Students and community members — many donning “Make America Great Again” hats — gathered outside Foellinger Auditorium Tuesday night to hear Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk speak.
Attendees, some traveling from neighboring counties, lined up in two parallel lines down the Main Quad, flanking a group of protestors who opposed Kirk’s visit.
Kirk’s rise
In 2012, Kirk founded TPUSA, a nonprofit organization whose stated mission is to build the “most organized, active, and powerful conservative grassroots activist network on high school and college campuses across the country.” The New York Times called TPUSA “the nation’s pre-eminent conservative youth organization.”
Kirk has garnered attention in recent years for debating liberal college students at TPUSA events across the nation. On Kirk’s YouTube channel, videos of these interactions have accumulated more than 900 million views. His content centers around topics like abortion, critical race theory, immigration, the economy and the “woke” ideology, among others.
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This immense popularity reflects a wider trend of conservatism gaining traction among young people, specifically Generation Z, a population Kirk referenced several times throughout his talk.
Kirk has not only capitalized on virality in the era of TikTok and Instagram — his popularity in part stems from his ability to appeal to younger audiences. To his supporters, who perceive the status quo as leaning too far left, Kirk represents a resistance to modern American culture.
“I think a big part of it is our culture has been dominantly left leaning … I think it has (gone) off the rail — it has (gone) a little too extreme,” said Eann Tang, junior in LAS and the University’s TPUSA chapter president. “I think the newer generation kind of saw that and started shifting right, people started embracing a lot of traditional values again.”
Kirk’s controversies
Still, Kirk’s journey to become one of the principal voices in the youth conservative movement has not been without controversy. The commentator has come under fire for unsubstantiated claims on Israel and Hamas and for referring to COVID-19 as the “China Virus” in a tweet that President Donald Trump reposted.
Gavin Volker, senior in ACES and treasurer of the University’s Young Democratic Socialists of America chapter, said Kirk’s intention is not to have discourse, but rather to profit off favorably edited social media clips.
“Honestly, it is a little sad that he’s grown such a fan base over the years,” Volker said. “The point is to get college liberals, leftists, into the auditorium, have them ask a question, have Charlie respond and then edit the clip in such a way that they sound foolish, and then he makes money off of that.”
Another YDSA member, Jonah Brue, junior in LAS, criticized Kirk’s debate tactics, arguing the TPUSA founder doesn’t engage in good faith arguments.
“(His goal) is to indoctrinate people more than it is to have a good discussion with people and find the root of these issues,” Brue said. “No matter what anyone’s going to say to him, it’s going to be clipped in a way that reasserts his view online and it is disseminated to his viewers.”
The conservative activist was also accused of antisemitism in 2023 after he said, “Jewish communities have been pushing the exact kind of hatred against whites that they claim to want people to stop using against them.”
Kirk captures campus’ attention
The University’s TPUSA chapter has promoted Kirk’s visit as a part of “The American Comeback Tour” in recent weeks. Earlier that day, Kirk drew a large crowd of attendees and protesters in Bloomington, Illinois, when he visited Illinois State University.
Prior to Kirk’s arrival on campus, a group called “CU Never Charlie” organized a teach-in, which discussed “far-right propaganda,” on Monday. The group also held a rally on the Main Quad Tuesday.
The protests against Kirk were met with mixed reactions, with some people in line engaging with the protestors in a heated back-and-forth, while others expressed their support for the right to free speech.
“I have no problem with them (protesters) being there,” said Abhi Bondre, junior in LAS. “If they feel like they should say something to others, they should say something … I don’t think anyone’s going to be convinced by it, but I don’t think of them too much.”
Many of the protestors held hand-made signs at the demonstration, such as “Go home KKKirk” and “hate won’t make America great,” a response to Kirk’s racially divisive talking points. The group also chanted “Charlie Kirk has got to go,” among other anti-deportation and anti-fascism chants.
“I think if they (protesters) actually went in and listened, they would maybe have a different outlook,” said Halle Rubino, freshman in DGS. “I mean, everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but sometimes there’s a correct opinion and a wrong one.”
Kirk’s event opened at 7:30 p.m. with a short set by Jobob Taeleifi, a comedian and contributor to TPUSA, during which he cracked jokes about college being a scam and the role he thinks women have in society.
“I wanted to be able to do my laundry, clean up and learn how to cook,” Taeleifi said. “So, my first semester in college, I wanted to learn those things, (and I) enrolled in a women’s studies class. That class was a scam — at no point did they teach me any of those things.”
Kirk then took the stage to a standing ovation and chants of “Charlie! Charlie! Charlie!” Throughout the evening, Kirk fielded questions and debated with audience members over their views on topics like immigration, abortion rights and the Trump administration’s tariffs.
The crowd was loud and energetic from start to finish, frequently cheering during Kirk’s arguments with audience members and occasionally booing — often in response to opposing viewpoints or delayed responses to questions.
The feedback to Kirk’s most recent visit is a far cry from his stop at the University in 2017, with Tuesday’s event garnering a much larger audience than eight years prior.
Kirk said when he last visited the University, during his melting snowflakes and smashing socialism tour, only about 100 people attended. But this time, according to organizers of the event, more than 5,000 people registered for free tickets, with over 2,000 prospective attendees turned away due to Foellingerʼs limited capacity.
“Overall, I thought the event went well. I think that maybe next time there should be a rule that it should be five minutes per person on the microphone,” Tang said. “There are not that many occasions where you have so many conservatives in one room, so usually these events are very hyped up.”
Kirk’s next stop on the tour will be Purdue University on Thursday.
