‘It’s very heartbreaking’: Students, politicians host vigil for Charlie Kirk at IU

Aaron Walpole, an IU junior, was studying at the library when he saw on social media that right-wing activist Charlie Kirk had been shot. He said he fell into a thousand-yard stare. 

He noticed another student put his hand over his mouth. 

“I go, ‘Charlie?’” he said. “And he said ‘Yeah.’” 

In a lecture hall later that afternoon, Walpole said, he heard someone ask if their friend had heard “the good news.” After the student described what happened, Walpole said he told them to “shut up.”  

“Do you think it's okay to kill someone for their political beliefs?” he remembered himself asking them, hours after Kirk’s assassination.  

But that discord was absent Sunday night at the Indiana Memorial Union’s Alumni Hall, as mourners of Kirk sought to honor the activist they looked up to. 

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Kirk was fatally shot in the neck last Wednesday at an event at Utah Valley University. The alleged killer, 22-year-old Tyler Robinson, was arrested late Thursday night.  

Kirk is survived by his wife Erika and two children, 1 and 3 years old. In the killing’s fallout came an outpouring of grief, anger and more. 

None of Walpole’s friends wanted to talk about Kirk’s assassination at first. But Sunday night, at the two-hour vigil commemorating Kirk and his life’s work led by elected officials, pastors and students, Walpole said it was great to see everyone coming together.  

Some in the crowd wore shirts reading “I AM CHARLIE” and “FEAR IS A LIAR.” Others wore MAGA hats or white shirts they scrawled messages on in marker. Some told the Indiana Daily Student they’d gravitated toward Kirk for his messages on faith, others for his politics.  

Hundreds of them filled Indiana Memorial Union’s Alumni Hall — students, parents and children. Numerous elected officials were in attendance, too. Speakers included Indiana Lt. Gov. Micah Beckwith, Attorney General Todd Rokita, Sen. Todd Young and representatives for Rep. Erin Houchin and Sen. Jim Banks. 

Security — featuring the IU Police Department, Allied Universal security and Indiana State Police — was tight around all; everyone had to go through metal detectors. 

And that’s perhaps an effect, or at least a reminder of, continued fears around politically motivated violence in America. In June, Minnesota State Rep. Melissa Hortman, a Democrat, and her husband Mark Hortman were shot and killed in their home.  

Before his killing, Kirk garnered a reputation as a prominent face of the youth conservative movement. He founded the conservative nonprofit Turning Point USA in 2012 when he was 18. According to the organization's website, it has chapters on over 2,000 high school and college campuses, including at Indiana University. IU’s chapter was supposed to host Kirk at IU Bloomington on Oct. 21. 

Kirk gained a following for his unique debate style, which often featured him sparring with students on their views of controversial topics, including religion and abortion. He was embarking on his “The American Comeback Tour” when he was assassinated. 

For many students and Americans at large, Kirk was known for his positions on issues deeply personal to them. That included what he said about people’s race, religion and gender.  

“Islam is the sword the left is using to slit the throat of America,” he wrote in a post on X, the day before his killing. “Reject feminism. Submit to your husband, Taylor. You’re not in charge,” he said on his show about Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce’s engagement. He once described being transgender as “a throbbing middle finger to God.” 

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IU graduate student Terrence McGoldrick was on a Zoom call when he first got an alert from Fox News that Kirk had been shot. He hoped Kirk had just been grazed in the ear, like President Donald Trump was. But when he opened X to see the video, he knew “this is not good.”  

He sent the video to his fiancée, Stephanie Rivero, also an IU graduate student. 

“He sends me this horrific video, and I just felt like the world stopped for a moment,” Rivero said. “Because at first I thought it was AI. I was like, ‘That can’t be real. I can’t be seeing this.’ To see somebody murdered over freedom of speech. It’s very heartbreaking.” 

McGoldrick and Rivero decided to attend Sunday’s vigil to pay their respects to Kirk and his family.  

“This is not a TV show,” Rivero said. “It’s real, and a real-life person lost their life, and their children will grow up without a father, and their wife is now widowed.” 

Much of the vigil focused on the role of free speech in society. IU student Hamza Sahli represented Indiana Sen. Jim Banks during the vigil, but he also took his time at the microphone to recount his own experiences at IU, including when protesters disrupted a College Republicans at IU event with Banks and “Libs of TikTok” founder Chaya Raichik in April 2024. 

“Despite that fact, Sen. Jim Banks decided to invite them in and to let them join the discussion. The ones that had no interest in having that conversation were let out,” Sahli said. “The ones that were willing to made that atmosphere the best it could have been.”  

McGoldrick stood with 12 other students behind Sahli on stage. He held an American flag out to the crowd.  

“(To) the people who are scared, I say this: don’t give in to people who want you to be fearful that you’re going to end up hurt or victimized like Charlie was,” McGoldrick said. “Don’t give in to that. Go out there and if something does happen to you, embrace it, because it’s what was meant to happen that day, and people will pick up the mantle that you left behind and carry on.”

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Derek Britt, pastor and director of Chi Alpha Christian Fellowship at IU Bloomington, said 300 to 400 students gathered Thursday at Willkie Auditorium for a weekly service. In the “chaotic moment” after Kirk’s death, he said a freshman named Tyler asked him to pray with him and for a hug after the service. 

He asked all the students in Alumni Hall to raise their hands, then encouraged audience members to reach around and put their hand on a student’s shoulder. Heads bowed, they prayed.  

“Lord, we are living in a world that is broken. Lord, and we need you,” Britt said. “We need you. This campus needs you, God, and we’re grateful tonight, Lord, that across this campus, Lord, we have thousands of students that are serving you, that are walking with you.”

Indiana Lt. Gov. Micah Beckwith addressed the crowd while wearing a white shirt reading “Freedom,” the same shirt Kirk wore when he was shot. Beckwith, a Noblesville pastor and self-described Christian nationalist, said he loved and admired Kirk. During his almost 15-minute address to the crowd, he frequently referenced Kirk’s commitment to Christianity. Beckwith said he will pray for Kirk’s accused shooter.  

“How amazing would it be to see in heaven Charlie and his shooter worshiping the same God, celebrating him for a thousand years because they both found Jesus,” Beckwith said. “I think Charlie would want that, and I think you should want that.”  

Beckwith continued to say he thinks the country will see a revival in Christianity across the nation following Kirk’s death.  

“But what this shooter didn’t realize, he was being lied to by demonic forces, by lies from the pits of hell,” Beckwith said. “But you know what he didn’t realize? When Charlie took his last breath in that moment, about 12 million Charlie Kirks were created.”