Student communities are reeling after the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, raising questions about what his death means for campus politics and free speech.
Kirk was shot and killed at a Utah college on Wednesday, Sept. 10, where he had been speaking at the opening event of his latest campus tour on behalf of his organization, Turning Point USA. While experts say it’s too soon to tell whether the incident will inflame or enhance campus political discourse, they agree it’s a moment students won’t easily forget.
His killing is part of a broader wave of political violence, including the assassination attempt on President Donald Trump and the killing of Democratic Minnesota House Speaker Emerita Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark Hortman.
But the death of the 31-year-old political activist, who connected with young people in a way that drew both admiration and accusations from critics that he spread misinformation, stoked division and promoted bigotry, and who played a central role in shaping a generation of young conservatives, has struck some student communities particularly hard.
“For most of us, he was our entry into politics,” said 18-year-old Aaron Tran, president of College Republicans at UC Irvine.
Locally, emotions ran high at a vigil held Thursday evening at UCI. Several dozen students gathered under half-staff flags — some crying quietly, others clutching flowers. A few called for “bridging divides” and “keeping the moral high ground,” while others delivered more provocative remarks, warning that “each and every one of radical left, they want us dead” and urging peers to “do everything we can to ruin the lives” of those online celebrating Kirk’s death.
“Be safe, stay near campus police and keep your eyes peeled because you never know when a liberal maniac might come and attack one of us,” one student said.
Tran said the emotional responses were understandable.
“They’re feeling feelings of sadness, feelings of righteous indignation, and a lot of people will be reasonable, a lot of people will be unreasonable. And that’s fine,” he said.
Tran acknowledged that “the sentiment we should encourage should be one of unity, it should be one of coming together.” But, he said, that doesn’t mean ignoring hostile reactions to Kirk’s death.
“That’s unjust as well,” he said.
Amy Binder, a sociologist at Johns Hopkins University’s SNF Agora Institute, who has spent years studying politically engaged college students, said moments like these can reshape student activism in unpredictable ways.
“Nothing is unimaginable at this point,” she said. “It could open doors to better conversations on campus, or it could open doors to crackdowns and more political violence.”
At Chapman University, senior Zack Dell said the assassination has been rattling. But the fear he perceives among peers is more social than physical.
“We saw an assassination on a guy who was just here to make conversation, and was vilified for it,” he said. “Kirk was the guy who wanted to start a conversation. I know people on both sides who thought he said too much, too little, or didn’t always agree with what he said, but he was thought-provoking.”
Dell said the real challenge is how quickly students who deviate from their peers’ politics can be ostracized.
“I know dozens of people who have ‘committed the massive crime of not hating absolutely everything about the right,’ and who have become isolated very quickly. They’re scared of being ostracized or repelled by their peers for the social crimes of not having the same opinions as them. That is a critical problem,” he said.
Dell and others pointed to incidents such as efforts to block controversial speakers from campus, including at Utah Valley University, where Kirk was killed, as examples of what they see as a narrowing space for dialogue.
Tran said some Republican clubs have even hesitated to ask their universities for support or security for their events.
“We didn’t even want to go through filing with the school because we were scared that they would just outright reject us,” he said.
Dell believes Kirk’s death could mark a tipping point.
“People aren’t just going to sit down anymore,” he said. “They’re going to start putting their foot down and say ‘enough is enough.’ This assassination was sort of a martyrdom, and a lot of students will be saying, ‘Well, I’m going to do this even if I also become a martyr.’”
Jeff Kidder, a sociologist at Northern Illinois University and Binder’s research partner on campus politics, said conservative students may see Kirk’s death as validation of longstanding fears about censorship.
“The idea that the left was out to censor the voices of conservatives was a pervasive thing that we heard among the students we were interviewing in 2018. And I don’t see any reason to believe that that has changed much over the last seven years or so,” he said.
“Repressive acts don’t always repress. Sometimes they have the opposite effect. And so I don’t know which way it’ll go, but it seems impossible for conservative students not to read this moment as deeply significant on some level.”
But concerns about free expression are not limited to conservatives. Some students on the left say they, too, have felt silenced, especially under the Trump administration. It recently cut grants for minority-serving colleges and has threatened to pull funding over DEI programs.
“I think in recent years, it has felt less safe for free speech, especially with the new administration. It’s harder to talk about things like genocide, DEI, women’s rights and immigrants’ rights,” said Zora Mihaley, a political science Ph.D. student at UC Irvine. “Students have had their visas revoked. People’s lives are being threatened. So I definitely don’t feel safe on campus to talk freely.”
Mihaley said the fear extends to research funding.
“There’s always fear that research funding will be pulled if students talk about certain topics,” she said.
Tran, the UCI sophomore who chairs the statewide network of Republican clubs, said fear is not the dominant mood on the right.
“(Kirk) instilled in us a resolve to take a stand and be willing to take even a bullet in the neck,” he said. “We’re not feeling demotivated, we’re not feeling anxious. We are feeling a wide variety of emotions that aren’t fear but are ranging from immense sadness and grief to righteous indignation and wanting to channel that into political action.”
But Binder said she worries Kirk will be remembered not as a catalyst for dialogue on campus but as a martyr of the right mowed down by the left.
“If the person who did the shooting was found, and if that person is on the left, I really am very worried about where it goes from here and how the conversation goes,” she said before a suspect in Kirk’s shooting was arrested.
When asked, Tran said he would welcome dialogue with campus Democrats.
“I would be open to it, because there’s a lot of rhetoric that Charlie gave, which is that we’re in a culture war. And that in this culture war, we have to debate this marketplace of ideas on college institutions because these are the most primary places where dialogue happens,” he said.
Some students are also wondering whether universities will increase security for campus events.
Denver Brown, a 17-year-old at Orange Lutheran High School who is active in the school’s TPUSA chapter, said he sees his campus as safe but understands why others may feel afraid.
“I wouldn’t say that I am worried physically, but I do believe that kids can be scared, because it has been scary for the past 10 years,” Brown said. “People have a right to be scared because it’s a time of uncertainty. Campus security should be armed.”
Brown’s mother, Angela, said Kirk’s death has made her question what comes next for her son as he heads toward college.
“It’s heartbreaking that it has to come to that, students on whatever side they are on are condemned for speaking their mind,” she said. “As far as college goes, it discourages me as a mom, like, ‘Gosh, do I want him to go into this political arena?’ But ultimately, I have to let him decide what he wants to do and hope and pray that some good will come out of this.”
She added that Brown’s father told him he is “concerned about him going out and voicing his opinions.”
“At the end of the day, Denver will do what he will do, and I will support him,” she said. “But I don’t want him to be ignorant and naive to what could happen. We told him to tread lightly and know your crowd.”
Mihaley, the doctoral student, said the tragedy also deepens her unease.
“Whenever I’m at school, I think about exit strategy, like where will I go if there’s a shooting,” she said.
While Mihaley supports dialogue on campus, she said schools should be mindful about which speakers they platform. Many on the left describe Kirk as a provocateur who goaded students to “prove me wrong,” then posted the exchanges online — clips that often went viral by portraying left-leaning students as dumb, out of touch or extreme, and that sometimes targeted left-leaning faculty as well.
“School isn’t the end-all, be-all of learning, so if a student wants to follow a particular figure and learn from them, they’re absolutely welcome to. But just like school science labs have protocols to keep everyone safe, campuses need to protect students from speakers that could potentially be dangerous, too,” she said.
“For example, you wouldn’t be allowed to mix harmful chemicals in a university lab, but you could explore that outside in your own time within legal limits, because America does have wonderful foundational freedoms. You could argue that lab regulations stifle learning, but you need students alive in order to learn.”
Mihaley added, “It’s all about finding middle grounds that protect everyone, even the speakers. No one should feel unsafe on campus and no one should be killed for free speech.”
Binder said she hopes students use this moment to foster dialogue rather than deepen divides.
“College campuses are settings where we have the best hope of having better conversations about this,” she said. “But I am afraid that at the moment, the forces seem much more divisive than unifying.”