, looking back. Give me the thumbs up. And man, we had the. We had just a heck of a time getting into the stadium because there was all these security barriers, but they had arranged. We'd arranged it with us beforehand to let Charlie get right up close so that he could just kind of get out of. Get out of the car and get on there onto the field. And this was his childhood favorite team, the Cubbies. He's got his Cubs hat. I kept wanting to get him one of the new era or like the actual field hats, but he liked his little, like low profile one. And it was the one he wore. I think that's the same Cubs Addy wore at Student Action Summit when he was doing the Prove Me Wrong with the students there. And it was just so fun. It was so fun. He wanted to be there with his whole life. Yeah, he wanted to be. He loved that. That field and that stadium.

[Tyler]

We had. This is way back in the day, but we had actually taken. We used to. We used to have our headquarters in Chicago, so it was it was a ways out from. From Chicago. And I remember at the early time, this is like right after we had made some changes to really grow Turning Point usa. We did a team builder at the Cubs stadium at Wrigley Field. And so we, Charlie and I had driven over to the Cubs, to Wrigley. Very difficult to park. You have to basically just park in people's garages and things like that. But we took all of the staff there and it was at the time, I think we have like 20 people. And I remember we're just there and we're sitting and he just non stop would be talking about to everybody how. Because we had staff from all over the country at the time, just different places, about how great the Cubs were, how much you loved them. And you knew from that moment how much that mattered to Charlie. And there were a few things that were like Chicago boy things. I mean, he loved Chicago. He told me, tyler, Chicago is the greatest city on planet Earth. I'm never gonna leave. And I was really nervous, you know, when we.

[Andrew Colvitt]

But then he, You. You were instrumental in him falling in love with Phoenix.

[Tyler]

He's really a Chicago boy at heart.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He is.

[Tyler]

And the. And the Wrigley, the Cubs. Yeah. Everything else was. Was such a big part of the things that he loved.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Right here in his studio in Phoenix, Arizona. His seat is empty. Because we are honoring one of the greatest people any of us will ever meet. A legend, an icon, a martyr, a man who lifted up God above all. His faith in Jesus Christ was the most important thing to him. And then it was his family, Erica, his two beautiful kids. Then it was the country and turning point and everything that our founders built. And I'm just realizing, Jack and Tyler and Blake, that how much I've been changed by this person. It was funny even while we were starting the show. And it didn't occur to me while I was doing it. And so I hope it didn't come off as some, like, fake, like, emulation. But I was sitting here going like, hey, send so and so in. Hey, so send so and so. And. And then like, like, I remember that's what Charlie would do before the show, right? It was always like. And it's like, I. It's. I don't think I'm gonna fully understand how much I've been affected and transformed and changed by Charlie. And I don't think I'll ever fully understand it.

[Jack]

Because you're not. You're not purposefully doing it like Charlie.

[Andrew Colvitt]

No. It was like we were so saturated with so Much Charlie Kirk. Yeah. At all times. That.

[Jack]

No, the way I put it was like, like, people ask you, what about this question? What about this question? Would Charlie wanted this, which Charlie wanted that. And it's like, it's like I can hear him in a way. Like, not like he's speaking to me, but it's just if you know him, you kind of know what he would say. Yeah, you know, you almost know. Not unlike, you know, certain things, but. But just little basic things. You just. Well, that's what Charlie would say.

[Andrew Colvitt]

This.

[Jack]

Well, Charlie would say this. Charlie would do this. And you just, you just, you just know. You just know that that's what he would have wanted.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And.

[Jack]

And it's weird because, you know, talking to everybody throughout all of this, it's, you know, even having heard that Erica said that she wanted the, the cameras on and wanted this up, I know that's exactly what Charlie would have wanted, that he would say, get on the stream. Get the rumble up.

[Andrew Colvitt]

It's almost like we are the large language model for Charlie Kirk because we've, we've. We've had so much input from this person.

[Jack]

I mean, that's, that's what a life is, right? When you know somebody.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah, that's.

[Jack]

That's what they do. They imprint on you.

[Andrew Colvitt]

People. People didn't give Charlie enough credit for how funny he was.

[Jack]

Charlie could be hilarious.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Charlie was funny. But it was his own very distinct brand of it. Like, because he was so distinctly Charlie and so rigidly Charlie Kirk. When he would kind of come, you know, he would do that look when he go, you know, but he would make. Oh, man, the plane rides were the best.

[Tyler]

We would just get on topics. Yes, it was, it was. There were topics and would almost kind of turn into. The best way to describe Charlie Kirk's humor is probably Seinfeld.

[Jack]

He loves Seinfeld.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I've been only watching Seinfeld, Charlie. I've needed it to fall asleep the last couple nights.

[Tyler]

But it was like kind of these weird, funny, just like situational things with personalities involved where it's like we would kind of talk about those things and it would be like, oh, that's just like, what's this guy doing? And that. That's that. And like, this. Is it funny how this is connected? That's connected. And it was like kind of smart humor, but it's like that's the very, in real life reality show type. He was.

[Blake]

He was a good storyteller too. And I almost feel bad that so many of the funniest Ones you can't tell because it's private information, but when he could actually tell you something, him relating it secondhand was so funny.

[Tyler]

I'll give you a good Seinfeld moment from Charlie Kirk's life, and I'll never. I think about this all the time, and I don't know why. It just sticks with me. So Charlie and I were going back and forth to LA for, like, every week for, like, a year. It was. There's a reason for it. It was crazy. It was. It was stupid. But my life got, like, completely uprooted, and I was going to LA every week. So the horrible part about this is we had to find lax. And LAX is like a third world country, and it just is. And, like, you just, like. And again, for people who have patience, you can probably get through lax. Charlie Kirk cannot. And we were flying just back and forth, and so one day we cut it really close on the Uber that we're going back to lax. And you get in the loop around LAX like a horseshoe, and it's. And if it's stopped and there's like.

[Jack]

That Uber spot, react.

[Tyler]

But you're so close to the terminal, but you're really not.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah, yeah. And are you talking about just as you enter the airport?

[Tyler]

No, just the horseshoes.

[Jack]

Sometimes you can just bounce, and then.

[Andrew Colvitt]

You can run faster than people who don't know lax. That's a total thing where you're stuck in your Uber. Yeah. Outside the airport, and you can see the whole string of cars and people are getting out, running in, but you.

[Jack]

Can cut across the thing.

[Andrew Colvitt]

You can cut. Yeah, because it's a horseshoe, and in the middle they have parking, and there's some pathways you can actually cut right in through.

[Tyler]

So anyways, this guy.

[Jack]

This guy was exactly what you mean I've done.

[Tyler]

This guy was dropping us off, and, you know, he wasn't communicating very well. And we're going through anyway. We're. We're. That basically scenario played out. And he's like, oh, well, it's just right up here. It's right up there. And we just kept going and going and going. He's like. And I just remember the guy had messed up and then missed. He cut through the middle because there's this kind of road through the middle and actually miss things like, oh, we're going to go have to go back and do this all over again. And we just flew open the doors. He's like, this is crazy. Like, you just, like, looked at the guys. Like, this is actually crazy. And we like, grabbed her stuff out of the car. We're, like, having to walk across the airport. But I just rings in my ear the whole time because the guy was like, oh, no, it's fine. I do this all the time. But the interaction between Charlie and this guy and us trying to get into.

[Andrew Colvitt]

The airport, you can almost hear the. He loved this clip, by the way. He actually thought that Seinfeld had really profound, like, deeper, like, parallels. He thought it basically thought our entire modern world could be. There was a. There was going to be a Seinfeld episode that mocked and parodied that what we're experiencing now. And so he loved this ribbon clip. So let's just go ahead and play the ribbon clip if we have it. I don't know what number. It doesn't have a number. But it's the ribbon clip. You're checked in. Thank you.

[Jack]

Here's your AIDS ribbon.

[Andrew Colvitt]

No, thanks.

[Tyler]

You don't want to wear an AIDS ribbon?

[Andrew Colvitt]

No, no.

[Tyler]

But you have to wear an AIDS ribbon. I have to?

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yes.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Andrew Colvitt]

See, that's why I don't want to.

[Tyler]

But everyone wears the ribbon.

[Andrew Colvitt]

You must wear the ribbon. What?

[Tyler]

You are.

[Andrew Colvitt]

You're a ribbon bully. Hey. Hey, you. Come back here. Come back here and put this on.

[Jack]

Hey, where's your ribbon?

[Andrew Colvitt]

Oh, I don't wear the ribbon. You don't wear the ribbon? Who do you think you are? Put the ribbon on. Hey, Cedric, Bob. This guy won't wear a ribbon. Who. Who doesn't want to wear the ribbon? And I'll try. Remember, Charlie loved this because it was the parallel to the black square during George Floyd. And this coercive. You have to put it up, and if you don't, you're guilty. And that was just one instant of. Of Charlie using Seinfeld as. And I'll never forget, he always brings Eric Metaxas on the show, and he'll. The first thing he does when Eric Metaxas comes on, and he'll make, like, a inside Seinfeld joke reference. Because Eric loves Seinfeld as well. And it's a beautiful thing, man.

[Jack]

It's just watching that clip. Charlie loved that clip.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Charlie loves saying that line, you must wear the ribbon.

[Jack]

Like, yeah, I'm gonna miss joking around with him so much. That's.

[Andrew Colvitt]

How did you get him to wear this hat? This is hilarious. Tyler.

[Tyler]

This is my greatest moment, by the way.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Tyler got him to wear this hat. Put this hat up. I can't believe you. I forgot you got him to wear that.

[Tyler]

The one thing that I feel.

[Jack]

Oh, yeah, this was the.

[Tyler]

I feel happiest about. I was able to get Charlie to do crazy things for a long time again for. For that. But we did. We had these hats that said precinctly precinct sheriff on them.

[Jack]

Sheriff.

[Tyler]

Because we're focused on recruiting for precincts. And this is how serious about it. And Charlie was very serious about chapters. And on our political side, we talked about precincts and getting everyone involved in the precinct level. And so I was like, charlie, if you're serious about this, you got to wear this. And we. I think we wore. For a Thought crime episode.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah, everybody had to wear Charlie. I think Charlie probably took that off pretty quickly. But it was great that he, that he. He was always a good sport like that.

[Blake]

No, he had it on.

[Tyler]

He had it on for quite a bit of the episode.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Charlie was always a good sport, actually. And what still got in my south.

[Jack]

Park, like they didn't understand the South park.

[Andrew Colvitt]

We found the clip 477 of Rush talking about Charlie. I'm going to play it before this show is out because this show is the Charlie Kirk Show. And Rush Limbaugh inspired Charlie to pursue this line of work. There's no question about it. That's not me speculating. I know for sure. That's why. And so I'm going to play the Rush Limbaugh clip because they were both two men that we lost way, way too early. And I'm pretty sure that was the clip. I just saw it. And Rush. Rush saw. Yeah, it's 477. Let's go ahead and play it.

[Rush Limbaugh]

They brought Charlie Kirk to the golf course to meet me about a month ago. He was in town to set up this Turning Point thing, and they brought him to the golf course to meet me. It was during. We're getting ready for a 8:45am start. And they brought him out while I was getting ready to go to the range. Loosen up. And I spoke with him for about a half hour and he told me how he grew up in a home where my program was on all the time. He was just effusively complimentary to me, which. Which I of course understood and told him he's very wise. His family's very wise. He chuckled. He laughed. This is the kind of guy that you can see really becoming big in politics as he gets older. It just has the kind. The carriage, the personality, the charisma. I. You may think this sounds weird, but I remember when Bill Clinton became president, there were all of these stories about Bill Clinton at Oxford and Bill Clinton at Yale and Bill Clinton here and all these people who went to school with him, there were story after story after story where people were saying that they just knew Bill Clinton was going to be president someday in college. He just had that kind of ambition, and he impressed people. And I'm telling you that people are saying the same things about. About Charlie Kirk.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. Rush saw it and Rush knew, and Rush didn't want people to know this. And then we asked Kathryn after he passed, and she said it was okay to share that. Rush was a seven figure donor to Turning Point and because he believed so much in Charlie and what he was building. And the mission of Turning Point usa, and I want all of you to rest assured that are wondering what's next. Turning Point USA is not going anywhere. The mission that Charlie started, he always wanted it to be an institution that would outlive him. And we obviously wanted so much more time with him. But that was very clear that that was spoken of expressly. And I know all of us are ready to get to work on that. We're honored by all our partners at Real America's Voice who believed in this show and have always been so supportive. By the way, they would send crews halfway around the world to have our back. Rob. Sig, Parker. Sig, we love you guys. You know what you mean to us. And I've talked with both of you in the moments after and since. And Jack, I know you work with them directly as well, and your show's coming up next, and we're gonna keep going for.

[Jack]

Yeah, but I'm not just.

[Andrew Colvitt]

It'll be the Charlie Kirk.

[Blake]

We're gonna do this.

[Jack]

We're just gonna continue this.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. And anyways, we love them, and there's so many people that we should remember and thank. We're not gonna. This probably is not the show to do that, just because it's impossible and we're gonna forget too many people. But. But I just can't tell you how many people believed in Charlie and gave us a shot. And as a matter of fact, I am. I'm gonna. Daisy. Do I have my permission. Do you have. Do I have your permission to read this? All right, so this is from Daisy Phelps. Daisy. She was originally Daisy Dibley when she joined us, and she got married, and now she's expecting her first child. And we love Daisy. She. We were joking. Tyler. You were like, my life was really hard. And then you came along, and then I was like, yeah, and then my life was really hard. You were like, I felt bad. I didn't want to tell you, like, how much easier my life got when I came around. And my life was really hard until Daisy Dibley came around. And Now Daisy Phelps 100%. And then Blake candidly changed everything as well. I'm trying to make sure I got my show clock right here. So this is from Daisy, who would do Charlie's makeup and make sure his eyebrows because he had these crazy eyebrows. He had like 60 year old eyebrows at 27. Like, they would just spark up like this. And I was like, daisy, make sure his eyebrows are like his hair. He had this crazy mop that would just fight you. And Daisy got really good at kind of putting it all together. And Daisy also ran his Instagram account and so much more.

[Tyler]

So much.

[Andrew Colvitt]

She did so much around here. She said Charlie was a force, a believer, a patriot. He was my friend. I've had the privilege of speaking to him every day for the last four years, and I can't tell you that I've ever known someone with more integrity. He was exactly who he said he was, except better. There wasn't one thing that was fake or fabricated. He believed in what he said and he lived out what he believed. He loved Jesus more than anyone. The truest thing about him was his belief in God. He was constantly researching new ways to defend the gospel and making sure we all knew them. It was that important to him. I can still hear him say, good morning, sports fans. Coming into our studio every morning. I could still hear the worship music coming out of his office. I and everyone in the building was watching. I can still hear. Oh, I can still hear the Cubs games. He'd turn on all the TVs to make sure everyone in the building was watching. I can still hear his kids running to hug him during breaks. He not only took a chance on me at 21 years old, but he pushed me, trusted me, and listened to me. Our show was everything to us. We lived and breathed the Charlie Kirk show because we believed in it. We still do. He consistently raised the bar for everyone on our team by first raising it for himself every day. He saw greatness in you, and he brought it out by first being great himself. Just being around him, being in the background, made you want to fight harder. He was ecstatic when I told him I was pregnant. He made sure to ask about the baby every day. He wanted to see every ultrasound. And when we found out it was a girl, he yelled, I told you, my faith is completely different. Had I never met Charlie? My career, my adult life, my marriage, from watching the way he loved Erica, everything is different. Had I never met him, I'll never be the same and I wouldn't want to be. If there was one thing to know about Charlie, it's that he loved Jesus. He is with God. He spent so much time learning about and teaching others about. We just miss him. And I know we're all very honored to be here. We're going to keep going for another hour, Jack, and at least. And I'd like to have an opportunity for people in the audience to call in and tell their stories and how they remember Charlie. So I want to do that. So I don't know if we're planning on doing that today. I think we probably should just keep going. And so let's set up, let's make sure the studio's ready to do that in a little bit, but go ahead.

[Tyler]

There's a few people too. And again, it's really important.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yes, please.

[Tyler]

This is not the show to everybody because there's so many people who are influential, but there's a few people who are so dear to Charlie that I know of that, that just loved him to pieces. Mike Miller, who's been one of our longtime board members, is like a father figure to Charlie. And in fact he's one of the individuals who has been there from really day one. When I met Charlie, he was a big time big game hunter, Africa, everything else. But he's a jeweler, a big jeweler in Illinois from Barrington, Illinois. And he's so American, the guy. His address I think for his jewelry shop is 123 Main street or something. So incredible. And I've slept at his house like. Like this. Mike's great man, incredible.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Love Charlie. Love Charlie so much.

[Tyler]

Love Charlie so much. But this is. I mean, there are people that have. That were so influential, our board members. We have so many incredible board members. But you know, Doug DeGroote, for example, has just been. There has been a rock and a stalwart for Charlie, Tom Sudeika, who is going through some health things and we're praying for him every single day. I mean, there's just so many people and so. And those early people, especially the Chicagoans that were there who believed in Charlie, Bill Montgomery, who was one of the first kind of in Bill's ending, magic energy was like a tea party guy that wanted to show Charlie to everyone. And it was many people like that who created, gave the way that enabling of Charlie Kirk to be introduced to the world. And if you're one of those people, and I didn't name you. I'm so sorry.

[Andrew Colvitt]

David.

[Tyler]

Get there. David's there, obviously. Rob McCoy. So many others that have been so close. All of our board members, truly. Jeff Webb. Others that you just. You took Charlie around to expose him to the world, to others. We're just. We're just thinking about you so much today because, you know, you did this, and you. You remember. And there were literally hundreds, if not thousands of people who.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Rebecca Dunn, Feinberg. These people were just champions of Charlie.

[Tyler]

Ed Zeman. So many.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. We shouldn't start because we're gonna miss people that really.

[Tyler]

But I. I want to.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Foster.

[Tyler]

Freeze Foster. I guarantee you Foster is waiting right there for him. When he. When he came out, we were sharing pictures of Foster. I remember sitting with Foster, actually just right before he passed in the Trump Hotel in D.C. and he scolded me. He was always scolding, you know, for, you know, giving that advice. Not to Charlie, to me, to anyone that would listen. And he loved Charlie. Everyone has loved Charlie so much.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I just. I just also want to say thanks just in these few final moments of the live show. And again, we're gonna keep going, but we want to thank all the Phoenix PD that has been stalwart and just from a security standpoint. Cops blocking off roads, making sure our staff was safe, making sure these buildings were safe, making sure all the families felt safe going home and coming in. The buildings are closed for all intents and purposes. And that's great. That's fine for right now. The first responders at the scene, we want to thank them. Thank Charlie's personal security detail. You cannot imagine how tough that was for them. And I really love those guys, and they love Charlie. Gotta believe me that if anybody loved Charlie, like, and had his back and was fight the warriors by his side, it was those guys. Dan and Brian guys are the best.

[Tyler]

Incredible. I can't. I mean, we've known Dan from the very, very beginning. There is not a person that loves Charlie.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Kirk more absolutely would have taken a bullet for Charlie and the PD at the vigils. I know that there's just. We're running out of time. We have 25 seconds left here before we lose radio. Charlie loved being on radio, and so there's a radio audience listening all across the country. Just know that Charlie was inspired by Rush. Rush believed in Charlie, and Charlie took this medium to the next level, and he was rewarded with it in ratings and the performance of the show and all of your amazing belief in it. Thank you so much. And. Sorry, I just. It's the way this thing works, man. Like, you see somebody you haven't seen yet, you haven't grieved with yet. And it gets the motions flowing in.

[Jack]

In, you know, guys that I know who have lost. People in the military, they say it's. It's waves.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah, it's waves.

[Tyler]

It feels like. It feels like waves. That's the best way to describe it.

[Jack]

And it's just. And it's, you know, certain. Certain phrases, certain people, certain faces, certain memories. Like, like, for me, I didn't expect a Seinfeld clip would just, you know.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. And everybody deals with it differently. And Charlie was not much of a crier unless, you know, he literally helped elect the future President and the 40, 45 and 47. And, you know, just hat tip to everything he just accomplished by sheer will. And I really, truly believe that without Charlie Kirk, we would not have President Trump and Vice President Vance and Vice President Vance. We would definitely not have him. And thank you to President Vance and to Usha, Vice President Vance and Second Lady Usha for just their. Just how wonderful they were with Erica yesterday through and through. They came to Salt Lake City and they picked up Erica and they picked up Charlie and all of us and took us on Air Force Two back to Phoenix. And it was a beautiful ceremony, both getting on and getting off. And JD came back and talked with us and he spent most of his time with Erica and I mean, just class act, class act, hugged us all.

[Tyler]

He is, he is genuinely, I want to say this about the Vice President. He's been genuinely interested in individuals. And this is the same thing with Charlie. This is the same thing with President Trump. To be very point blank is very interested in individuals. And his touch, his warm touch on this, of making sure that Charlie was honored the way that he deserved to be honored is never going to be forgotten. It's never going to be forgotten by this team. It's never going to be forgotten by the conservative movement, by obviously the entire Turning Point family. But that is. That is such a testament to our vice President's character, because it's just as easy to say.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And you got to understand, JD's hurting, too. JD loved Charlie as a brother and as a friend. They talked almost. I really mean this probably on text at least almost every day, if not every day. And JD was strong. He understood the moment was probably not his moment to grieve. He's grieving in private, and he was there and he was strong. Usha was strong. And, yeah, I just love him for it. And There's a lot to love about JD but that was a really amazing, really amazing moment and for our members. And by the way, thank you, Jack. This is your hour and you're, you're graciously letting us continue this show.

[Jack]

And I, I wouldn't have this hour if it wasn't for Charlie, so. Doesn't mean anything. Just, let's just keep going.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And I appreciate that, brother. And I just. A quick programming note. We're going to be sending our [e-mail], we're going to be sending you a phone number to call in and share your thoughts. So if you're one of the members of this show, you know who you are. You were the nearest and dearest to us out there, and you believed in this show and you put your money where your mouth is and we adore you for it. And Charlie believed in his members in such an amazing way. And so if you're a member of the Charlie Kirk show, you are about to get an email with a phone number and you can call in and you can share your thoughts and your remembrances of Charlie and what he meant to you. We would love to hear from some of you. We'll try and fit in as many as make sense.

[Tyler]

And how you got to know Charlie, how you discovered Charlie is incredible. Your interactions with Charlie and your interactions with the show, your interactions with Turning Point, please, coming to events, whatever we want to hear, all of it. And please send those thoughts. If you don't call into freedom.

[Jack]

Charliekirk.com I'll just say that, you know, and we haven't really addressed it here, obviously. We, you know, you know what we do, we see all the information that's coming in about the suspect. We've even got stuff that hasn't been put out yet. And we just, there'll be a time for that, and we know there'll be a time for that. There will be justice for Charlie Kirk. But that's, that's not what we're doing right now. That's all I'm saying.

[Tyler]

Can I share one more thing that I saw that was a frequent thing that was really touching. We have, of course, tons of people who've worked for us, tons of people who have worked with us, alongside us that have helped build Turning Point into what it is today. But so many people, even people who, you know, again, there are people who aren't always, that don't always agree with every single thing that comes out of Turning Point. I think this is really important. But their life was dramatically changed because of Turning Point, and they had met their spouses. The one common theme I saw was people reaching out to me, saying, tyler, I've always had this unbelievable respect for Charlie and for Turning Point because it changed my life for the better. I found my spouse. I have my kids because of Turning Point.

[Jack]

I heard so many stories like that.

[Tyler]

And that consistent message that Charlie gave about the family and building your family and everything else reinforced all of that. And so, so many people are, like, almost coming back home because they're like, oh, you know, I didn't always agree with Trump or, like, Trump or whatever, and. Or I didn't like X, Y, and Z. And now they're on. They're on the team. And it was because Charlie, they stuck with it and listened. They're like, yeah, actually, you know what? This is the life I want to live. My family is important. My religion is important. Christ being the center of my life is important, what Charlie said. And so it's been really a beautiful. Actually, honestly, a miraculous thing to watch as these people came back who I haven't heard from for almost 10 years, maybe, that have said, hey, this is how much this has impacted and changed my life. And, you know, and some of. Some of these people saying, I'm sorry I didn't say something before. And that was because of Charlie and what he built.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Blake.

[Blake]

I just. You know, I keep thinking about. There's a. There's a poem that's a favorite of mine. It's from. It's a poem during. It was written during World War I by Lawrence Binion. It's titled for the Fallen, and it was about the men they lost in World War I. I think about just a few lines from it and about Charlie. They went with songs to the battle. They were young, straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow. They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted. They fell with their faces to the foe. They shall not grow old as we that are left grow old. Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning, we will remember them. And that's how Charlie will always be for us. All of us are going to grow old. All of us are going to die. But Charlie will forever be how he was on September 10th. Brave, strong, out there. Could be like that forever.

[Jack]

The end. The end of that one is well said.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Thank you.

[Jack]

There's a couple lines where the next line of this, actually, they mingle not with their laughing comrades again. They Sit no more at familiar tables of home. They have no lot in our labor of the daytime. They sleep beyond England's foam. And the very last part. As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust moving in, marches upon the heavenly plain as the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness to the end. To the end they remain.

[Andrew Colvitt]

So much of this in retrospect, and you don't have eyes to fully appreciate it in the moment, but where you realize that you were encountering greatness, and the moment you get the news, you realize that you were around somebody that was so. So incredible. And kind of in a weird way, like, in retrospect, it all kind of makes sense that we were. That we only get him for such a short time.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Because he was too great for this world in so many ways. And he was a shooting star. He was a mythological creature. You know, you hear these pictures, these. Hear these images of descriptions of George Washington and how he's this huge man and, like, especially for his time. Well, Charlie, we always joked he was a nephilim. He is literally the only chair that we could get. I. This is actually a really funny story. When we first started getting Charlie the chairs for his studio, it was like, nope, not. That was like. It was like mattress shopping. It was like, nope, not that one. Not that one.

[Tyler]

Literally. This chair.

[Andrew Colvitt]

This is a shack chair.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Andrew Colvitt]

From Shaquille o'. Neal.

[Tyler]

It's a fairly inexpensive chair.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. Just from, like, huge people like Shaquille o'. Neal.

[Tyler]

And from Staples.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yes, and from Staples. It's like, oh, this is the one. And he's worn it out. It's got, like, a little, like, you know, the. The very cheap, you know, veneer on it or whatever. I don't even know what you call it. Like, not. It's definitely not leather.

[Tyler]

It's like the vinyl.

[Charlie Kirk]

Vinyl.

[Tyler]

Vinyl. Vinyl.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And he wore it out, and he loved that big chair. And I have to say, like, when I've sat in it in the past, like, you've sat in it. It's like, you're like, okay, I see what he was kind of. You know, it's a good chair, but he was larger than life, and we all saw it, and we all. You know, he was younger than us. Everybody at this table, he was younger than us. And so we just. You know, you assume that you're gonna probably go before him, and. But in retrospect, like, he was so larger than life, and he packed so much into every single day that it's pretty impossible to it's impossible to. To fully grasp just how much life he lived and how much he accomplished in 31 far too short years. But we do have our first caller. Do we want to. You guys ready for that? His name is Evan. Evan, the floor is yours.

[Evan]

Gentlemen, it's an honor to just be on and talk about Charlie for a sec. I'll keep this quick. Charlie was a friend. I consider him a dear friend. Even though I never ever met him. I've listened to him for a very, very long time. I run and operate a lawn landscaping business and also host a podcast. And what Charlie really taught me was he was always continually learning. And even with my show that I hosted, you got to know things. You got to know about equipment and things like that. And Charlie was always learning. He's always listening to books and things like that. In his boldness to stand on the word of God and Jesus is what I've tried to do with my business and in life and even my family, too. I have a two and a half year old son and a kid on the way. When I heard the news just a couple of days ago, I was on the moor. I stopped and I cried. It was just. It's. It's devastating. But we know that God's gonna work this together for good. And through his tragic death, guys, more people are gonna know about Jesus. And that's the one thing that we have to remember through this. And it's just I've never been. He had considered him a friend, even though I just never knew him. And I want you guys to hold on to God's word because that's what Charlie would want for us to do is stand on God's word and hold on to it right now. Not let the enemy just blind us from the mission that he had set. Guys, appreciate all that you do. And just, Charlie, just thank you and thank you, Lord, for putting him on this Earth for 31 years.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Well said, Evan. And I think I just want to echo what you're saying. I've gotten so many notes and I've seen so many comments on social media of people saying their kids are coming back to church because of Charlie and because of this. What's happened that people are coming back to the Lord and I just. Jack, it is your hour, but I'm just going to say a quick prayer. I'm going to say a quick prayer for that. Heavenly Father, we ask that you would bless Charlie's legacy right now in this moment, across the country and across the world as we mourn his Passing far too early and too soon. We ask, Holy Spirit, that you would enter the hearts of millions of people across this planet, across our nation, and that you would bring people to faith in you. Jesus saving faith in you. He loved you. And I know that he is getting his reward in heaven right now. And that's what he wanted in the beautiful eulogy that Blake helped write, that all he wanted was thriving young people that went back, found their faith in you and thriving young families that made this country strong and great so that more could follow that same path. And I know, Lord God, that getting married and having a family and knowing you were his greatest accomplishments on top of everything else he did. And so, Jesus, we just bless this country and everybody that loved Charlie or that heard about him, that only heard about him even from his death, Lord, that you would make so many new believers meet so many new members of your heavenly kingdom right now and in the days and weeks to come. Lord Jesus, we ask in your precious name. Amen.

[Tyler]

Amen.

[Jack]

If you guys want, we could follow that up. Tyler, I know you just put the hat back on, but we could all say together, Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Amen.

[Jack]

Charlie would have wanted people going back to church more than I hate anything. More than anything that. More than politics or campaigns or whatever the next election was or whatever the next turning point was, the core.

[Tyler]

The core belief was that was it. He was. He was a true believer in what Andrew Breitbart said. And we talked about this all the time. I actually remember visiting. We were visiting a donor, and we stood in the spot where Andrew Breitbart passed, which is a kind of a.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I think it's in la. You've been there, right? It's on Sunset.

[Tyler]

Yeah, it's. It's really interesting. Just right outside a restaurant.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Well, it's in. It's in Brentwood, at least. I don't know.

[Tyler]

Yeah, it's. It's. It's kind of an interesting place. But we. He had always had kind of this infatuation with the concept, and we actually leaned into it, talking about culture wars and all of that. But that culture is what dictates your politics, so. And culture is dependent upon your faith. There's nothing.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Faith's the bedrock. It's the absolute starting point.

[Tyler]

There's nothing that. That impacts that. So the politics that is really downstream from culture is really. And this is like, kind of like, I would say, Andrew Breitbart next level, which was with Charlie Kirk, is that. That's why I believe Charlie was so adamant about faith being so important, is that he was a true believer in that statement, but that faith was what was dictating how our politics would end up, which is absolutely correct and true. And so there's nothing that could be more important right now.

[Jack]

What you can think is tie it up and say politics is downstream from culture, culture is downstream from faith.

[Tyler]

That's right. And Charlie led by example and embracing faith, embracing the Christlike attributes that are necessary to impact culture in the positive way that needed to happen. And I think that's why you're seeing that turn of so many young people that were influenced by this, maybe starting with politics, but walking themselves backwards and going, oh, my gosh, well, my politics is dictated by my faith. And that's a great legacy. That is the most important legacy, which Charlie himself said, which is. That's all. That's all he cared about, was that people would know that.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Well, I was interesting. I saw a clip yesterday from Larry o', Connor, who worked for Breitbart, Andrew Breitbart, and they were talking about. He was talking about this memory at cpac. They were doing an Andrew Breitbart panel. And Larry put it together. He was kind of. He's like, well, all of us worked directly with Andrew. You never knew him. He's like. And Charlie says, I can't wait to be on this panel. You know, this is so amazing. And so he's like, I'll call you and tell you about it. Like, my thoughts. And he's like, okay, we probably should talk, because the rest of us knew Andrew. And Charlie said that I was so inspired by Andrew Breitbart that I created Turning Point. And Larry realized that. He started Turning Point in 2012, the year that it happened, and he realized that. That. That Charlie, in many ways, is the blossom of the seed planted by the death of Andrew Breitbart. And so when you think about how that can keep going forward, and I know Charlie would want that. That. That. That we would have many such stories like that, not just Turning Point or whatever.

[Tyler]

And it's really an interesting point to make for those that study modern conservatism. There aren't very many people. I mean, let's. If you. If you had to pick the Top three, it would probably be, you know, and again, we're setting Charlie aside, but Andrew Breitbart, Donald Trump, and the. The third being Rush Limbaugh. And when you look at that and you start to go, wait, what's the connection between all three of those men? It's really. You look at that, you go, charlie Kirk. And Charlie was a. Again, enigma. He had a personality that was unlike anything else, but he was the continuation. He picked the baton up for all three of those men in different ways and carried the entire conservative movement on his back and created something, again, that. The culmination of that, you know, what is the representation of Charlie. And people are like, well, what can we do to, you know, keep Charlie. You have it. It's Turning Point usa. It's Turning Point the entire ecosystem. He did it.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah, he was. He was able to do all the things.

[Tyler]

All of the things.

[Andrew Colvitt]

All the things.

[Jack]

I promised we would. We would mention this. And before we go to the next caller, I saw some people saying that, you know, they thought I was trying to brush it off. I just. I wanted to give the vigils a moment because the. And I wanted. Because I knew we were up on a clock before. It's unbelievable. And they are worldwide. South Africa, I've seen Australia, Australia, New Zealand. Huge one in Australia. I got a video from Sydney this morning. Someone sent me Sweden.

[Tyler]

Sweden.

[Jack]

All across Europe.

[Tyler]

I just got one from Hungarians, I'm sure.

[Jack]

And then all across the country, and there's like. There's, like, little ones popping up, you know, like, just, hey, this is the one in our town, if you want to come. Just come on. Someone said Westchester, Pennsylvania. And, you know, I hear there's. I hear there's going to be a. I think. I hear this. They're trying to put together one, not like an official one, but like at the. At the White House at Lafayette Square Park. There's just some local people trying to get a permit. And it's that spirit of individuals becoming activated and coming together around one core concept, principle, value. That's what Charlie Kirk stood for. That's what he was all about. He lived his entire life trying to inspire a turning point in this country, and he's done it.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I take so much solace in a couple of things. He got to see young men and the youth vote win a president.

[Tyler]

Yes.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He got to see it, and he got to do it. And he got to see. He got to see the decline in church start going back up. He got to see that bounced, and he got to See, just, just before that NBC poll that said that young men want to get married and have babies as their top priorities. And I can't tell you how much that means to me that he got to see the fruit of his work, because so many people don't. They don't get to see what they've accomplished. And he actually got to see it. And all of you that came out to the campus events, all of you that came out to our Turning Point events, all of you that subscribed to this, the show that gave him like one of the biggest shows and reaches and platforms in the entire country. Day in and day out, we had millions of people listening to Charlie every day, Every day, every day. We tried our best to estimate it in the way of modern analytics with fast channels versus radio versus podcasts. And then you take clips. It was basically impossible to measure. But even just in the fall, going up to the election, it was 15 billion views of Charlie Kirk content just ahead of the election. And every day there was between 2 and 3 million people that tuned into this show to Charlie Kirk show or listen to the podcast or. And that's just the live show that's not even counting clips. So that was podcast radio. And it was truly, truly a feat for anybody. But the fact that he was able, like we said, Tyler, to be like a Rush Limbaugh, to be like an Andrew Breitbart and to be.

[Tyler]

He brought all that together.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He brought all that together in one human that took. And by the way, and I want to give a shout out to all of his assistant staff and his chief of staff, Mikey, who made his day to day possible. They were really amazing. We're gonna get to another caller, and this one is Anthony. Anthony, the floor is yours, my friend. Tell us about Charlie.

[Evan]

Thanks, Andrew. Well, first, my condolences to you and everybody. So Charlie and I, I've been listening to the show since it probably started, and I've been a member for a while and everything. And then. But the one time that it stood out to me, and this might have been the funniest disagreement, was probably end of July, early August, the weekend before you had to go on Fox and Friends. And he put out the question to everybody in the first hour, does baseball need a salary cap? And he knows that I work in the industry and it's on the college side of athletics. And we talked about the political question I sent into him. And then he goes, all right, Anthony, give me your. I need, I need to know you're the professional. I go, I Already emailed you my answer in the first hour. He goes, I know. I'm not letting you go until you tell me. And I said, well, I believe I'm on the fence. And he literally starts laughing and goes, you can't be on the fence about this. You have to be on my side. And I'm like. And then. And I'm like, literally sitting there, and I'm like, he's yelling at me. He's yelling because the guy in the industry won't side with him. And I'll be honest. I always wanted a salary cap until I did more research. And then he's like, well, you have to. Blake, you can relate to this. You got to find me that research and Senate. So I said, all right, I will look for it. I sent it to him next Saturday morning when he's live on Aaron Fox the following week. He goes, I got your emails. I haven't read them yet. But he goes, but it was the funniest to see his facial expression just.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Light up because he's like, anthony, I just want. You're reminding me of a very unique detail of Charlie Kirk that unless you emailed in the show, you didn't know. He would argue with emails, and he would get these. He would get into these during the show. During the show. He's sitting there hosting the show, going, welcome back to the Charlie Kirk show. Press send. And then he'd be like, you know, they didn't keep the show going, but he would. He was arguing with people as we went.

[Jack]

He could be talking, like giving a monologue and writing a separate argument to an email.

[Tyler]

We would all be debating, too. So he would. Your emails that you would. You would make, he would drop into the chat and it would be like rolling a grenade into the chat.

[Blake]

Or sometimes he'd be like, what do we think? And he'd be like, well, this person just agrees with me.

[Tyler]

And we would take sides with all of you. So, like, we would have all of that. And truly. And this is the one grassroots part, because one of our culture point that we have at turning point is grassroots humility. And this is the really interesting part. And again, Andrew deserves a ton of credit for this because they framed the entire show, the Charlie Kirk show, here around your feedback, your commentary, your conversations. Individual. Every individual in America that talked to Charlie or would email in or would DM had a voice. And again, that's not most people that do this. And it helped with the work because it helped frame Charlie's opinions about things. It helped frame from A grassroots perspective, how we think about things at Turning Point. And we think about issues, issues that would be covered on Charlie's show every single day that everybody listened to. Everybody at the White House would listen to. And I mean, I. Twitter would change because we, the three, like, between Jack and Charlie alone, them dropping something changes the whole direction on Twitter anyways.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And then Benny. Yeah. Benny Johnson. Yep. Throw this up. I just want to. I don't know all the details about this, but there is a prayer vigil planned in Washington, D.C. on Sunday, September 14th. So this Sunday at 6pm location to be announced soon.

[Jack]

I think I may have just accidentally said it.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Oh, whoops. Well, if you did, I, you know, that's fine.

[Jack]

I wasn't given the full confirmation on that.

[Andrew Colvitt]

It's not Sunday. I mean, who knows? But It'll be at 6:30pm in Washington, D.C. and I think it's a beautiful way to honor Charlie. Charlie candidly didn't love Washington, D.C. didn't love going to Washington, D.C. i mean, he was Imperial Capital. Imperial Capital. Imperial capital. But he would stomach it because he loved his country and he would go there. And so, I mean, I think it's a fitting tribute.

[Jack]

Can I just say, if you are at Washington, D.C. or if you're in any other blue area and you're going to one of these vigils and protesters come up or something like that, just I'm not going to say, you know, don't get into it, but just. We're not there for that.

[Blake]

We're just.

[Jack]

We're really not there for that.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Charlie. Charlie was. His message was peace. I mean, yeah, Charlie, he was a master swordsman, but his sword was the word, the logos and debating. And he didn't believe in peace per se. He believed in verbal combat, and he believed in intellectual and ideological combat. And he believed that we were in a war of ideas and a spiritual battle. I'm not here to give you some rosy prescription about the state of the world. We're in a battle not against flesh and blood, but against powers and principalities.

[Jack]

And obviously close understanding of the state of the world.

[Andrew Colvitt]

A couple years ago. Yeah. But like, Charlie ultimately believed in the promise of America and the fact that our institutions will hold. I guess Speaker Johnson will be at that one, along with Anna Paulina Luna and, you know, more details coming about.

[Tyler]

That, which is very fitting because Ana is, you know, by her own admission, is the turning point. Congresswoman. She, you know, tell this fun story again. I know some people have heard it, but Ana was thinking about Going to med school. And she had engaged with us online. We had, I found her, we saw that she was saying some smartthings on Instagram and we actually reached out to her, invited her to Young Women's Leadership Summit. And she came and she was like, hey, I'm applying to med school. And she was again an Air Force veteran. Everything else. And that one experience of her being there at Young Women's Leadership Summit, which by the way, that was Young Women's Leadership Summit was the brainchild of Charlie. We started that many, many years ago. He knew that was important, wanted to do that. But it culminated. It started at a tiny little thing in Illinois and then we moved to the airport. We were at the airport, you know, kind of a three star hotel at.

[Andrew Colvitt]

The Hyatt and DFW at dfw tidy.

[Tyler]

It was like inside. It's like literally inside the airport. So you don't even, I remember that you don't even leave the airport when you show up. And it grew and grew and grew. But Anna showed up there and we convinced her to not go to medical school, to quit basically move to Arizona and start touring and learning how. The ropes of how to debate on campus. And to do that, that was like the Charlie Kirk model by the way.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Apl she is so fierce. In Charlie's defense, since all this, I've been texting with her.

[Tyler]

She has been the person.

[Andrew Colvitt]

She's so great and I just love it. Anyways, she's part of the legacy too.

[Tyler]

She left, she left here wanting to run for Congress, wanted to change the country. She's, she's doing just that. And she's a tremendous friend and ally and she's been incredible for the last few days.

[Andrew Colvitt]

We're going to take another caller. Caleb, you are on Caleb and Michelle, how are you, my friends?

[Caleb]

My friend Andrew. Well, you know how we are. But it's such a privilege and honor to, to that Charlie called me his friend and you know, even though we were occasional acquaintances and I loved how he, every time we would meet, he would treat us like family, you know, and I have this. What I want to talk about is maybe just a couple stories about how he elevated those around him. And I know it's been said before that that was the kind of person he was. He wanted everyone to be their best and. But you know, we. And Michelle's already emailed you guys the story of how we first met in 2020. And you know, we. He introduced us to people. You, I think you were there, Andrew. We come back and Says, these are my 2020 friends because we met. You met him in 2020, just after the election at the headquarters. And what was so cool is that every time afterwards we would go to an event that Charlie was speaking at and he did this like at least twice to me. He's like, oh, hey, Caleb means out in the crowd. I'm just sitting out in the crowd. He says, oh, there's Caleb and Michelle. I should tell you the story about how we met in Arizona. And he remembered you when he saw you again and welcomed you in. And Michelle and I just, we're so happy that, you know, three weeks ago he was in Myrtle beach and, and you know, we're in North Carolina now and like, we could drive, we could go to that. And we, you know, and so we went to see him and saw you.

[Andrew Colvitt]

There, Charlie there, Caleb.

[Caleb]

Yep, saw you there. And it was so cool because Charlie invited us backstage or, you know, Mikey did, and he brought us into the green room and there's Alex McFarland. And Charlie introduces us. You know, Caleb, Michelle, you know, my, my super fans. These are guys are Charlie Kirk show super fans. And, and he, he said, you know, Charlie, Charlie said to. Said, you know, Caleb just sends me the, you know, the best feedback. I love reading his emails. You know, he always talked about how he loved Michelle's emails. She's always so encouraging to him. And, and then he said, so, Caleb, what's on your mind? He just puts me on the spot, you know, like, you know, I'm not the guest speaker or anything. What's in your mind? I throw out a couple ideas and he says, you know, I'll let you choose. You know, here's a couple ideas. What do you want to talk about? And he's like, oh, that's a great topic. Hey, Alex, you and Caleb, you guys should debate this topic. And then he just put this on the spot and he facilitated, you know, he kind of moderated. He jumps in on my side, you know, gives a good point here from the Bible, because it was a, it was a, you know, a biblical discussion.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And by the way, Caleb, I want to give you credit because Charlie threw it to you to make a point. Remember backstage with McFarlane and you crushed it, man, you crushed it. And I remember looking at, I walked away with Charlie and I said, caleb did well. And he goes, oh, yeah, he's been paying attention. I want to throw up another image here. This is from some friends here. Memorial rally tribute ride in Lynchfield park here in Arizona. Arrive at 5pm Ride at 5:30 and speakers to be announced. Candlelight vigil at 7:30. This is just. This is what's happening. People want a way to help. And I think it's. I think it's incredible that so much of this is happening so organically. Nobody's planning this. Nobody's like, there's no like organization, by the way, doing like the DC one. It's just like people in D.C. that love Charlie.

[Jack]

Charlie would have loved this.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And it's just hap. People are grabbing the bull by the horns and they're doing this because they loved him.

[Jack]

But, but Charlie would also say. He say, okay, but don't stop there. Of course he would say, don't stop there. Do not stop there. Thank you. But do not stop there.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Speaking of which, this is like I had my team coming to me going like, how can I help? Like, can I make a montage? Can I make a tribute video? And I'm like, sure, I haven't seen this one either. Let's go ahead and play. This is from Noah on our team and I haven't seen it, so 4:19. Thank you, Noah.

[Charlie Kirk]

This is why your faith is the most important thing. You are commanded to go do something productive with your life. You are not commanded to go sit idly by and just receive. You are commanded to go give and to produce and to risk, to then go so into other people. That is a biblical idea that has made the world a profoundly better place. We must put God first in everything that we do. We are nothing here but just for a short instant, short little glimpse. We act not out of outcome, but we act out of obedience. Everybody. This was not earned. You guys were a vessel.

[Jack]

We were a vessel.

[Charlie Kirk]

Psalm 10:7 1. Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. For his steadfast love endures forever.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I have to say this without getting.

[Blake]

Emotional, but I'm very proud of my husband.

[Andrew Colvitt]

You are so intentional with your faith.

[Tyler]

And you are so intentional with just.

[Andrew Colvitt]

How you are as a father and a husband.

[Charlie Kirk]

Becoming a father has made me first of all understand that what I'm fighting for is beyond even yourself. We do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities and darkness and spirits. Cuz at its core, what we are fighting is a spiritual battle. And if you're here and you don't believe in God, okay, fine, I'll pray for you. And I hope you find Jesus Christ as your Lord and savior, cuz it will change your life.

[Tyler]

How do you want to be remembered?

[Charlie Kirk]

I want to be remembered for courage, for My faith.

[Andrew Colvitt]

That would be the most important thing. Most important thing is my faith in my life. Wow. Good job, Noah.

[Tyler]

Great job, Noah.

[Jack]

That was great.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Noah's pretty new to the team. And you captured it, brother. I got a note here from a John. He said, charlie sat down with me after my dad died. He says, hey, thought crime crew. I look back fondly on the time I spent with Charlie, from my time as a student at GCU to working for NFP and then chased the vote. Charlie inspired me and was my hero. I specifically remember when Charlie came to GCU in 2022, he was informed that my dad had died. He personally spent time with me backstage before his event, and that has stuck with me forever. Charlie was an incredible man and made me the man I am today. Sending love and prayers, John.

[Tyler]

Now he's working for President Trump in.

[Andrew Colvitt]

D.C. and we have Sarah. Sarah, you're on with the crew. What's on your mind?

[Julie]

Hi. I am holding back tears. It's been a rough couple of days, as I'm sure you all know. I just wanted to say to all the people listening and all of you folks who are continuing this movement, thank you, especially to Charlie. I really believe he has been the turning point of our nation for, I guess, what those words are worth. And I'm grateful to him. I'm grateful to his words. I'm grateful to how he held himself and was able to hold conversations with people. And I do think that in this tragedy, I'm hoping that it really is the turning point of our nation and that we can move forward as a nation in a way that Charlie would be super proud of.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Beautiful, Sarah. Well said. Thank you. And I think we're all praying that. That the reach and the impact that Charlie has, I don't think any of us have any idea just how big it is. And that's what I'm realizing. I feel like, Tyler, you and me specifically, and kind of what we had to do the last couple days, I think we're a little insulated from it, and I'm. I feel like I'm just starting to see it.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Of what I've been kind of ignoring and the calls I haven't been taking and the texts I haven't been responding to. But that's probably just the tip of the iceberg of how huge his impact is.

[Tyler]

I don't think we have any idea. I, like, I woke up this morning realizing that, yeah, just because of the people, like the. The layers of people talking to people who talk to. To people who talk to people who are kind of coming back. And people have been so good to all of our team. Like, you know, people were worried about the safety of our team. And so, you know, Phoenix PD and Mesa PD have been incredible. I know that Scottsdale PD and everyone else. There's been so many people impacted by this, by the way, aren't even saying anything.

[Andrew Colvitt]

And when we. We landed in Phoenix yesterday, there was a huge crowd, like, gathered outside of the airport. And as we drove away in the procession, there was people lining the streets, like, American flags and MAGA hats, probably half of them that Charlie threw to them. And when we got to our final destination, again, there was a huge crowd gathered, waiting for us and for him. And it was really, really amazing. And it was just kind of a little insight. And I had. Blake, I joke with you, because we couldn't take him anywhere in life. We couldn't take him anywhere. Like, he would get absolutely mobbed. Can I get a selfie? Can I get a selfie? I mean, it didn't matter if you were in Seoul.

[Blake]

It was unbelievable. Yeah, Just in Seoul, in Japan, Just the number of people, or, you know, even. We realized it when we went to Cambridge and Oxford last spring.

[Andrew Colvitt]

The.

[Blake]

The number of people who would recognize him all over the place.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. And I. I took him to a. Like, a very, very private place in California, and I was like, don't worry. We'll be. We'll be left alone because we had business to attend. We had a real, like, pretty important call, like, discussion we were having. We needed to work out some details and some planning. And I was like, don't worry. We'll be fine. It was like, no, it was not. It was like, people would come. I mean, candidly, they were a bit rude. But I looked at him, and. Because, you know, we're obviously having a private discussion, and they were like, can I. Oh, my gosh. Can we get a selfie? And as he was driving away after. I mean, there was, like, very private place. There was still about. I would guesstimate, about 30 people in the course, about 40 minutes, like. And we were trying to hide. And then as he's driving away, these two kids were like. Rode their bikes after him. And they were 14, 14, 15 years old. They're like, is that Charlie Kirk? I was like, can we get a selfie before he leaves? And I was like. I was like, charlie, you know, and Mikey was in the car with him as they were driving away. And of course, he's like, I. I got him to stop, and he Was. And I asked him in the middle of it, I said, are you okay with this? He's like, honestly, it's just. I've accepted it. This is life. And I just. I want. Like, I know that I can make somebody's day by doing it. It's fine.

[Blake]

You know, always, always say yes to every photo.

[Jack]

The one funny.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yes, he would always say that. Said, always say yes to every photo, even if he was in the biggest hurry.

[Jack]

The one funny moment that I have that's like. That was the opposite of that with Charlie. And I don't know why this memory sticks with me, but it was. It was during that whole time when he lost his voice, and we were trying to get his voice back. So it was like, me, Charlie, and Mikey, and we were just. Because the way the travel route, we were just driving through, like, central Florida, where it gets kind of rural, and we. We had this idea to get him, like, a humidifier with, like, medicated humidifier, but we couldn't figure out where to get one. And Charlie wanted a specific one. And then we were just driving down the street, and Charlie goes, well, there's Walgreens. Let's just. Let's just go to the Walgreens. And you know how he is when he. Like when he wants something, and he wants something specific. So we're like, are you coming in? And we just. We just went to Walgreens, and we're just, like, walking around. And it was just so surreal because, like, nobody came up for, like, the one time among all these times where it was just, like, the most normal, simple. And of course, we couldn't find the one he wanted, and we had to get very Seinfeld, you know, kind of thing. And then we just go check out, and it's like, in the middle of all this craziness, it's just a random trip to Walgreens trying to find something for my buddy because his throat hurts.

[Andrew Colvitt]

You know, it's funny, actually now thinking of thinking about that you inspired this. I remember when he was in Seoul just like a week ago, two weeks ago, whatever it was. And he. He went out and explored the city. He got up early and explored the city. And I remember going alone. Are you like. And he was like, yes, alone. Lol. Like, it's safe here. Like, it's clear. Like, that actually meant a lot to him. And I'm so glad now that he got to do this thing that he hadn't been able to do in so long and just go explore a city by himself.

[Tyler]

He hadn't been by himself for so long.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He hadn't, like. And he loved it. He would. Kept sending us pictures in our chat and, like, videos. And you were there, right, with. I mean, you were. I mean, you did do some exploring with him on his own.

[Blake]

And then later we were in this old town neighborhood, and he's like, all right, Blake, just tell me about Korea. And I'm just babbling.

[Andrew Colvitt]

This is the.

[Blake]

The palace where they do the Confucian examinations. He loved it. And of course, it was also a trillion degrees out. So we were all in, you know, nice clothes because we had to go to the thing later, and it was swamp and I was dying, but it was. It was so much fun.

[Tyler]

That's such a good point, though, Andrew. I mean, the thing that I think most people don't realize, especially in these last years, that Charlie was with us was that he was never alone. I mean, the weight and pressure of having to be that celebrity, like, that's a lot. It's a lot to do. And that has an impact on most people. And the one thing I think that was really astonishing about Charlie is he didn't change as a person at all.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He didn't. By the way, he wasn't like the party animal either. Like, so a lot of people get in this role and they use. I don't know, you see him at clubs, you see them drinking, you see them partying or, like, enjoying all this stuff. Charlie would go home at like, the first instant that was socially acceptable for the programming. Like at America Fest, maybe the program didn't get over until 7:30. He would go straight back to the hotel as soon as he could after meeting with donors or supporters, he would do like. He would do a circuit of like four stops, five stops, meet with donors, and then he'd go straight back to be with Erica like, immediately.

[Tyler]

And he. But his personality never changed. His. No, his demeanor never, never changed. I mean, his busyness level was never different. He was always busy in different ways throughout his career, throughout the time that. As he grew. But the thing that was always really difficult, that I was always really worried about him, was that you're never having that reprieve from the public eye or being able to go out and just do normal things. And the one thing I really appreciate about Erica and you guys actually, specifically that are here with Andrew and Blake, because you guys spent a lot. When he did have alone time, it was with you. And so it was like, that was as alone as you got with Mikey. And he. He got to do Some normal things in that way, right? Which was like going to the Cubs game.

[Andrew Colvitt]

He was always just the kid from.

[Tyler]

Chicago and wanting to be.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Always was.

[Tyler]

And wanting to eat. The restaurants, like, I'll always remember again, just after we had a long day of doing something extraordinarily exhausting. And I felt like it was like 10pm and you, you guys know this. Like, Charlie loved to just go sit down and break bread and eat.

[Andrew Colvitt]

By the way, the way he would order was hilarious. He'd sit down, we'd be at a restaurant and be like, you know, four or five of us gathered around and he would take the menu and go get us some of this, some of this, some of this, some of this, some of this. Get these out for a shareable plate. You guys are gonna love this. You're gonna love this, Trust me. And then he would go, and can I get some hot sauce and olive oil and some salt and pepper, please? Thank you. It was like he would order like a crazy person, like 15 items. And then so you're just like, I guess I'll just eat what Charlie's having. And the, the table would be filled and he'd be like, get some more of this. You're gonna love that. Eat some more of that.

[Tyler]

And then everybody's around, eating, talking again, kind of decompressing from whatever the crazy was that you're going through, whether it was the travel or the event or the donor meeting or whoever, or whatever you're doing the show, the speech, I mean, the rally, the activist event, that was the consistent thing, is that if you got that opportunity to sit down and then you talk, and then it wasn't just talking about nonsense. It was usually talking about big ideas and having the conversation similar to like what we have on Thought Crime. So, like, if you, you as an individual out in the world, and I don't know if you agree with.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Thought Crime is probably the closest visual video, videoed version of what it was like to kind of like hang out with Charlie. And some shows. He was more distracted.

[Jack]

That was sort of like our. Like, it was. We used to joke about it because it was just. It was like our group chat on camera.

[Tyler]

That's right.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah.

[Tyler]

And that's what it was like to sit down with Charlie. Like in a scenario where it's like you're sitting there talking about there's these things going on, these topics and like, everybody's going around the horn just like, you know, talking about it, debating it. And, you know, he was like, well, isn't that Interesting. Or like, you know, you get into it and ideas would spark and he'd do that smile and he would think.

[Jack]

Favorite. My favorite. I was just sharing with Daisy that my favorite segments in Thought Crime were so uncomfortable. Yes. That was the point. Was.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Was.

[Jack]

Was when we would explain memes to him.

[Tyler]

Yeah.

[Blake]

Just like Charlie's like, entire knowledge of pop culture froze when he was 17.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah.

[Jack]

Like what? What Char. Like, Charlie, you. You don't. You mean you don't know what a bonus hole is?

[Blake]

Charlie, don't use that one.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Or just, just whatever the riz. What is.

[Jack]

No, no, I'm not going to get into it. I just mean like, whatever. Whatever the thing was that was going around, he'd be like, is that good? Yes. No. Okay.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yeah. Is this good? Yeah, he just wanted the binary. Like, yeah, he's a good thing or a bad thing.

[Jack]

Remember the J.D. vance memes?

[Andrew Colvitt]

Yes. The J.D.

[Jack]

Vance memes came out. He like, are they making fun of J.D. kind of.

[Andrew Colvitt]

But. But in a good way. Sort of in a good way. Charlie. Charlie didn't necessarily speak meme fluently or natively, but he underst power of them. I have a story I just want to share. He loved them. He loved them. Yeah, he loved them. I have a story I want to share from Emma on our team. And she said, the night after the election, Charlie wrapped the stream and came out to the bullpen and sat and ate his dinner with the team and told us stories about the behind the scenes work he was doing that nobody knew about for like 2 hours. It was one of my favorite CK memories of all time. He told us how much we can trust JD as vice president and the work he did to get him to that spot. It's really beautiful.

[Tyler]

Charlie had. The thing that makes me the saddest about Charlie's passing and that he was ripped away from us so abrasively is that that man had probably a library of books to write about the things that he knew that have gone to rest with him, things that he saw that are very interesting for politics. Because again, piggybacking on that. You sat down with Charlie, he could tell you about things that nobody knows. I mean, there's things that we know. There's memories that I have that I can tell you and I, when the time's right, at some point, I hope that I can share some of these stories that they come out. Andrew has a gazillion of them. Blake, since you've been traveling, Jack knows these things because he lives this lifestyle every day. But.

[Jack]

And that's what I mean.

[Tyler]

I'm sad that we'll never hear.

[Jack]

I don't want, like, we can't. You know what I mean? I just can't. I can't process because people are, like, sharing text messages. And I was going back and look at. Because look at some of the ones that I have, and I was like, can't share that, can't share that, can't share that. Where do you even begin?

[Andrew Colvitt]

No, I know the Riz. What is funny? Like, we should probably put that up.

[Jack]

That's how I brought up the memes. Because, like, we talk about.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Put the Riz one up. This is funny. This is, like, perfect Charlie. And so I always like to, like, hound Charlie a little bit. And it looks like I was making fun of the cough drop thing because the. And by the way, that was the one thing that his Zinn cough drops.

[Jack]

Right?

[Andrew Colvitt]

The South Park. Yeah. People thought it was Zinn when he was on campus, and he would pop the cough drops in. So this. Welcome to the inside chat, guys. This is about as close up as you can get. And I would be like, actually, Charlie, I love the cough. It makes you look really cool, like, when you're, like, popping. You got this kind of, like, nonchalant look when you're just popping the cough drop. And Daisy says, everyone thinks his cough drops are zins. And I was like, nicotine cough drops. And Charlie. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. And I go, charlie's Rizz Secret. For the record, it's a great Rizz Crutch. Makes you look nonchalant. Plus, the athleisure wear versus the suit. Charlie goes, what is Riz? And I go, like, swagger. And Blake has to go, k Riz.

[Jack]

Muh, but no question mark, right? What is Riz?

[Andrew Colvitt]

What is Riz? What is Riz? Period?

[Jack]

Is it good?

[Andrew Colvitt]

It's probably because he was hosting a show or something.

[Tyler]

Yeah, that was always his follow up, though.

[Jack]

Is it good?

[Andrew Colvitt]

Is it good?

[Tyler]

Is this good?

[Andrew Colvitt]

We have one more caller I want to get to, and that is Julie. Julie, hopefully you're still with us. The floor is yours.

[Julie]

Yes, can you hear me? Yes, yes, yes, I'm Julie. This is me letting Charlie inspire me to be more joyful, bold, and brave. I'm calling instead of emailing.

[Evan]

Calling.

[Julie]

The scariest thing in the world. So I learned about Charlie after he followed Steve Bannon on rav. I listened to his podcast every morning on my walks. I love thought crimes and the glimpse that gives you into the secret world of men. I was glued to the rumble late night election coverage. I was blessed to see Carly interact with college students at Normal, Illinois. When I was here this spring, I was so afraid to go because I thought there's no mute button because I'm kind of like banning, like on the cold open. Stop, stop. I can't take anymore. And. But I didn't need it because Charlie was just fantastic. And then lastly, I'm most thankful for Charlie for introducing me to Jack Hibbs and the Real Life Network and reinvigorating my face. Thank you.

[Andrew Colvitt]

Beautiful. Well said, Julie. Thank you for calling. Thank you for sharing that, Julie, and sharing that. And you, your bravery was rewarded. And by the way, I want to say this. Like, people describe Charlie as fearless. He wasn't fearless. He was courageous. He looked fear right in the eye and he overcame it again and again and again. And I can tell you how many moments I spent with Charlie in this behind the scenes and the quiet before he walked out on stage or before he had to tackle something or a setback, bad news. And Charlie just looked at the fear right in the eye and he knew there was no way but through. And he just was so courageous and he just did it. And he always won. He always won. He won and he kept. He kept, like, coming back and he was stronger and fiercer. And frankly, I think I said this to Erica yesterday. I said probably for the last two years, I knew Charlie actually was fearless because he'd overcome so much. And that's.

[Tyler]

He was an absolutely fearless individual. I mean, since the day I met him and I shared a story yesterday, I won't repeat it, but the times where I had the greatest fear of people, and there's lots of people to fear in politics, and I had this privilege of getting to know what President Trump would label as bad hombres. And Charlie was always the person that said, stand in the pocket. Fight these people. Fight, fight. Fight these people.

[Andrew Colvitt]

I saw him do it to you in our chat.

[Tyler]

Too many times. Many times.

[Andrew Colvitt]

We have to wrap. It's been a pleasure to be with the audience. Thank you, Jack. Thank you, Blake. Thank you, Tyler. Thank you, Charlie. Kirk, you are our hero and you always will be.

[Tyler]

We love you, Charlie.

[Andrew Colvitt]

We love you.

[Tyler]

We love you, dear friend.