In this article

• How liberals and the soft left covered up for Charlie Kirk
• Who Kirk really was.
• The right wing background on his accused assassin
• Threats against “the left”
• Concluding thoughts

From Wired magazine

The Wall Street Journal editorial board must have had a suspicion what was up. On the day Charlie Kirk was murdered, instead of fulminating against the “violent left“ they wrote “this is now a dangerous moment for the country, which could descend into a… cycle of political violence that would be hard to arrest”. They probably suspected a far right fanatic since almost all of such personal assaults in recent years have been conducted by the far right.

But before we get into the background of the suspected shooter, let’s make a point about who Charlie Kirk really was:

The Wall Street Journal editorial board makes this claim: “Kirk built his movement, turning point USA, the old-fashioned way: through political debate. His method was to appear on college campuses and welcome all commerce to take him on with questions and opposing points of you. He did this in mid the height of cancer culture, and the worst of screaming mobs on campus who want to shut down conservative speakers.”

The liberals and the soft left myth
As night follows day, the liberals tried to make themselves respectable before Corporate America by spewing the same nonsense and the soft left then tried to ingratiate themselves with the liberals. Ezra Klein, columnist for the New York Times, wrote that “Charlie Kirk was practicing politics, the right way” by supposedly engaging in serious political debate. Jacobin online magazine, which is one of the most widely red supposedly socialist journals, then followed suit. They published an article by soft left academics Ben Burgis and Meagan Day entitled “Charlie Kirk’s murder is a tragedy and a disaster”. The article jumps to the assumption that it was somebody on the left who murdered Charlie Kirk. Then Burgis and Day paint Charlie Kirk in the same light as did Ezra Klein. They forget to mention that Charlie Kirk was one of the organizers of the January 6 coup attempt.

The real Charlie Kirk
According to Wikipedia, Kirk bragged on social media that his group, Turning Point Action and Students for Trump, was sending more than 80 buses of “patriots” to Washington DC for January 6. He also bragged that he was “getting 500 emails a minute calling for a civil war”, something he never denounced. Kirk also reportedly received one and a quarter million dollars to help fund the buses for the January 6 event, and subsequently he portrayed rioters as merely walking into the capital building to “take a selfie” and complained that they had been put in solitary confinement for that supposedly peaceful action. By spreading the stolen election lie and helping build the Jan. 6 coup attempt, Kirk helped foster the general right wing violence. Like his hero Trump, Kirk never once opposed the threats against election officials, nor the (foiled) plan to kidnap and murder Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer, nor the numerous fascist shootings, such as the shooting of the Atlanta CDC office. He actually celebrated the man who nearly beat to death the husband of Nancy Pelosi and called the attacker a “hero”. By supporting the gun culture, Kirk also helped foster the far right violent atmosphere to which he ultimately fell victim. Ever the opportunist, Kirk campaigned for the release of the Epstein files, until Trump openly opposed their release. Then Kirk did a one-eighty and also opposed their release.

Kirk was also an advocate of the so-called white replacement theory as well as nationalism, homophobia, anti semitism and male supremacy. He also established a public list of “left” professors whom he tried to get fired and set them up to be doxxed. This shows the reality of the false claims of his willingness to debate the left. It’s not a matter of debating fact nor even interpretation of fact. The issue is that his entire approach appeals a dismissal of actual historical and scientific facts. Those who like the ideas of Charlie Kirk are simply not interested in considering actual facts nor any other point of view. All they are looking for is phrases that make them feel good, phrases that justify their own drive to dominate and exploit others.

The Jacobin article shows how any time a crisis strikes a direct line develops from the conservative corporate board rooms to the establishment liberals to the soft left.

From Wired magazine

Trump and other MAGA leaders
As opposed to the Wall St. Journal editors, Trump, true to form, immediately jumped to the conclusion that it was somebody on the “left” who “is directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in the country today .” Elon Musk posted “the left is the party of murder”, Katie Miller, wife of Steven Miller, wrote that liberals “had blood on their hands”, and Alex Jones wrote “this is a war, this is a war, this is a war”. Trump whisperer Laura Loomer, made it most clear where they would like to see this headed. She posted on Instagram, “it’s time for the Trump administration to shut down, defund, and prosecute every single leftist organization.” Charlie Kirk’s “ life cannot be in vain.”

Tyler Robinson with one of his guns.

The right wing links of accused shooter, Tyler Robinson
As far as Tyler Robinson, the accused shooter – with emphasis on “accused” since he has not even been tried or convicted: He grew up in a right wing, gun obsessed family. As a 14 year old, he obsessed over the attack on the U. S. embassy in Benghazi, Libya. This was a right wing cause at that time. There is no evidence that he had any contact with anybody on the left after that time. At least by that age, if not even earlier, Robinson entered into the online gamer world. In her brilliant book “Black Pill” journalist Elle Reeve shows how that world is often connected to male and white supremacy. Also, by making the real world and the cyber world interchangeable, it confuses cyber world violence with real world violence. And making a name for oneself in the real world translates into increased prestige in the cyber world.

All of this evidently played a role for Tyler Robinson. There are still some questions about the rifle found near the scene of the crime. However, the inscriptions on the shell casing of that rifle tell the tale. This N. Y. Times article and this one discuss some of these inscriptions and his connections. According to friends of Robinson, he was massively into shooter video games including “Halo” and “Call of Duty.” All the inscriptions apparently are references to these games. That even includes the inscription “Bella Ciao”, which is an old Italian anti fascist song from the 1930s or ‘40’s which for some reason has been taken up by the followers of pro Nazi Nick Fuentes. (Fuentes and his followers reportedly hated Kirk, whom they regarded as being insufficiently extreme.) Two reporters from MSNBC also reported that Robinson hated Kirk because Kirk wasn’t conservative enough.

The N. Y. Times also reports on a group chat on Discord of which Robinson was a member. Before he had been arrested, Robinson posted (regarding the photo of the at that time unidentified suspect) that his “doppelgänger is trying to get me in trouble”. This led to a series of jokes, including a suggestion that they turn him in for the reward money, to which Robinson replied “only of I get a cut.” Someone posted, “Whatever you do, don’t go to a mcdonalds anytime soon.” The Times reports: ‘When another user suggested that the killing of Mr. Kirk would lead President Trump to send the National Guard to Utah, the suspect replied, “in a red state??? nah CLEARLY the shooter was from california.”

‘A few minutes later, he joked: “I’m actually Charlie Kirk, wanted to get outta politics so I faked my death, now I can live out my dream life in kansas.”’

There is an air of unreality to the entire conversation, making light of this extremely serious event while at the same time leading towards making Tyler Robinson some sort of hero or anti hero.

Despite the evidence, we emphasize that Robinson has not even been tried, no less convicted, although many liberals, such as youtuber Kyle Kulinski, are already referring to him as the murderer. This attitude will be used against us when leftists and others are falsely accused. Don’t forget the Central Park Five. Those five black youth also “confessed”, under pressure, to raping and beating a white woman. Then after spending years in prison they were ultimately exonerated. (Trump had called for their execution and to this day he defends that call.) There was also the case of security guard Richard Jewell, falsely accused and convicted in the press of planting a bomb at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. (I remember a coworker at the time telling me the s.o.b. should be hanged because “we know he did it.”) They press reports were so one-sided that they ultimately lost a massive lawsuit launched by Jewell. Nevertheless, as opposed to those cases, the evidence against Robinson seems pretty strong, including a reportedly voluntary confession.

MAGA still blames left
The Republicans are bitterly disappointed that the accused assassin is apparently one of their own. They can’t totally escape that fact, so they are equally blaming “the left”, including Democrats. Utah Republican governor Spencer Cox in announcing Robinson’s arrest, said “I hear talk all the time that words are violence. Words are not violence. Violence is violence.” In other words, threatening violence is okay, and the violent atmosphere created by these right wing threats is okay. It’s just that MAGA leaders like Cox can’t defend the actions that flow from this atmosphere, especially when one of their own falls victim to those actions. Cox then said, “there is one person responsible for” the murder. But as the Discord chat shows, these individuals do not act without some sort of moral support. The fostering of political violence by nearly the entire Republican Party – including Kirk himself – is what led to the shooting of Charlie Kirk.

Just as we prepare to publish this article, the latest news is that Utah governor Cox is claiming that Robinson had “leftist ideology”, although Cox hasn’t provided any evidence of that. Cox is also claiming that Robinson was living with somebody who was transitioning their gender. We will have to see where these claims lead. Update – We had not heard about this aspect before: It now turns out that Robinson was living with a roommate named Lance Twiggs. The two had a romantic relationship. Twiggs is transitioning genders. Apparently she posted a comment in support of Biden although, like Robinson, she comes from a right wing family. If support for Biden is all Cox has for his claim that Robinson has left ideology, that is a blatant attempt to encourage attacks against the left. Twiggs is reportedly cooperating with the FBI and has been called a “snitch” by some of Robinson’s supporters but a “whistleblower” by others. Hopefully, we will find out more in the coming days and weeks.

As for the WSJ editors, they blame both sides equally. In their editorial on the subject, they also blame Representative Ilhan Omar, whom they attack for having said “these people are full of shit.” They fail to put that one sentence on its full context. Her full remarks were actually very thoughtful. The WSJ editors also fail to mention that Omar has received countless death threats from these Republican types. Those threats must be taken seriously. Instead, the WSJ editors place Omar at the same level as Republican demagogue Nancy Mace, whom they quote as saying, “Democrats own what happened today.” According to the WSJ editors “the failures are bipartisan,” meaning both sides are equally guilty for this level of violence.

This plays right into the increasingly violent rhetoric of the far right. Despite the fact that the accused shooter apparently one of their own, the MAGAites have increased their threats. Erika Kirk, Charlie Kirk’s widow, said “you have no idea what you have unleashed”. Trump is leading the band. After justifying the “radicals on the right”, he said “ we have radical left lunatics out there and we just have to beat the hell out of them…The radicals on the left are the problem, and they’re vicious and they’re horrible and they’re politically savvy.” This after MAGA has been responsible for the overwhelming majority of political violence. Also, in general there has been an absence in the news about the far right connections of the accused murderer. Trump is consciously encouraging more far right threats and actual violence. Part of his plan, in addition to outright suppression, is to stir up enough chaos that if he feels it necessary he can suppress the 2026 elections, including by martial law.

The assassination of Charlie Kirk has strengthened all wings of MAGA as well as similar groups throughout Europe.

Crisis in working class
This blog has discussed many times the political crisis of the working class. That includes this report on Labor Day, 2025 and this in depth pamphlet on The Nature of this Period. The result of this crisis is that a huge vacuum in society has developed. Shocks like the murder of Charlie Kirk magnify the problem many times over. Into this vacuum has stepped MAGA, including gun worship and political violence. The only alternative to this tendency is a conscious, independent and organized working class movement. As we saw last Labor Day, the entire union leadership are doing their utmost to divert away from such a movement. The murder of Charlie Kirk and its aftermath is a warning of what is coming if such a working class movement does not develop.

Coming Next: a critique of the socialist movement, including how it relates to the unions and their leadership, and what the alternative is. Be sure not to miss it. Subscribe to Oaklandsocialist to get notified when we publish a new article. It’s free and your contact information won’t be passed on to any others.