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The Dan Bongino Show
Rest In Peace Charlie Kirk | Episode 123
00:57:16
On the anniversary of 9/11, we look at Charlie Kirk's life and all the good he's done as well as the political environment in America that got us here.
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- [00:00]
Donald Trump
To my great fellow Americans, I am filled with grief and anger at the heinous assassination of Charlie Kirk on a college campus in Utah. Charlie inspired millions, and tonight, all who knew him and loved him are united in shock and horror. Charlie was a patriot who devoted his life to the cause of open debate and the country that he loved so much, the United States of America. He fought for liberty, democracy, justice, and the American people. He's a martyr for truth and freedom, and there has never been anyone who was so respected by youth. Charlie was also a man of deep, deep faith, and we take comfort in the knowledge that he is now at peace with God in heaven. Our prayers are with his wife, Erica, the two young, beloved children, and his entire family, who he loved more than anything in the world. We ask God to watch over them in this terrible hour of heartache and pain. This is a dark moment for America.
- [01:15]
Host/Commentator
Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day thy daily bread. Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory, forever and ever. Amen. Charlie Kirk was assassinated yesterday at Utah Valley University. We were live on the radio show. We were about to close it out yesterday, and we were going into our final segment, and it was this audience, actually, that alerted me first to the news, which, like you, I was completely staggered by. And we were able to. Not able to. We had the tragic obligation to bring the first reports of the shooting to the national radio audience yesterday. Many of you have messaged me about finding out about that on the program. And it was when that hour had concluded. All of us were praying, still holding out hope that there was hope for Charlie to survive this and to be with us. In fact, even at this hour, as I'm talking to you now, it does feel. It still feels like he's alive. Charlie Kirk is alive. He's 31 years old. Not only is he alive, he's going to be here forever. It's definitely the thought that just keeps running through my mind. And yet that, of course, is not true. He's gone. And we're going to do a lot today. I'm going to do a lot today. I want to talk to you about the impact that Charlie Kirk has. I think in a lot of ways, Charlie Kirk's life had a measurable impact. You could see the size of the crowds that would attend his events. You could see the size of the audience that he spoke to on the Internet and on television and wherever he got a chance to communicate his great message, you can see all of that. There are things you can't see, though, just behind the scenes, how much influence he was able to wield on behalf of the rest of us. As such a young man, 31 years old, and so impactful, living the kind of life that people twice his age only dreamed that they would have been able to live. He did it in 31 years. So we're going to talk about that today. I want to start this morning as we start this show with breaking news. We need to catch Charlie's killer. The assassin needs to be captured. Now, any number of things can change by the time you're hearing this. If you're watching me live, of course, this is just based on what we know at this hour. By the time you hear this on a podcast, perhaps later, hopefully, God willing, the assassin's been taken into custody by authorities and we can, and we can move on towards justice here. But already this morning, the FBI and the Utah Department of Public Safety have just done a briefing in the wake of the shooting. Yesterday, they took into custody two different people, persons of interest. They questioned them and then subsequently released both of those individuals. But as of this morning, they now claim that they do have clear video footage of the assassin. And I want to take you now to the statement just made moments ago. You're going to hear from the Commissioner of Utah's Department of Public Safety. You're also going to hear from the FBI. Here's what they said again just moments ago this morning.
- [05:15]
Utah Department of Public Safety Commissioner
11 Law enforcement has come together as a group to recognize and honor those that sacrificed to preserve the ideals of this country, the freedoms of this country. And instead we find ourselves today hunting a murderer who chose to violate our rights, the rights of an individual within this country. Just to recap yesterday's events, at around 12.20pm, political influencer Charlie Kirk was at Utah Valley University participating in a student sponsored event with Turning Point usa. Charlie was shot at that event. He was transported to a local hospital where he later passed. Last night, his body was moved to the office, the state office of the Medical Examiner. We will continue to facilitate movements to get him home today and with his family. Yesterday, during the investigative process, we located a couple of persons of interest. We interviewed those individuals and after releasing them and after clearing them of being suspects, they faced scrutiny, they faced threats. We asked the public to be patient with the investigative process. These Individuals were not suspects. They were people of interest. We ask that you do not impose into those. Into those people in that investigative process. They don't deserve that harassment for being subject to that. I'd like to thank all the investigators that are involved in this. They have worked around the clock all day yesterday through the night last night. Investigators from the state Bureau of Investigations, from county, from city agencies, the university, our federal partners with the FBI, the ATF and many others. Those are just a few of the people that we have involved in this. I'd like to thank all of them for their strong work. Through all that work last night, we were able to make a few breakthroughs.
- [07:28]
Host/Commentator
Here's the key.
- [07:29]
Utah Department of Public Safety Commissioner
We were able to track the movements of the shooter starting at 11:52am the subject arrived on campus shortly away from campus. We have tracked his movements onto the campus through the stairwells, up to the roof, across the roof to a shooting location. After the shooting, we were able to track his movements as he moved to the other side of the building, jumped off of the building and fled off of the campus and into a neighborhood. Our investigators have worked through those neighborhoods, contacting anybody. They can withstand doorbell cameras, witnesses, and have thoroughly worked through those communities trying to identify any leads. We do have good video footage of this individual. We are not going to release that at this time. We are working through some technologies and some ways to identify this individual. If we are unsuccessful, we will reach out to you as the media and we will push that publicly to help us identify them. But we are confident in our abilities right now and we would like to move forward in a manner that keeps everyone safe and moves this process appropriately.
- [08:41]
Host/Commentator
Okay, let me just pausing on this for a moment. So what you're hearing from the Commissioner of the Department of Public Safety in Utah is yes, they've got clear imagery of the guy, and that comes as a great relief that they've got that. Clearly their position at the moment is we're going to use our technology to track this guy down. If necessary, we will release the images to the public to get that assistance. But they must feel like they're getting close without public assistance here. And God willing, they do get this guy. You'll. This is. That is after we saw very grainy footage. We saw grainy footage of a man at the top of a roof with a clear line of sight down to Charlie inside that amphitheater at the university. And, and. But other than that, we had just hadn't had any clear images, not at least publicly. The law enforcement now saying they do have that. That's a big and important change this morning.
- [09:41]
Utah Department of Public Safety Commissioner
Last night, I communicated with Erica. That family's devastated. As a Commissioner of Public Safety, as a father, as a husband, I can only imagine what that family's going through. The heinous event that happened yesterday is not Utah. This is not what we're known for. Over the past several weeks, we've seen this state come together to help families in mourning come together as a community to show what Utah is known for, for a state of character, of service, of camaraderie of a neighboring field. We will not stand for what happened yesterday. We are exhausting every lead we have, every officer invested in this, every investigator, every local agency. The outpouring of support from the law enforcement community has been astounding. We are investing everything we have into this and we will catch this individual. Having walked through the crime scene, through the hallways of this school, through the classrooms, I can't imagine what the people on scene felt as well. A horrific event where some of them barricaded in classrooms, some of them ran in fear. Can't overstate the tragedy and the horrific event that yesterday was and how we will work to bring to justice the actions of one individual or any other individuals that assisted in that. Our state has gone through a lot and we will come out successful with that. I'll turn the time over to Special Agent Bowles.
- [11:24]
Host/Commentator
This is the FBI.
- [11:28]
FBI Special Agent Robert Bowles
Good morning. My name is Robert Bowles and I am the special Agent in charge of the Salt Lake field office. Following yesterday's tragic shooting of Charlie Kirk, FBI agents have been working around the clock in coordination with our law enforcement partners. We are and will continue to work non stop until we find the person that has committed this heinous crime and find out why they did it. This morning I can tell you that we have recovered what we believe is the weapon that was used in yesterday's shooting is a high powered bolt action rifle.
- [12:08]
Host/Commentator
That rifle, a high powered bolt action rifle. Pay attention to this detail because we do have more information this morning that comes to us by way of Steven Crowder. I'll share that with you in just a second.
- [12:17]
FBI Special Agent Robert Bowles
Was recovered in a wooded area where the shooter had fled. So the FBI laboratory will be analyzing this weapon. Investigators have also collected footwear impression, a palm print and forearm imprints for analysis. Now, I understand there are a lot of questions about motive. I assure you that all leads, tips and tips are being fully investigated. As of this morning, we have received more than 130 tips. We thank the community for that. The FBI has brought every resource to bear and we will continue to do so throughout the course of this investigation. The FBI's mission is to protect the American people. It's to uphold the Constitution of the United States. Any attack on the First Amendment is an attack on the very foundation of our democracy. That is why we will relentlessly pursue this case and the shooter until we find him. We also continue to grieve with the family and the community. It's our community. If you have any video or images from the shooting, we ask you to please submit them to our digital media tip website@www.FBI.gov Utah ValleShooting. Yeah, you can also call the FBI at 1-800- call FBI.
- [13:51]
Host/Commentator
He takes some questions here.
- [13:52]
FBI Special Agent Robert Bowles
We truly to want rely on the public's help in these types of cases. And no tip is too small or insignificant. Thank you.
- [14:02]
Host/Commentator
A hard to hear question here, but they get into some basic descriptions of the shooter that have not been revealed until now.
- [14:10]
Utah Department of Public Safety Commissioner
So what I'll release about the suspect is suspect blended in well with a college institution. We're not releasing many details right now and we will soon.
- [14:23]
Host/Commentator
Blended in well, right now we're not.
- [14:25]
Utah Department of Public Safety Commissioner
But that individual appears to be of college age. We are confident in our abilities to track that individual. If we're unsuccessful in identifying them immediately, we will reach out for the public's help and the media's help in pushing those photos. That was a new development overnight. Working through the night, studying those cameras. So that's, that's something that's new and that we're working through right now as far as.
- [14:50]
Host/Commentator
Okay, all right. So what we know as of this morning, the brand new information is they have clear imagery and that this is a college aged assassin. The person who fired this shot, college aged, they say, would have blended in well with the college campus. Additionally, to get to the point that I wanted to make just a moment ago about the high powered bolt action rifle, we do have some information this morning that came out ahead of that press conference from Steven Crowder who no doubt will be talking about the details about this on his own program. But I do want to show you some of this. It says here, this is as Stephen puts it today that his team has received an email from an officer at the atf. The email includes a screenshot from what appears to be an internal message describing a weapon and cartridges located by the ATF and other law enforcement near the scene of the Charlie Kirk shooting. And in it they describe how the agents responded. The suspect had fired one shot from an elevated position on the rooftop in an adjacent building on the campus. Surveillance video shows the suspect jumping off, fleeing the area on foot. That's all consistent with what you just heard in this press conference from the Department of Public safety and the FBI. The ATF and other law enforcement located an older model imported Mauser.30 06 caliber bolt action rifle wrapped in a towel in a wooded area near the campus. Again, consistent with what we just heard. The location of the firearm appears to match the suspect's route of travel. The spent cartridge was still chambered in addition to three unspent rounds at the top. Fed magazine. All of the cartridges. Pay attention to this detail. All of the cartridges have engraved wording on them expressing transgender and anti fascist ideology. Transgender and anti fascist ideology. We know that Charlie was in the midst of actually answering a question about transgender violence when he was killed. My mind immediately jumped to, is that a coincidence? The person who asked that question was asking a question about transgender violence. And now we see this. I don't know. I don't know the answer. I won't pretend to know. I just. I'll relay to you that I have all of the same sort of rapid action emotions and responses to this and trying to piece all of this together from the distance that I'm sitting at all the way across the country. I desperately want answers here as to what the hell happened. But this ATF report says that all the cartridges had engraved wording on them expressing transgender and antifascist ideology. An emergency trace has been submitted and the ATF slc, I believe that would be Salt Lake City is working. Leads generated by the trace, the firearm and ammunition have been taken by the FBI for DNA analysis and fingerprint impressions. Upon completion of forensics, the firearm will be disassembled for additional importer information. Multiple people of interest have contacted or been detained because of eyewitness testimony and review of video footage. That primary suspect has yet to be identified. That was as of the time that this screen grab was taken. And you can see here just some proof here from. From Steven Crowder of the. The actual Department of Justice filing that was shared with him. So these are, these are some of the early details we have as of today. Deeply frustrating, of course, to. To go this long without this suspect taken into custody. Custody pandemonium yesterday at Utah Valley University. Let's, let's. Let's talk about some of the other elements here. There's, There's a lot to get to. I, I'll, I'll tell you of. About Charlie Kirk. Charlie Kirk is is a man who, just like you, I was deeply aware of his impact. Really just a really incredible human being with a really incredible message. And the message, it was an important, a basic one. It was a reminder to get back to basics, which is that there is a God. You are not Him. We should worship that God. And, and that, that thinking that, that spiritual acknowledgment will lead you to conservatism. And Charlie Kirk was one of the single most effective communicators on those messages in any of our lives. And again, he was struck down yesterday at the age of 31 years old. You know, when he first arrived on the scene, he was just a high school student. I think back to 2012. You'll remember it was the Republican convention in Tampa in 2012 and all. All those many years ago. And Charlie Kirk was at that convention. He was 18 years old at the time. And I was. I've been talking to people who know Charlie well a lot in the last. In the last day, kind of getting a sense of all of this. I didn't know him well. I met Charlie a couple of times, but I wouldn't have said. I wouldn't said that we were close or anything. I didn't. I didn't know him. But I do know a lot of people who, who did. And the one story that stuck out through the years is back then, in 2012, he approached a big conservative donor by the name of Foster Freeze, a wonderful human being who passed several years ago. Very tall man. You know, he lived in Jackson, Wyoming, wore a cowboy hat. He was a deeply spiritual man. He came to Christ very late in life, but when he did, he went all in. And in fact, I can't remember a single conversation or meeting that I was in with him where that man did not bring up Jesus Christ in the most jovial possible way. He was just overflowing with angelic energy. And I felt like God had definitely touched that man. And he had a really good. He had a successful career. This is Foster Fries. He has super successful career at picking stocks and being an investor and becoming a very wealthy man as a result of all of that. But he also had a skill for picking people. He had an innate talent for identifying people who would be successes. And the reason I'm telling you this is because it was at that convention. Charlie walks up to Foster Freeze, walks up to him and says, Mr. Freeze, I'd like to pitch you on an idea I have for an organization. Could I get a couple minutes of your time? And as I understand It Foster's first reaction was to suggest that he was a little busy. He had to move. He wouldn't be able to do it right now. And maybe he could get in touch with one of Foster's assistants. And Charlie insisted. He said, no, no, it's just going to take two minutes. And Foster, being a generous and a very good man, said, okay, sure, two minutes. So Foster gave him those two minutes. Over the course of the next two minutes, Charlie had successfully convinced Foster Freeze. That Turning Point should be a real thing that will change the country, that conservatives can reach young people and can win them over, that conservatives can create a movement of young people that will forever improve the future of our country. Charlie, in the course of two minutes, used the blessings that God had given him even at an early age, just the age of 18 years old, to convince one of the wealthiest and certainly most powerful people on the right at the time to support his cause. And Foster did, right on the spot. Foster cut him a check for six figures to start this organization and then would, of course, support it with utter enthusiasm in the years that ensued, watching Charlie's many successes. That was back in 2012. 2012 was a wild year for the right, obviously, the Mitt Romney candidacy, but it was also the year that we lost Andrew Breitbart. Andrew Breitbart had died earlier that year. And that was. That created shock waves on the right. It was. It reminds me a lot of actually of what we're all experiencing today as we say this too soon. Goodbye to Charlie Kirk. Breitbart passed, and the right was completely stunned by it. So many people who we now know and love, who are all big voices on the right, were impacted by Andrew Breitbart. He had created a universe of people who would go on to do all sorts of good things for the country. And. And then that's the same year that Charlie Kirk's political career, his influential career, began. And I remember thinking back, you know, I was. I was with the Daily caller from since 2010. So I've been in conservative media for a while now and long enough to have observed Charlie Kirk on the rise. And I remember thinking, and on first blush, when I was aware of what he was standing up and doing. And I hate myself for thinking this, but I. I was worried. I was like, gosh, I hope he's just not one of these guys who's. There's all sorts of people in politics who basically take money and pretend like they're going to do something with it and then don't do anything but enrich themselves. You know, they come along. You know, kid comes along and says, hey, older conservatives, I can get the youth to support the conservatives. And then they start raising money. And you're like, man, you're just taking advantage of old people who are. Who are hopeful about the future. And they. They're believing you, and they're wrong to believe you. I was wrong. Whatever. Whatever concern I had about that was allayed very quickly because you suddenly, you discovered very quickly that Charlie Kirk had one of the most unique generational talents for both communication and organization that anyone has ever been given by the Lord above. And Charlie built a behemoth. We see the public side of it. We see the public side. All the social media videos, all of the college visits, all of the massive events that he put together, you see the public side side of it. Behind the scenes, though, Charlie was our spokesman. Charlie was the guy who was able to get into the room with the people who made the decisions to represent the rest of us. He was the one who was reminding people what this is all about, that we're here for Americans. We have to see to their needs. He was the one who was forcing them. I can't tell you how many politicians I've seen in the last 24 hours that he would go to, and he would tell them, okay, good, now what? What are you going to do next? How are you going to win this race? Where are you going to concentrate your time? How are we going to get these votes? J.D. vance, the Vice President of the United States, reflecting on his friendship with Charlie Kirk in the last 24 hours, posting to social media saying that they became friends. And J.D. vance, of course, is so thankful for that. And Charlie said, you take care of Wisconsin. I've got Arizona. It's pretty big for a guy just turning 30, 31 years old to be able to help the President and the Vice President of the United States win an entire state and return to the White House. But that's the kind of influence that Charlie Kirk had. Charlie Kirk maintained close friendships with some of the biggest names and people that you and I are aware of, including people who really disagree with each other from time to time. Charlie Kirk was the bridge between so many of the factions of the right that exist today. He was the bridge, actually. He maintained a very close relationship with Don Jr. Who we've heard, of course, loved Charlie like a little brother, adored him, in his words, Little brother. He was very close to J.D. vance. As I said, the two had a very good friendship. He's Very close to Tucker Carlson. Very close. Tucker and him were great friends. And by the way, it wasn't always that way. There's a time period you can find years ago where, where Tucker went on a debate stage with Charlie and the two of them squared off and it was wild to watch. But what it was was dialogue. It was dialogue. And I, and you could see over the years the influence that they had on each other and certainly that Tucker had on, on Charlie and that Socratic impulse that Tucker became famous for, which is to simply just ask the core questions. How is this good for the country? How does this serve the American people well? And Charlie embodied that thought process as well as anyone. Also, speaking of Tucker, I mean, it's no secret that Tucker and Mark Levin have been at war with each other. Well, at war, meaning they've just been fighting with each other publicly. Charlie is the bridge between those worlds. Both men love Charlie Kirk. Both men are so sad that he's gone. Alex Jones expressing his condolences and outrage now about what happened to Charlie Kirk. Just all of these, this whole universe of people all coming together around this one man who brought us all together. I saw Matt Walsh say in the last 12 hours that it's time for the infighting to stop on the right. We have a mission. We have a mission to move forward together. The left has elements that want to kill us. There is no question about this. I mean, how could anyone question it? You just saw it happen yesterday. The left has elements that want to murder their political opponents. It's because they're incapable of engaging in the dialogue that Charlie Kirk represented. Charlie Kirk was a guy who just said, hey, let's have a conversation. The people who would pick up a rifle to kill him are the weak minded lefties who've been inflamed to take out the people who want to have that dialogue. I use weak minded very intentionally because one, it's true. It's absolutely true. Another thing to remember about all of this is it's not the first time we've seen this in American history. Remember, these things happen. If you know history, you can detect the elements here. And there's a chaos that the United States has experienced before, certainly in the middle of the last century. But I want to take you back a little over a century ago and remind you of the words of, of Teddy Roosevelt. Teddy Roosevelt on October 14th of 1912 was shot in the chest by a would be assassin on his way in to give a speech. Now, Teddy, by virtue of the folded up speech in his pocket and the spectacles that he also kept in his pocket was able to survive the shooting, but with a pretty serious wound to his chest. And he walked in and he gave the speech anyway. And when he walked in to give the speech, he announced to the crowd that he wasn't surprised that assassin had tried to kill him. And here are the words that he used back then and I think they're instructive for us now. He said. Now, friends, of course I do not know, as I say anything about him, but it is a very natural thing that weak and vicious minds should be inflamed to acts of violence by the kind of awful mendacity and abuse that have been heaped upon me for the last three months by the papers in the interest of not only Mr. Debs, but of Mr. Wilson and Mr. Taft. In other words, what Teddy Roosevelt was saying at the time is my political opponents have lied about me so viciously and so thoroughly and so disgracefully that there are weak and vicious minds who are being inflamed who are taking up arms against me, not for legitimate purposes, but instead to eliminate me at the urging of the people who run my political opponents parties. That's what Teddy Roosevelt announced back then. And here we are doing this conversation again. We had this conversation last year. We as a country, we had this conversation last year when the President of the United States, Donald Trump, was almost assassinated one time, wounded multiple times, multiple times. When is it going to stop? And now a vicious, weak minded radical lefty has decided to take these shots at a softer target, a very influential target. But when I say a softer target, I mean a less protected target, murdering Charlie Kirk yesterday. This is a part of a long string of left wing violence in our country. You are witnessing right now in the media some attempt to suggest that this is a, quote, both sides problem. It is not. Are there people on the right who are driven to do awful things beyond reason? Yes, it happens on occasion, but it is nowhere near where the left is in terms of its sheer out of control violence. Just dating back to the first year of the First Trump presidency, 2017, we had the Alexandria baseball shooting. Steve Scalise was grievously wounded on that field by a Bernie Sanders campaign volunteer who not only shot Scalise, but shot several others as well. Of course, last year we had multiple assassination attempts against President Trump, one of which wounded him. A shot to the head that he survived by the grace of God. We saw an assassination attempt on Justice Brett Kavanaugh in order to compel an outcome in a case that was designed to prevent the murder of the unborn. We just watched the murder of a health care CEO in cold blood in a city street and, and the left lionized the assassin, treated him as if he was a king. In D.C. recently, we had the murder of those young Israeli diplomats. Just a young, just young people in the prime of their life gunned down, killed by a radical lefty. We saw the terror attacks on Teslas earlier this year. All of the Tesla stations, Tesla dealerships attacked by radical lefties angry that President Trump and Elon Musk were working together for the betterment of this country. We've seen the endless assaults on law enforcement, including in Washington D.C. where left wing grand juries refused to indict the people who commit these acts of violence. We've seen the attacks on ICE agents themselves. An explosion against members of Immigration and Customs Enforcement because of the words and the encouragement of the leaders of the left and the activated weak, vicious minds of the radical left calling ICE agents Nazis. People like Tim Walls and Michelle Wu, Hakeem Jeffries. The list is endless and unfortunate. Now, the left has been very activated to violence, there's no question about it. And the data support exactly what I'm telling you today. And by the way, what the President told you in his address to the nation last night, we knew, and Charlie Kirk knew to be clear, that the left has been overtaken by something that we unfortunately have to refer to as an assassination culture. Look at this. This is from April of this year. Here's Charlie Kirk. Assassination culture is spreading on the left, said Charlie. 48% of liberals say it would be at least somewhat justified to murder Elon Musk. 55% said the same about Donald Trump. In California, activists were naming ballot measures after Luigi Mangione. The left is being whipped into a violent frenzy. Any setback, whether losing an election or losing a court case, justifies a maximally violent response for the left. This is the natural outgrowth of left wing protest culture, tolerating violence and mayhem for years on end. The cowardice of local prosecutors and school officials and have turned the left into a ticking time bomb. Charlie knew what was going on. Charlie is now a victim of that assassination culture on the left. And those numbers that Charlie was reciting, those came to us from something called the Network Contagion Research Institute. And of course, he was right about that. 55% of so called left of center people said that they could at least somewhat justify the murder of President Trump. 48% of left of center. You heard What? I said left of center people, people who consider themselves somehow moderate, take these radical extremist positions on the American left. This is a massive cultural cancer on the American left. It's huge. It's not a small thing. It's not a concentrated number of radicals. It is a massive contagion. That wasn't the only survey that found that Scott Rasmussen found in September of last year the following shocking data. 17% of people in the United States said that Trump. We'd be better off. America would be better off if Trump had been killed. If Trump had been killed. 28% of Democrats say that America would have been better off if Trump had been assassinated. Another 24% were not sure. Fewer than half of Democrats could bring themselves to say that America would not be better off if the opposing party's candidate for president had been assassinated. These numbers really lay out in vicious and unfortunate detail just how crazed the left has become, how disinterested in dialogue they've become. I've got one more piece of evidence on the data side that shows this and I've shared this from time to time. This comes to US back in 2022, the Southern Poverty Law center and I highlighted it at the time, a poll done by the left wing and out of control Southern Poverty Law center, who, by the way, has inspired violence against people like Charlie Kirk on a routine basis. They were the source of inspiration for the attack on the Family Research Council years ago. The Southern Poverty Law center found in their survey that nearly half of young male Democrats approve of assassinating a politician who is harming our country or democracy. So I'm sorry, when I see tweets from Barack Obama, when I see tweets from Joe Biden and Bill Clinton and Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer and Gavin Newsom saying things like violence is not the answer. Violence has no place in our democracy, as Obama said overnight areas. 5:26pm yesterday. Despicable violence has no place in our democracy though, said Obama. I'm sorry, I don't believe you. You knew what you were breathing life into. We've seen it growing for a very long time. It is not enough for any one of these Democrats, all of those high profile Democrats, the list I just read off to you, all of them saying that violence is not the answer overnight. All of them rushing to suggested there's no way they had anything to do with this. No, no, no, we, we could not have inspired any of this. It's not enough for you to say political violence is not acceptable. If there is decency anywhere to be found. Anywhere to be found. And I'm addressing now the American left. You have to pull yourself out of this dissent. You have to recognize the humanity of Donald J. Trump. You have to recognize the humanity of Charlie Kirk. You have to recognize the humanity of the people that you share a country with. The dehumanizing has to stop. And you need to get control of your own house. This is not a message for everybody. It's a message for the half of Democrats who say it is justifiable to assassinate the President of the United States. If you were anything close to serious, you'd be involved in cleaning it up. But they've shown no signs of that. Joe Biden spent his presidency saying that Donald Trump was a threat to, quote, democracy. Obama has done this very thing as well. Hakeem Jeffries has done this very thing as well. Chuck Schumer threatened the United States Supreme Court in the lead up to the assassination attempt on Brett Kavanaugh. The reality is every single one of these guys should have no influence on our politics. Actually should not be engaged in this at all. And let me extend this critique to the media again. In the last 24 hours, the media have demonstrated the same kind of poisonous instincts that they have every time something like this happens. We've got attacks on Charlie Kirk in the wake of his assassination. They're calling him a right wing extremist, far right, on and on and on, designed to, of course, prejudice the audience into believing that he deserved his fate, that it was his fault that he was shot. On MSNBC yesterday, there was a person called Matthew Dowd, a paid employee of msnbc. Cut three. And here's what he said on the air yesterday. Saying that Charlie had it coming. But following up what was just said, he's been one of the most divisive, especially divisive younger figures in this, who is constantly sort of pushing this sort of hate speech or sort of aimed at certain groups. And I always go back to hateful thoughts lead to hateful words, which then lead to hateful actions. The reaction to that was immediate and intense all across our country yesterday. Matthew dad was not the only person who went on that network to say something completely poisonous. Matthew Dowd has been fired as of this morning by NBC. But that's not enough. NBC as a network should not exist. These networks have squandered whatever credibility they ever established in the past, if at all, and they should be sued into oblivion. These are. These are not news channels. These are propagandists who've made our country more dangerous, who've used their perches to pit Americans against one another. They shouldn't exist. Remember, Fox News had to pay, like, a bajillion dollars, like an epic, epic settlement in a case about questioning the results of the 2020 election. And yet you have entire cable networks where they dignify the assassination of. Of. Of attempts on Donald Trump or people like Charlie Kirk, and there are no consequences for the entirety of the network. That's insane. And in a moment, the fellows tell me I've got some news to share with you, so we'll do that in a second. But I. Let me. Let me just finish on a point here. And this is about Charlie. Charlie called all of us to our better angels. I get it. It's this. This is also infuriating. And if you are a gun owner, be well trained on your weapon, protect your family, defend yourself. That's all very important. We have no idea what the future holds, but I do know what we can control, and that's ourselves. Charlie Kirk has called all of us to appeal to our better angels, to engage in dialogue, to believe in this country and to believe confidently in its future. It would be an utter tragedy for us to reject the mission that he's given the rest of us. It would be an utter tragedy to let the bastards win. The kind of person who would open fire on Charlie Kirk in the hope of creating the kind of chaos that brings this country down. Don't give those assholes what they want. Look after your country. Speak up. Be better in every single way that you detect that you're not good enough yet. Do it. Charlie did. Charlie spent every waking hour pursuing excellence. I don't even know how he accomplished all of the things he accomplished in his young life. He's already inspiring me to tap into every last second and every last resource I can to be better. And I intend to do that, to honor Charlie and to be inspired by Charlie, which I am. We've got more in a moment, but first, Justin, you say we've got some. Some breaking news from the President.
- [46:00]
Donald Trump
Now, before we begin, let me express the horror and grief so many Americans at the heinous assassination of Charlie Kirk have felt. Charlie was a giant of his generation, a champion of liberty and an inspiration to millions and millions of people. Our prayers are with his wonderful wife, Eric, and his beautiful children. Fantastic people they are. We miss him greatly. Yet I have no doubt that Charlie's voice and the courage he put into the hearts of countless people, especially young people, will live On. I'm pleased to announce that I will soon be awarding Charlie Kirk posthumously, the Presidential Medal of Freedom. The date of the ceremony will be announced and I can only guarantee you one thing, that we will have a very big crowd. Very, very big.
- [47:07]
Host/Commentator
God bless the President. God bless him. Yeah. You know, what a world in which we live. It was the President of the United States who told most of us yesterday, actually the. The tragic news. He. You could tell the President knew already. It was just a matter of. Of time before he would make the announcement about. About Charlie's death. You could tell just ahead of it. The reason I know that is because as a reporter for the New York Post, by the name of Diana Nerozi, she used to be my White House correspondent. She was her maiden named Diana Glabova. And she tweeted this out yesterday at 4.19pm this was ahead of the President making the announcement on Truth Social. She said she asked the President, how is Charlie Kirk doing? He said, he's not doing well. It looks very bad. And then she asked him how he was feeling, the President, that is. And the President responded, not good. He was a very, very good friend of mine and he was a tremendous person. You could tell that the President was on the verge of making the announcement that he did moments later, that he knew that Charlie Crook had passed. This is a really important moment for our country. Obviously, I would. And people are looking, figure, trying to figure out what to do about all of this. Well, let me just begin with the most obvious thing that I know Charlie Kirk would urge you to do, which is definitely to lift your eyes, to lift your heart, to lift your soul in prayer on behalf of our country and that we can keep this entire thing going. That's the thing. Another would be, I do think that it is worth paying attention to the words that are coming out of the White House right now and the President of the United States. This is a moment where the President is being called once again to be the leader of the nation. And I know he's receiving condemnation already from the left overnight and who cares? But just to make a basic point, they're attacking him for pointing out the excesses of the radical left and how dangerous everything has become. What the President is doing is the thing that all of us need to do every single day, which is just say the truth out loud. Just tell the truth out loud. The only way anything improves is if you can tell the truth out loud. So the President of the United States has been doing that. So I'm gonna keep paying attention to every word he has to say on this subject. Also, I personally, in my house, I lowered my flag to half staff last night. I don't have one of those huge flagpoles. I just have one of the ones that lean outside the house. But I was able to lower the flag down the pole. And to the extent that you can show your love for your country in that way and send the message that this has to end, I encourage you to do that. I think sometimes conservatives feel like they're living in isolation, especially if they live in blue communities. It's okay to indicate that you love your country. And in fact, sometimes you bring people out of the woodwork who maybe you didn't realize they, too, do love their country. That's an important piece of this. And then the other big lesson here is hold your family close as a father and as a husband. I was thinking a lot yesterday, after all of this went down. What were Charlie's final moments like with his family? Did he kiss his kids on the head as he walked out the door for the last time, assuming, of course, that he would see them imminently? Was it a rushed goodbye? Did they dwell? I mean, I'll never know the answer to that question. It's not mine to know, but it's the kind of thing that I thought a lot about, and it reminded me just as a person. I'm not saying, by the way, I'm not saying any of this is like a conservative media person or anything like that. I'm. All I'm saying is just as a human being, you just really never know when God's going to call you back. And to treat, to treat every moment like it's the blessing that it actually is. So that's the, that's the plan. That's the plan for me, anyway. Let me, Let me. Yeah. Don't get dead. Exactly right. Oh, and I do want to. Let me offer one other thing. I, I, I know Dan Bongino. I know you. And I know instinctively that there are. I almost. My instincts tell me that Dan Bongino is working more fervently to capture this killer than maybe anybody in the FBI right now. Dan is a dedicated warrior on behalf of this country, and he is doing this job because he loves it. And I don't have a single question in my mind about his resolve to see this through. And I will say with utter, unimpeachable confidence that he is moving right now with aggression to his great credit. And he's doing exactly the job he has to do. And I did send him a message this morning. He's busy, so he hasn't had a chance to respond to it. Maybe he won't. I don't need him to. But I did tell him, Dan, I'm preparing to do a show that you should be doing because I want to see what Dan Bongino has to say on this subject. Look, I want to end today with Charlie. I want to end with Charlie and what he has had to say and why you should be inspired by him. They are not going to be able to take away his influence. They're not going to be able to take away his impact because you and I have an obligation to keep that alive. There's a lot of video of Charlie Kirk that we could dwell on. There's a lot of. A lot of things he said through the years that I could share with you, but I'm going to instead share with you something that he told the Deseret News just a month ago. It's a quote that I have obsessed over all night long because I think it represents the essence of the mission that God placed Charlie Kirk on this earth to perform. And here's what he said. Charlie Kirk told the Deseret News last month. My job every single day is actively trying to stop a revolution. This is where you have to try to point them towards ultimate purposes and towards getting back to church, getting back to faith, getting married, having children. That is the type of conservatism that I represent. And I'm trying to. Trying to paint a picture of virtue, of lifting people up, not just staying angry. Charlie Kirk called all of us to live up to our God given potential. Charlie Kirk is asking you, and he's asking me to be the absolute best versions of ourselves. God didn't give you the talents and blessings that he gave you for you just to let them waste away. He gave them to you on purpose so that you could use them to glorify him, to care for the souls around you who God also created. And each of us are unrepeatable and irreplaceable. And that is totally true in the case of Charlie Kirk. The world is a better place for getting 31 years from Charlie Kirk. 31 years. 31 of the most effective years that any man has ever given. And he died using the blessings that God gave him. And his death will absolutely not be in vain. You and I refuse to let that happen. God bless you and God bless Charlie Kirk. Rest in peace, Charlie. What advice do you have for me as I move into adulthood in order to become a more informed and involved citizen.
- [56:14]
Philosopher/Advisor
Well, first of all, thank you for being here. And I have hope thanks to people like you. How old are you again?
- [56:21]
Host/Commentator
13.
- [56:22]
Philosopher/Advisor
13. Here's a couple things I want want to encourage you to do. Learn something new every single day and focus on what it means to be a good person and a person in strong character. Aristotle said that courage is the ultimate virtue. Without it, there are no other virtues. If people aren't courageous, you don't have honesty, you don't have justice, you don't have beauty, you don't have wonder. And so, at age 13, I want you to commit yourself to a life of courage. Courage is doing the right thing when you don't know how it's going to work out.
- [56:49]
Host/Commentator
Courage.
- [56:50]
Philosopher/Advisor
Courage is committing yourself to the correct course of action, regardless of the cost associated to it. Every human being, I believe, is made in the image of the divine, is sacred, is unique. And if we get away from this principle as we have, we not only have moral degradation, we not only have the collapsing society around us, but it's bad for that being itself. That being itself is unique. That being has rights. And who are we to say, just because we're older that we get to murder it?
- [57:14]
Host/Commentator
Thank you.