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One of the last times BlazeTV host Steve Deace saw Charlie Kirk, Deace recalls having a long conversation with him to discuss the state of the country and the conservative movement.

Deace’s wife, who was there, said later, “I just have a feeling that whatever we do moving forward, he’s going to be a big part of it.”

When the pair last spoke on Tuesday, Deace received a text from Charlie: “Thank you, you are a dear friend.”

And he is among the thousands of Americans who can count themselves forever changed — for the better — by the Turning Point USA founder.

“I’m devastated. I’m angry,” Deace says through tears. “But now is not the time for anger. There will be a time. There will be a time, and it is coming soon. But we have to mourn first so that that anger does not eat us alive.”

“Charlie was the best of us,” he continues. “He was the brightest of the lights. He was literally one of the last people left on our side still trying to change minds, still trying to persuade, who hadn’t given up. And that frankly was just too much light for the darkness in our world right now.”

“If the enemy wanted to target our most important general, he did. The void that is left here is incalculable. There is no single person that could possibly step into the shoes of everything Charlie was a part of and helped to lead or made happen. It’s going to take more than a village. It’s going to take a movement to fill his shoes,” he adds.

While Deace is at a loss as to why Charlie was taken, he believes there must be a reason.

“I am going to trust that a God who did not even spare his own son for me or Charlie or for you, whose son the grave could not hold and whose last enemy, death, he conquered,” Deace says, “I am going to trust that someday in the future I’m going to look back on this, and I’m going to say, ‘Devil, that was the dumbest thing you could have possibly done.’”

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My liberal friends are completely oblivious about how radicalizing the last week has been for tens of millions of normal Americans. Zero clue. So I am telling you, my liberal friends and leftists everywhere. This is what has happened.

I’m not talking about people who are “online.” I mean regular, everyday Americans. “Normies.” People who scroll through Facebook posts and Instagram reels from the Dutch Bros drive-thru line. Political moderates who have water cooler chats about Mahomes touchdowns and Bon Jovi concerts, not Twitter threads or Rachel Maddow monologues.

These normal, middle-of-the-road, nonpolitical citizens just become politically active. They realized that politics cares about them, even if they don’t particularly care about politics.

Millions of them. Tens of millions. They’re logging on, they’re engaging, and they’re furious. And I’ll be candid: They blame you guys. They blame the left. Regardless of whether you believe it to be justified, they think you’re the bad guys here. And they are reacting accordingly.

I can already hear some of you racing toward the comments to start screeching in moral indignation, so I’m going to be blunt: Shut up and listen to what I’m telling you. Your movement will lose any semblance of relevance if you don’t develop some small measure of self-awareness, and — absent someone force-feeding you bitter medicine — you guys collectively lack the humility to do this on your own.

Here are the facts.

1) Tens of millions of Americans started the week seeing a 23-year-old blonde woman — a young woman in whom virtually every parent watching pictured their own daughter — stabbed in the neck by a career criminal. These people then found out the murderer had been released from jail 14 times over.

2) Two days later, tens of millions of Americans saw on video Charlie Kirk get murdered speaking to college students. Millions of these people knew who Charlie was; millions of them didn’t. Upon seeing the video, however, these normal Americans from across the land and across the political spectrum agreed that he was the victim of a terrible, fundamentally unjustifiable crime, and their hearts broke in sympathy for his family.

Good people who had never even heard the name Charlie Kirk before wept.

3) Immediately after seeing the footage of a peaceful young man getting shot in the neck, these same people logged on to Facebook and Instagram (remember, we are talking about regular Americans, not perpetually online Twitter or Bluesky users) and saw some of their local nurses, teachers, college administrators, and retail workers celebrating this horrific crime. Not just defending it but cheering it.

These are all facts. You may not like the implications of these facts, and we can certainly debate the underlying causes thereof, but, indisputably, they are factual statements nevertheless.

RELATED: Charlie Kirk’s assassination ignites global fire: Patriots hold memorials from the UK to South Korea

Photo by Eric Thayer/Getty Images

Here’s what it means for Democrats reading this: These normal, middle-of-the-road, nonpolitical citizens just become politically active. They realized that politics cares about them, even if they don’t particularly care about politics.

After watching Iryna Zarutska and Charlie Kirk both bleed out from the neck, they think their lives and the physical safety of their families — the bedrock of human society, the foundation of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs — depend on political activation, whether they desire it or not. These people are now sprinting — not jogging, not walking, but racing — to the right.

Because they blame you guys for everything that just happened.

When they see footage of Decarlos Brown stabbing a Ukrainian refugee to death, they don’t see just one demon-possessed man. They picture every university administrator, HR bureaucrat, and DEI apparatchik that ever lectured them about systemic racism, the “carceral state,” or the need to release violent crime suspects without bail in the name of social justice.

They then think back to conversations they’ve had with their cop friends — their buddy from high school who quit the force after getting tired of being called a racist, their friend at the local YMCA who vents about having to release career criminals because Soros-funded prosecutors aren’t willing to file charges — and they realize everything the left has told them over the last five years has been utter BS.

All BS. Not even smart BS, but stale, mid-grade, low-IQ BS. Ordinary Americans see right through it, and they don’t like how it smells.

And they blame you. Because even if you count yourself as a moderate Democrat, your party supported the district attorneys, city council members, and mayors that let fictitious concerns about mental health and racial justice supersede very real concerns for their families’ safety.

When these Americans see blood erupt from the side of Charlie Kirk’s neck, they don’t see just a martyred political activist. They think of every extreme leftist they’ve ever met who calls anyone to the right of Hillary Clinton a fascist and constantly jokes — “jokes” — about punching Nazis and “bashing the fash.”

They realize that there really do exist people who wish to see them dead for their moderately conservative political beliefs, their Christian faith, and even the color of their skin.

They ask themselves if the violence visited upon Charlie might one day show up on their own doorstep.

And they blame you. Because even if you’re just a center-of-the-road liberal, you lacked the courage to police your own ranks. You let modern-day Maoist red guards run loose across every facet of society, and what started with social media struggle sessions has now turned to .30-06 bullet holes.

When these Americans log on to social media and see their neighbors justifying, celebrating, glorifying murder, they realize that some who walk among them are soulless ghouls at best, literally demon-possessed at worst.

These people — whether they faithfully attend church every Sunday or only attend with relatives once a year, on Christmas Eve — start talking about things like spiritual warfare. They implicitly understand that no normal human casually celebrates the mortal demise of a peaceful person.

And they blame you. Because even if you condemned Charlie Kirk’s murder, they probably haven’t seen you condemn those in your own movement who cheered it on. They view you as complicit in allowing heartless fellow travelers to celebrate death, and it repulses them.

RELATED: TPUSA plans historic memorial for Charlie Kirk

Photo by Jeremy Hogan/Getty Images

For all of these situations, what has your response been? Nothing but BS.

In response to Iryna Zarutska bleeding out on the floor of a train, you post nonsensical statistics about reductions in reported crime. In reality, anyone who’s been to a major urban center in the last decade knows that actual crime has skyrocketed, and victims do not waste their time reporting it to cops who don’t have the manpower to respond and prosecutors who seek to downgrade as many felonies as possible to misdemeanors.

In response to a 31-year-old man taking a bullet to the neck in front of his family, you post nothing but nonsensical whataboutism. “What about January 6?” Honest answer: After you let Liz Cheney spend two years operating a star chamber in the House, combined with countless other failed attempts at “lawfare” against Trump, no one cares any more.

“What about Paul Pelosi?” That’s not comparable to Charlie Kirk getting shot, and we all know it. Also: Paul who?

“What about regulations on assault rifles?” That’s not going to get you very far when one of these killers used a knife and the other one used a common hunting rifle.

In response to teachers, health care workers, and thousands of other liberals cheering on Charlie’s murder, it’s nothing but more BS and misdirection.

“It’s not THAT many people celebrating!” Yes, it is. Everyone has seen it on their Facebook and Instagram feeds.

“I thought you guys didn’t support cancel culture.” We don’t cancel people over their opinions; we’re more than happy to see people lose their jobs — especially their taxpayer-funded jobs — for actively cheering on murder, though. If you can’t see the difference, that’s your own shortcoming.

All BS. Not even smart BS, but stale, mid-grade, low-IQ BS. Ordinary Americans see right through it, and they don’t like how it smells. You probably don’t like hearing this. But you need to hear it. Because I’m right, and as you reflect on this, you know I’m right.

The ranks of my political movement gained millions of righteously angry new members last week. We have a mandate to ensure that these crimes never happen again, and that’s exactly what we are now going to do. If you want to keep a seat at the table as we do so, you’d better clean house and start policing your own.

Editor’s note: A version of this article appeared as a post on X (formerly Twitter).

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Pastors have a sacred duty. They are shepherds of flocks and responsible for discipleship, biblical teaching, spiritual counseling, and the administration of sacraments. It’s a high calling.

In recent days, pastors from all across the nation did something they might not do at a “typical” church gathering: They preached based on what happened last week, helping their congregations process the assassination of Charlie Kirk.

‘I’m sad. I’m mournful. But I’m not in despair, because we serve a God of hope.’

And how could they not?

Speak to almost anyone — aside from the liberals celebrating Charlie’s death — and they will tell you that something about this tragedy feels different. It’s heavy in a way we cannot understand, process, or describe. Charlie’s murder represents the collision of good and evil: a loving husband, father, and man of God so violently and unjustly murdered under the influence and inspiration of demonic forces.

We cannot ignore the spiritual warfare taking place in our country. Charlie certainly didn’t, and neither did countless pastors who knew it was necessary to guide their flocks through unfathomable tragedy.

Here is a roundup of how pastors addressed Kirk’s murder.

How could this be, God?

Pastor Luke Barnett of Dream City Church answered the question he received from many, including his own board members.

“Pastor, what are we going to do? What are we going to do? Charlie is gone to be with the Lord.”

Barnett answered, saying that it was his role, and the role of followers, to double down. “We’re going to feed more people,” he explained, save more people, and call out a sin when it is a sin.

The pastor explained that Kirk was not only a friend to him but a lover of Jesus Christ and an American patriot.

“He loves the United States of America. He not only loves it, he’s vested. He’s bled for it. He died for it,” Barnett said.

Not only has Kirk been a motivating factor for living his life and showing his faith unashamedly, but he has been a role model for those in the faith who have been afraid to preach the truth.

“How could this be, God?” Barnett repeated. “This man’s being used by you to shape and mold the young minds of America. How could this be, God?”

This turning point, as Barnett called it, should be a point to rise up and defend faith like it has not been defended for decades. It’s a time to defend traditional marriage, to defend the fact that God chooses your gender, and to harness the explosion in faith that is to come after Kirk’s death.

RELATED: Charlie Kirk sparks viral Christian revival: ‘I’m going to go take his seat for him’

You might have pulled the trigger yourself

Bishop Patrick Wooden Sr. warned followers at the Church of God in Christ that once people are put in office and then viciously demonize their political opponents, they, figuratively speaking, may have pulled the trigger themselves.

Calling out the media’s inability to criticize religions other than Christianity, Wooden cited politicians like Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) for inciting political confrontations in public against those who disagree.

“When you start saying stuff like that, calling your political opponents Nazis, fascists, stuff like that. Well, sooner or later, a kook is going to hear that. A crazy person is going to hear that, and they’re going to act on it,” the pastor explained.

A lack of logic and consistency among those who oppose Kirk, including his assassin, are showing that they “don’t know God,” Wooden continued, focusing on the sheer audacity of taking Kirk’s life over a disagreement.

“I pray that our country has not degenerated to the point that if you cannot overcome someone’s point of view, someone’s stated position,” he said. “I hope we haven’t degenerated to the point where the response is, then you shoot him with a gun.”

People may disagree, and they should stand their ground, Wooden added, but they should never turn to violence.

RELATED: Grieving Charlie Kirk: How to cling to God in the face of evil

You’ll see it in their eyes

Pastor Michael Clary of Christ the King Church rightly revealed that pastors can expect to see many first-time visitors in their pews following Kirk’s death.

“Perhaps even many non-Christians, who are seeking answers and guidance as they process their anger, sorrow, grief, and confusion,” Clary said.

Describing Kirk as a “threat the left cannot tolerate,” Clary described Kirk as a martyr, “unusually gifted by God,” and so uniquely attractive to young people that he could lead a spiritual movement and shift what it means to be Christian for an entire generation.

Kirk gave his life identifying good and evil, the pastor went on, appropriately drawing attention to that which is tearing the United States apart and “sending people to hell.”

As such, Clary advised that pastors give their parishioners the medicine they seek in mourning Kirk’s death.

“So give them Jesus. Give them the Bible. Give them the gospel. Give them hope. Help them apply God’s word to their lives. Give them a vision for the supremacy of Christ in all things.”

More alive than ever

Pastor Rob McCoy from Godspeak Calvary Chapel spoke of Kirk’s character, and as his pastor, he said that in death, Kirk would be more alive than ever.

“He honored those who disagreed with him. He’d let them go to the front of the line because he knew that debate and and the use of words would stave off violence,” McCoy said, echoing comments that have been shared across the globe.

Kirk even traveled to South Korea with McCoy a week before his death, a report a churchgoer revealed.

“I’m running out of tears,” McCoy, reportedly said, fighting to harness his emotions. “I didn’t think I could cry that much … but I’m crying.”

Many shared the feeling, including McCoy, that Kirk did more for Christianity than any minister in modern-day America. The key was being unafraid to have Christ in the center of his politics and to bring God into the town square where he shared his views.

Kirk is an example of why truth-tellers are targeted, McCoy continued. But “the truth is never afraid of a lie.”

Armed with the truth, prophets, apostles, and faithful others are silenced with bullets instead of reason, McCoy said at one point.

“I’m sad. I’m mournful. But I’m not in despair, because we serve a God of hope.”

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The past few weeks have seen multiple terrible tragedies — the Catholic school shooting, the stabbing of Iryna Zarutska, and the assassination of Charlie Kirk.

And BlazeTV host Rick Burgess believes they all have one thing in common, and it’s definitely not guns. Rather, the killers are “demon-possessed,” he tells Blaze Media co-founder Glenn Beck on “The Glenn Beck Program.”

“You go to kill children in cold blood, just because they’re gathering and while they’re praying, and you seem to be repulsed at even the mention of Jesus Christ, as the demons always are in Scripture,” Burgess explains.

“Why do you think that these demonic forces feel like they’ve been invited here? We’ve been killing babies for how long now? This was a pagan practice of slaughtering babies, and now we’ve taken human life and we’ve dumbed it down so much,” he continues.

Burgess cites video games and Hollywood as a reason that an increasing number of people don’t see killing as “real.”

“Look at them sitting down on these video games with blood and guts, and they’re being dumbed down to the killing of people like it’s not real, like they’re playing a video game. They’re watching movies by the same people who lecture us about guns as they all slaughter people like it’s no big deal,” he tells Glenn.

“We have lost our ever-loving minds, and then we turn around and can’t believe that we’re living in darkness,” he adds.

“The guy who, you know, killed Iryna in Charlotte … was he mentally ill, or was he demon-possessed? … How would you know the difference?” Glenn asks.

“I know what Scripture says, and I know some of the markers. Let me be perfectly clear, because I’m telling you what I’m saying, but I want to be perfectly clear on what I’m not saying. I am not saying, nor do I think it’s accurate to say, that all mental illness comes from demonic forces. That’s not true,” Burgess explains.

“The brain is just like any part of the body. It can be sick. It can have a chemical imbalance. And we have wonderful doctors. Now, do we need to address how we take care of the mentally ill? Yes, we do. It needs some work. But there are people that their brains are just sick just like your heart would be,” he continues.

However, Burgess believes someone like Decarlos Brown was demon-possessed.

Brown said in a recorded phone call to his sister that he didn’t know her name, didn’t speak to her, and that he just took out his knife and killed her. After explaining what he did, he said, “What kind of person does that?”

“That’s demon possession,” Burgess says, adding, “He is under the control of something else.”

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In the wake of Charlie Kirk’s assassination, hundreds, if not thousands, of people across the nation have publicly gathered to honor and memorialize the late conservative giant. However, these peaceful gatherings have sometimes been met with violent outbursts, including at the headquarters for Turning Point USA, the organization Kirk founded.

Fox News cameras were rolling at the growing memorial outside TPUSA’s headquarters in Phoenix, Arizona, when a man began trampling on mementos placed on the ground by mourners.

The alleged perpetrator was identified as 19-year-old Ryder Corral.

The memorial, which was made up of American flags, balloons, vases, flowers, and signs, stretched along a public walkway. Several onlookers and mourners were in the area.

After a vandal stomps through what appears to be several yards of the memorial, a man in a blue polo shirt is seen on video grabbing the vandal and throwing him to the ground.

RELATED: Charlie Kirk hater goes nuclear on supporter of slain activist — then pays price after allegedly unleashing physical attacks

Photo by CHARLY TRIBALLEAU/AFP via Getty Images

The suspect’s T-shirt, which appears to have a bald eagle with the words “Land of the Free” across the top and “Home of the Brave” across the bottom, is remarkably similar to the shirt that the alleged shooter of Charlie Kirk was wearing.

Police, who were already on the scene to assist with traffic control, swiftly grabbed the man, handcuffed him, and took him away.

The alleged perpetrator was identified as 19-year-old Ryder Corral.

Phoenix Police Department Public Information Sergeant Philip Krynsky told Fox News that Corral is now in custody at the Maricopa County Jail on one count of criminal damage and one count of disorderly conduct.

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The FBI is looking into whether online trans-activist groups had foreknowledge of the Charlie Kirk assassination plot — and is taking deadly seriously those alleged social media posts that appeared online prior to Sept. 10 discussing Kirk’s slaying at the Utah Valley University Turning Point USA event.

Bongino told Fox News on Monday both that “there appear to have been multiple warning signs” of suspected assassin Tyler Robinson’s intention to kill Charlie Kirk and that some people may have known in advance.

“Did they know? Were they sure of this? Or did they hear this and just write it off?” said Bongino. “That’s what we’re going to have to find out, and that’s what we’re investigating now.”

A number of social media accounts belonging to trans-identifying/LGBT-associated individuals apparently discussed Kirk’s assassination, specifically referencing the date it would ultimately take place — days and weeks ahead of the slaying.

‘Lets just say something big will happen tomorrow.’

The Washington Free Beacon obtained screenshots of now-deleted posts that the FBI is now reportedly reviewing, including a Sept. 3 post in which a user with the handle @TallyHallAlbum allegedly wrote, “itd be funny if someone like charlie kirk got shot on september 10th LMAO.”

RELATED: Antifa, gay furries, and bomb codes? What the engravings on the Kirk assassination bullets may mean

Photo by Michael Ciaglo/Getty Images

A user with the handle @altulige allegedly wrote on Aug. 6, “September 10th will be a very interesting day,” then noted on the day of the assassination, “I plead the fifth” — a follow-up post the Beacon indicated was reposted by an account named “churbum75m (SAW TYLER JUNE 30),” which apparently followed the alleged social media account of Robinson’s trans-identifying boyfriend, Lance Twiggs.

Churbum75m allegedly posted just minutes after Kirk died, “WE F**KING DID IT.”

Just days before the assassination, the user of an account that is also reportedly under investigation — @fujoshincel, apparently a reference to a genre of homosexual anime — allegedly wrote, “You guys … I have something BIG coming soon. Just be sure to check the news, you’ll know it when you see it [winking emoji].”

A supposed nonbinary-identifying user with the handle @NajraGalvz allegedly wrote a day ahead of the assassination, “Charlie kirk is coming to my college tomorrow i rlly hope someone evaporates him literally,” then allegedly noted in a subsequent message, “Lets just say something big will happen tomorrow.”

The engravings on the suspected assassin’s ammunition suggest an immersion in leftist subcultures online.

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox (R) stated last week that one of Robinson’s family members told investigators that he had become more political in recent years. In an interview on Sunday, Cox indicated Robinson was captive to a “leftist ideology.”

Several reports have confirmed that Tyler Robinson, the 22-year-old suspected assassin, lived with a trans-identifying roommate. The two men were apparently engaged in a homosexual relationship.

FBI Director Kash Patel told Fox News on Monday that Robinson allegedly told another individual in a text message exchange that “he had an opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk, and he was going to do it because of his hatred for what Charlie stood for.”

The suspected assassin’s male lover, who claims to be transitioning to a female, reportedly “had no idea” that his boyfriend allegedly planned the attack. The trans-identifying boyfriend has not been accused of any criminal activity in connection with Kirk’s slaying.

A law enforcement source confirmed to the New York Post that as part of the probe into whether groups or individuals aided with the assassination or at least knew about it in advance, federal investigators are taking a look at Armed Queers Salt Lake City — a radical socialist outfit that has deleted some of its social media accounts in an apparent effort to hide its online footprint — as well as some groups on the gaming community Steam.

Blaze News has reached out to Armed Queers as well as to Steam for comment.

RELATED: Charlie Kirk’s murder wasn’t just an attack on him — it was an attack on us all

Photo by Trent Nelson/Salt Lake Tribune/Getty Images

The Armed Queers SLC group stated in the bio for its now-deleted Instagram group that it was a “revolutionary LGBTQ organization dedicated to the defense, and success” of supposedly oppressed peoples.

‘We have organized, educated, and agitated within LGBTQ, anti-imperialist, and labor movements towards a socialist future.’

A membership form for the socialist group identifies six principles, including “the armed and militant protection of queer and trans communities” and “trans liberation from the gender binary and biological essentialism.”

An archived version of the Instagram page reveals that the group shared various radical sentiments and quotations.

For instance, in a post titled “Black August,” the group shared a quote from George L. Jackson, a Marxist thug who was convicted of armed robbery and accused of murdering a prison guard, which read, “Settle your quarrels, come together, understand the reality of our situation, understand that fascism is already here, that people are dying who could be saved, that generations more will live poor butchered half-lives if you fail to act. Do what must be done; discover your humanity and your love in revolution.”

Past posts also include mention of the group sending its members for training in Cuba “as a part of a yearly May Day Brigade,” as well as mention of firearms training for members.

The group told Voyage Utah in a July 2024 interview, “We have organized, educated, and agitated within LGBTQ, anti-imperialist, and labor movements towards a socialist future.”

When pressed for comment, the FBI referred Blaze News to public remarks made by Director Kash Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino, noting the bureau did not have any further comment at this time.

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The tragic assassination last week of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk sparked memorials in his honor not just across the nation, but around the globe.

Canadian patriots gathered in Calgary to sing the American national anthem and chant “USA” in memory of Kirk. Those in Alberta held a vigil and sang “Amazing Grace.”

‘He gave his life fighting for America’s future, and now his impact is multiplying. The political assassination of Charlie Kirk has backfired.’

Outside the U.S. embassy in Madrid, Spain, people placed candles, flowers, and posters to create a memorial to Kirk.

“Organizers described the tribute as part of a growing global movement standing against political violence and censorship,” entrepreneur and podcast host Mario Nawfal stated. “The event was peaceful, with a moment of silence held in Kirk’s memory. Supporters say this marks a turning point, not just in America, but worldwide.”

In South Korea, a large crowd gathered and marched through the streets, waving both South Korean and American flags. Participants chanted and held signs reading, “We are Charlie Kirk.”

RELATED: Charlie Kirk sparks viral Christian revival: ‘I’m going to go take his seat for him’

Photo by Tracey Nearmy/Getty Images

Germans held a candlelight vigil in honor of Charlie Kirk outside the U.S. embassy in Berlin.

“Charlie Kirk is dead,” Martin C. T. Kohler, a German politician, wrote in a post on X, inviting individuals to join the vigil. “That is the bitter truth. We must not allow this to be the ending point. Charlie stood for freedom and debate. But first and foremost, he stood for his country and his faith.”

“We want to make a statement so that everyone can see what he died for. His death must not have been in vain,” Kohler continued. “Grief must not slip into resignation. We will carry on his message.”

A youth ambassador for TPUSA’s United Kingdom chapter known as “Young Bob” addressed the crowd that had gathered to hold a vigil for Kirk.

“The radical left have been persecuting the conservatives, who have one clear message: We want to conserve our culture and our heritage,” Young Bob stated.

“We will continue in civil discourse. We will continue his work. We will pick up the megaphones, the microphones, the stands. They won’t be able to move our minds by an inch,” he continued.

RELATED: TPUSA plans historic memorial for Charlie Kirk

Photo by James Willoughby/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

Joel Jammal, the head of TPUSA Australia, shared a video montage from a vigil in Sydney. In the audio for the montage, a speaker addressed the gathering, stating, “How strange is it, so far away from the USA, that we should feel such sadness?”

“There will not be another man like Charlie Kirk,” the video continued. “Christ is King. Christ is the one that inspired Charlie. ‘Christ’ was one of the last things Charlie said. Christ is the way, the truth, and the life. And until that is proclaimed throughout all the land, we will not be made great again as a nation.”

Memorials celebrating Kirk’s legacy were also held in Tel Aviv and New Zealand.

Benny Johnson reacted to the memorials.

“From prayer vigils on college campuses to murals and memorials around the globe, Charlie’s influence is spreading further than ever,” Johnson said. “He gave his life fighting for America’s future, and now his impact is multiplying. The political assassination of Charlie Kirk has backfired. He is more powerful now than ever. That’s the power of a martyr.”

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ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. — Thousands of people in Charlie Kirk’s hometown gathered at North School Park to honor the man who founded Turning Point USA and who was atrociously killed at a campus event in Utah last week.

Charlie was born in Arlington Heights and raised in the suburbs of Chicago. He graduated from Wheeling High School and started TPUSA out his parents’ garage. As the organization grew, the headquarters was moved to Lemont, where early backer and support Bill Montgomery lived and worked. TPUSA’s headquarters eventually was uprooted from Illinois and moved to Phoenix, Arizona.

‘Charlie was a courageous warrior for Christ, and politics was second with him.’

Kirk became a worldwide phenomenon through his activism. The people who gathered on Sunday were proud that he came from their town.

Victoria Karalis brought her family to Sunday’s vigil and told Blaze News she admired the work Kirk did for the nation’s youth.

“Those are my children there. This is the future of America, and they’re being taught what is right and wrong and what is constitutionally correct and accurate. And Charlie was a proponent of that. He loved people, he loved this country, and he especially loves the youth to make it great for the future of the whole world,” she said.

“His death is his life beginning with the Lord,” Karalis added.

The crowd sang “Amazing Grace” and “God Bless America” and chanted “USA! USA! USA!” throughout the vigil.

— (@)

One man who wished to remain anonymous told Blaze News that while he is saddened over Charlie’s death, he feels hope “seeing a crowd come out, especially from his hometown. … There’s different levels that are emotional right now with how deep this goes for me personally.

“And I just think that Charlie was a courageous warrior for Christ, and politics was second with him, and it’s becoming more and more evident. And I think everybody needs to carry on that message: We are all Charlie Kirk,” he continued.

RELATED: Erika Kirk makes first public remarks since the death of her husband, Charlie Kirk

Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty Images

“I think it’s a wonderful demasking,” Karalis said about people on the left celebrating Charlie’s murder. “So that people in general finally understand that those vile remarks show a vile heart that can only be cured by our Lord. And we need to have pity on them and pray for them.”

Charlie’s public memorial service will take place at State Farm Stadium, the home of the Arizona Cardinals, in Glendale, Arizona, on Sunday. President Donald Trump and many members of his administration are expected to be in attendance.

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​Politics 

Stories of renewed religious fervor have flooded the internet since Charlie Kirk’s assassination.

The September 10 murder of Kirk was captured on video from multiple angles for all in the world to see. Socially, Kirk’s murder has invigorated a passion among supporters not seen for generations.

‘For some reason, whenever he’s been talking about God, I am just trying to not lose control.’

In June, Kirk appeared on “The Iced Coffee Hour” for a 90-minute conversation on fake news, corruption, and greed. Just before the podcast ended, host Jack Selby asked Kirk, “If everything completely goes away, how do you want to be remembered?”

“If I die?!” Kirk quickly clarified.

Selby specified: “If you could be associated with one thing, how would you want to be remembered?”

Kirk’s answer was clear.

“I want to be remembered for courage for my faith,” he said. “That that would be the most important thing. Most important thing is my faith in my life.”

Posthumously, Kirk’s wish is coming true.

RELATED: Charlie Kirk: Loving father, fearless communicator, happy warrior — 1993-2025

— (@)

Kirk’s grassroots activist organization, Turning Point USA, has already seen signs of a faith and freedom revival in young people across the country.

According to TPUSA spokesman Andrew Kolvet, the organization has received more than 32,000 inquiries over the past weekend about starting new campus chapters of the organization.

Kolvet added, “To put that in perspective, TPUSA currently has 900 official college chapters and around 1,200 high school chapters, with a presence on 3,500 total. Charlie’s vision to have a Club America chapter (our high school brand) in every high school in America (around 23,000) will come true much much faster than he could have ever possibly imagined.”

Kirk has clearly inspired Christians both new and old to head back to church or pick up a Bible. That much is clear even in the comments section of TPUSA’s pages.

“I went to church today for the first time in 15 years. Thank you, Charlie, for bringing me to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Until the day we meet, brother,” a man named David Perez wrote on a post about an event honoring Kirk.

On another TPUSA post with a drawing of Kirk, a woman named Samantha Lynn said that while she had not been to church in 10 years, she would be taking her entire family to service the Sunday after Kirk’s death.

“I’ve never felt more called to incorporate God more in our lives. I owe that all to Charlie and the legacy he leaves behind,” Lynn wrote.

These comments were only the start; tens of millions of viewers have tuned in to TikTok, for example, to hear similar accounts.

RELATED: Why Charlie Kirk’s assassination will change us in ways this generation has never seen

— (@)

A man named Kevin Leonard spoke to over 1 million viewers on his TikTok account when he revealed he had only been to a church service twice in his entire life, but he wanted to go last Sunday to fill Kirk’s seat.

“Since Charlie Kirk is unable to go this Sunday, I’m going to go take his seat for him,” the man revealed.

“It was really good,” Leonard said in a follow-up video. “I will continue to go back.”

The content creator added that he would start donating the money he had made off the video views to a worthy cause.

Furthermore, a quarter of a million viewers watched a woman named Brittany explain that she and her husband were inspired to go to church for the first time in 20 years.

“It was the first time for our children,” she explained.

Brittany added that she wanted to raise her three sons to be “as strong in their convictions as Charlie Kirk.”

Thanks to Kirk’s tireless work, not only are church parking lots full, but followers are expressing feelings that they have never felt before. In fact, many who were just casual viewers of Kirk’s content have been exposed to more faith-based videos.

“I’ve seen his content before, but only him debating the college kids. I’ve never seen anything else,” explained one young male.

“Brother, ever since he passed away three days ago, every time I see a video of him talking about his faith, bro, straight water works, like, I can’t,” he stated. “It’s almost hard to control.”

“For some reason, whenever he’s been talking about God, I am just trying to not lose control.

“And I’ve had a few people telling me, like, maybe it’s God trying to reach out to you, which sounds crazy to me because I’ve never believed in God, ever. I’ve always been like, that doesn’t exist. It’s not real. But it doesn’t make sense. It’s like, why would I get so — I’m not an emotional dude at all. So for me to get like uncontrollably emotional about this thing that I don’t even believe in, it’s like, well, why is that happening?”

These powerful words are everywhere online and prove that Kirk is being remembered exactly how he hoped.

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​Faith, Christianity, Church, Charlie kirk, Tiktok, Jesus, Bible, Christ, Religion 

Americans across the nation have been mourning the loss of Charlie Kirk since his tragic shooting last Wednesday. Thousands of Charlie Kirk’s supporters and fans are set to attend his memorial service, including one very high-profile guest.

President Donald Trump is set to attend Charlie Kirk’s memorial service on September 21.

The memorial will celebrate the ‘remarkable life and enduring legacy of Charlie Kirk, an American legend.’

The service will be held at State Farm Stadium, home of the Arizona Cardinals, in Glendale, Arizona, according to a Turning Point USA social media post. The memorial will celebrate the “remarkable life and enduring legacy of Charlie Kirk, an American legend.”

State Farm Stadium can typically seat 63,400 people. For big events like the Super Bowl, however, there are an additional 8,800 seats available, bringing available seating up to 72,200, according to one source.

RELATED: TPUSA plans historic memorial for Charlie Kirk

Photo by David Ryder/Getty Images

Supporters have gathered and set up smaller memorials across major cities in the U.S. in the past week in a unifying moment of prayer and reflection. Fans across the globe have also gathered to pay their respects, including a large memorial demonstration in South Korea.

Vice President JD Vance, a close friend of Charlie Kirk, announced Sunday that he would pay homage to him by hosting “The Charlie Kirk Show” on Monday.

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​Politics, Trump, Vance, President trump, Charlie kirk, Charlie kirk assassination, Charlie kirk memorial, State farm stadium, Turning point usa 

FBI Director Kash Patel announced newfound evidence that strengthens the case against Charlie Kirk’s suspected assassin.

Patel confirmed that the FBI found and processed DNA evidence from the towel wrapped around the firearm found discarded in a wooded area near the Utah Valley University campus, as well as on a screwdriver found on the rooftop where the shooter is believed to have been. Both samples were identified as a positive match to the suspect in custody, 22-year-old Tyler Robinson, according to Patel.

‘He claimed that he had an opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk.’

“I can report today that the DNA hits from the towel that was wrapped around the firearm and the DNA on the screwdriver are positively processed for the suspect in custody,” Patel told “Fox & Friends” Monday.

This development will be instrumental in building the case against Robinson, who is likely facing charges for aggravated murder, obstruction of justice, and felony discharge of a firearm.

RELATED: Alleged bomb plot near Charlie Kirk assassination lands Pakistani native and son with terrorism charges

Photo by Trent Nelson/the Salt Lake Tribune/Getty Images

Although Robinson has not confessed or made clear his motive for allegedly assassinating Kirk, the facts surrounding the case appear to suggest a political or ideological motivation.

In recent days, it was confirmed that Robinson was living with his trans-identifying boyfriend, a biological male who claimed to be a woman. Utah Gov. Spencer Cox also revealed the writing inscribed on bullet casings found at the crime scene, one of which read, “Hey fascist! Catch!”

“His family has collectively told investigators that he subscribed to left-wing ideology, and even more so in these last couple of years,” Patel said.

RELATED: TPUSA plans historic memorial for Charlie Kirk

Photo by Office of the Governor of Utah via Getty Images

“He claimed that he had an opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk, and he was going to do it because of his hatred for what Charlie stood for,” Patel added.

Editor’s note: The FBI declined a request for further comment from Blaze News.

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​Kash patel, Fbi, Charlie kirk, Charlie kirk assassination, Spencer cox, Utah valley university, Tyler robinson, Dna evidence, Left-wing ideology, Trans ideology, Transgender, Politics 

In the wake of the assassination of Charlie Kirk and the public demonstrations about it, President Donald Trump indicated he would look into those financing the “professional agitators” who have taken over the streets in recent years.

In a Friday appearance on “Fox & Friends,” Trump renewed his promise to investigate Democrat mega-donor George Soros.

It went on to say that the organization does ‘not support or fund violent protests.’

“We’re going to look into Soros,” the president told the Fox hosts. “I think it’s a RICO case against him and other people.”

RICO stands for Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. This set of laws is known for helping to prosecute members of the mafia.

RELATED: ‘We’re watching you’: Trump threatens George Soros and his ‘group of psychopaths’ with prosecution

Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images

Trump added that the protests that we have seen in recent years are different because they seem to have “professional agitators.”

“This is more than just a protest,” he said. “This is real agitation.”

Soros has become known for funding Democrat campaigns for offices like district attorney, leading many to link high-crime rates to Soros-backed districts. The Open Society Foundation, which was founded by George Soros and is currently run by his son Alex Soros, has also been scrutinized by Republicans in the past.

Trump suggested to NBC News in a phone interview that Soros should be imprisoned. “He’s a bad guy,” Trump said, according to the Independent.

In response, Soros’ organization called these claims of funding professional agitators “outrageous and false.” It went on to say that the organization does “not support or fund violent protests.”

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​Politics, Rico, Protests, Paid protests, George soros, Alex soros, Open society foundation, Fox and friends, Donald trump, President trump 

A unhinged female was caught on video mocking and accosting a Charlie Kirk supporter — and paid a big price after allegedly unleashing physical attacks.

The incident took place Friday at Texas Tech University and involved a student there, the Daily Mail reported.

‘I’m not being aggressive! My voice is very calm! You’re calling me aggressive because I’m a black woman!’

Cellphone video shows a man wearing a Make America Great Again hat and holding a sign in memory of Charlie Kirk, who was assassinated Wednesday at Utah Valley University during one of his popular student-focused events.

But a female didn’t like the Kirk supporter’s sign, which simply read, “Rest in peace, Charlie.”

Video shows the female jumping up and down and chanting “F**k y’all homie dead! He got shot in the head!”

The man wearing the MAGA hat says, “Evil is real, people, and it kind of looks like that,” as he pans his cell phone toward the female in question. He adds, “Evil. Evil. Murder is bad; she is evil.”

She’s seen getting in the man’s face with her cell phone, after which he asks, “Can somebody tell her to back up, please?”

Oddly, the female tells him to not push the camera in her face, and he replies, “I’m sitting here. You walked up to me. I don’t want this. I said, ‘Rest in peace.’ Just leave me alone. Please don’t come after me. I want to be left alone.”

Another female off-camera tells her she is being emotional, which only raises her ire: “I’m not emotional, ma’am! Don’t tell me what I am and what I’m not! You can get out of my face ’cause I can tell you what you are, but you won’t like it!”

The man insists she is being aggressive, and then the female shoots back, “I’m not being aggressive! My voice is very calm! You’re calling me aggressive because I’m a black woman!” The man denies the allegation.

RELATED: The left’s reaction to Charlie Kirk’s assassination is DISGUSTING

The Daily Mail identified the female in question as 18-year-old Camryn Giselle Booker, a Texas Tech University student.

The outlet added that things escalated when “Booker allegedly shoved several people, including an elderly veteran and a young mother with her child” — and that “prompted a physical altercation that spread into the street.”

The Lubbock County Sheriff’s Office on Monday morning told Blaze News that Texas Tech Police arrested Booker on Friday, that she was given a Class C Citation for assault, and that she posted a $200 cash bond on Saturday.

The incident caught the attention of Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who posted reactions on X. One of them reads, “Definitely picked the wrong school to taunt the death of Charlie Kirk. Thanks Texas Tech.”

The other post from Abbott shows a photo of Booker getting handcuffed, and it reads, “This is what happened to the person who was mocking Charlie Kirk’s assassination at Texas Tech. FAFO.”

In response to one of Abbott’s posts, Cody Campbell — chairman of the Board of Regents for the Texas Tech University System — posted on X that “We, @TexasTech, are proud of our values and are not afraid to stand up for them. Strive for Honor Evermore! Long Live the Matadors!!”

NewsNation reported that it’s attempting to confirm reports of Booker’s expulsion from Texas Tech and has reached out to the school for comment.

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​Texas, Texas tech, College student, Charlie kirk, Physical attack, Arrest, Greg abbott, Politics, Assault charge, Crime 

A father and son were arrested in Salt Lake City on Sunday for allegedly affixing an explosive device to the bottom of a KSTU-TV news vehicle parked next to an occupied building.

The device was discovered just days after Charlie Kirk’s assassination around a half-hour drive away at Utah Valley University and amid an increased media presence in the area.

KSTU revealed that the device was determined to be real. While the explosive had reportedly been lit, the arrest report indicated that it “failed to function as designed.”

Law enforcement officials reportedly also ‘observed additional contraband and evidence of crimes outside the scope of the original warrant.’

Salt Lake County Jail records indicate that Adeeb Ahamed Nasir, 58 — whose race was somehow entered into the system as “white” — is a Pakistani-born American citizen.

He was booked into the jail on Sunday and charged with the manufacture, possession, or use of a weapon of mass destruction; attempted aggravated arson; possession of an explosive/chemical/incendiary; threat of terrorism; and felony possession of parts for an explosion/chemical/incendiary device.

Nasir’s American-born son, 31-year-old Adil Justice Ahme Nasir, has been charged with manufacture/possession/use of a weapon of mass destruction; attempted aggravated arson; threat of terrorism; and possession both of an explosive/chemical/incendiary device and parts to make one.

The Salt Lake City Police Department confirmed to Blaze News that the FBI is handling the case.

RELATED: Charlie Kirk’s suspected assassin lived with trans-identifying lover

AzmanL/Getty Images

Following the discovery of the malfunctioning explosive device, the FBI assumed jurisdiction of the case, reportedly citing the nature of the device and apparent target as indicators of a significant threat to public safety.

The FBI tracked down the father and son to a house in Magna, Utah, which they searched in concert with the SLC Police Department and Unified Fire bomb squads.

According to the arrest report, the Nasirs, who were found on the premises, allegedly told investigators that “two hoax weapons of mass destruction” were “real,” prompting an evacuation of nearby houses.

During the search, law enforcement officials also “observed additional contraband and evidence of crimes outside the scope of the original warrant, to include firearms and firearm related items, explosives and explosive-related components, illegal narcotics and associated paraphernalia, as well as electronic devices reasonably believed to contain evidence,” according to arrest documents.

The alleged discovery of firearms is also bad news for the father and son, as they both had a protective order barring them from possessing guns. CBS News indicated the protective order is connected with their “histories of illicit drug use.”

KSTU station manager Leon Wood said in a statement, “Fox 13 News is working closely with law enforcement and our risk management team, with the safety of our employees as our top priority.”

Both men are being held without bail.

Blaze News has reached out to the FBI and to KSTU for comment.

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​Terrorism, Crime, Pakistan, Pakistani, Bomb, Explosive, Charlie kirk, Salt lake city, Assassination, Fox 13, Media, Explosion, Politics 

Patriots in London gathered Saturday for a historic march organized by British independent journalist Tommy Robinson.

Authorities estimated that the crowd, which flooded the blocks surrounding Whitehall, included roughly 100,000 individuals. Yet Robinson and other attendees of “Unite the Kingdom” placed those estimates in the millions.

‘The despicable traitor UK Prime Minister Slippery Starmer and virtually all of the corrupted regime media are lying about the Uniting the Kingdom rally.’

“We asked: ‘where are the men of England?'” Robinson wrote in a social media post the day after the festival. “And instead of only the men of England. The men, women, even their children, from all four corners of the UK, Ireland, Europe, USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the list goes on, came calling, in their millions.”

Robinson declared that “a cultural revolution has begun.”

“The liberal elite and legacy media have labelled, everyone, ‘far right,’ for simply voicing an opinion that doesn’t fit theirs,” Robinson said. “Those labels don’t wash anymore, they massively overplayed their hands and exposed themselves. Millions of us in London yesterday. United as one.”

American podcaster Dan Keith stated, “The [sheer] weight of this massive crowd in London protesting their government and celebrating free speech is unbelievable with @TRobinsonNewEra and friends.”

RELATED: Unite the kingdom: Tommy Robinson leads historic 100,000-strong march to save Britain

Tommy Robinson. Photo by Andy Barton/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

The legacy media labeled the gathering a far-right anti-immigration protest, highlighting roughly two dozen arrests. The Metropolitan Police accused the Unite the Kingdom attendees of “significant aggression,” but those on the ground rejected those assertions.

“The despicable traitor U.K. Prime Minister Slippery Starmer and virtually all of the corrupted regime media are lying about the Uniting the Kingdom rally,” journalist Dan Wootton, who was on the ground reporting on the march, told Blaze News. “I broadcast the entire day. All six hours on the Outspoken YouTube.”

“It was a patriotic celebration of love designed to take back our country, with a special appearance from Elon Musk, who made a plea to save our Disunited Kingdom,” Wootton continued. “They’ve even lied about the numbers in attendance, with police claiming 110,000 when over 1 million were there. Luckily with the rise of the independent media here, patriots are no longer prepared to be gaslit.”

RELATED: ‘Christ is king!’ chants break out at large memorial for Charlie Kirk in London

Photo by Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

Carl Benjamin, a political commentator who spoke at Saturday’s gathering, previously told Blaze News, “Today’s Unite the Kingdom rally shows the scale of the discontent in Britain against not just the current government, but the entire system itself. The scale of the rally shows that people are tired of being treated as second-class citizens in their own country.”

“There was no ‘significant aggression,’ just a couple of trivial skirmishes at the fringes of the events which came to nothing,” Benjamin continued. “The entire day had the atmosphere of a festival, very family-friendly, and a powerful demonstration of patriotism.”

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​News, London, Unite the kingdom, United kingdom, Uk, U.k., Tommy robinson, Protest, March, Rally, Politics 

I slept through high school civics class. I memorized the three branches of government, promptly forgot them, and never thought of that word again. Civics seemed abstract, disconnected from real life. And yet, it is critical to maintaining our republic.

Civics is not a class. It is a responsibility. A set of habits, disciplines, and values that make a country possible. Without it, no country survives.

We assume America will survive automatically, but every generation must learn to carry the weight of freedom.

Civics happens every time you speak freely, worship openly, question your government, serve on a jury, or cast a ballot. It’s not a theory or just another entry in a textbook. It’s action — the acts we perform every day to be a positive force in society.

Many of us recoil at “civic responsibility.” “I pay my taxes. I follow the law. I do my civic duty.” That’s not civics. That’s a scam, in my opinion.

Taking up the torch

The founders knew a republic could never run on autopilot. And yet, that’s exactly what we do now. We assume it will work, then complain when it doesn’t. Meanwhile, the people steering the country are driving it straight into a mountain — and they know it.

Our founders gave us tools: separation of powers, checks and balances, federalism, elections. But they also warned us: It won’t work unless we are educated, engaged, and moral.

Are we educated, engaged, and moral? Most Americans cannot even define a republic, never mind “keep one,” as Benjamin Franklin urged us to do after the Constitutional Convention.

We fought and died for the republic. Gaining it was the easy part. Keeping it is hard. And keeping it is done through civics.

Start small and local

In our homes, civics means teaching our children the Constitution, our history, and that liberty is not license — it is the space to do what is right. In our communities, civics means volunteering, showing up, knowing your sheriff, attending school board meetings, and understanding the laws you live under. When necessary, it means challenging them.

How involved are you in your local community? Most people would admit: not really.

Civics is learned in practice. And it starts small. Be honest in your business dealings. Speak respectfully in disagreement. Vote in every election, not just the presidential ones. Model citizenship for your children. Liberty is passed down by teaching and example.

RELATED: America’s rights come from God — not from Tim Kaine’s government

Photo by Bill Oxford via Getty Images

We assume America will survive automatically, but every generation must learn to carry the weight of freedom.

Start with yourself. Study the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and state laws. Study, act, serve, question, and teach. Only then can we hope to save the republic. The next election will not fix us. The nation will rise or fall based on how each of us lives civics every day.

Civics isn’t a class. It’s the way we protect freedom, empower our communities, and pass down liberty to the next generation.

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​Opinion & analysis, Opinion, Civics, Civics class, Voting, Jury duty, Constitution, Declaration of independence, Education, Republic, Democracy, Civic duty, Bill of rights 

Ever since the COVID “Great Reset,” the American economy has functioned like a silent depression for two-thirds of households and most businesses. Washington pumped out biblical levels of spending and easy money, and a cycle of debt, high prices, and stagnation has crushed consumers.

Meanwhile, a handful of well-connected corporations — propped up by cheap credit, regulatory favors, and asset bubbles — keep the stock market afloat, creating the illusion of growth. The result is an economy that looks healthy on paper but feels like collapse on Main Street.

Enough. A nation cannot live on financial tricks and asset bubbles forever. Let the recession come.

The time has come to let it crash. No more bailouts. No more “too big to fail.” If we want a free-market recovery built on broad opportunity and wage-based wealth, we must let the bubbles burst.

The silent depression

Americans live under record-high prices for food, fuel, rent, and electricity. College graduates face the worst job market in decades. Payroll data shows just 1,494 new jobs were added in August — the weakest since the 2008 crash. Layoffs are up 38.5% this year.

For graduates, the outlook is even worse. Fortune reports that 58% of recent grads still can’t land a job or internship. Forty percent of the unemployed last year never even got an interview. One in five job seekers remained unemployed for 10 months or more.

Those already employed are struggling to make ends meet. Thirty-seven percent of workers have tapped retirement accounts for hardship withdrawals or loans. Personal spending, adjusted for inflation, fell 0.15% in the first half of 2025 — the sharpest decline since the financial crisis.

Families are drowning in debt. Household debt sits at $18.39 trillion, up $600 billion in one year. Student loans total $1.64 trillion, with more than 10% delinquent. Credit card debt has hit $1.21 trillion, with average APRs over 22%. Auto loans stretch to seven years for one in five new vehicles. Nearly half of renters now spend more than 30% of their income on housing.

A stock market built on sand

You’d expect Wall Street to slump alongside Main Street. Instead, the S&P 500 posts records. Why? Because 10 mega-cap tech stocks make up 40% of its total market cap. Strip them out, and the picture darkens.

More than 450 large companies filed for bankruptcy in the first half of 2025, the most since the Great Recession. Manufacturing has lost 78,000 jobs. Construction spending has fallen in seven of the past 11 months. Small caps fare even worse: 43% of Russell 2000 firms are unprofitable.

AI hype fuels the illusion. Nvidia’s data center revenue — half of it from just three shaky firms — drives much of the market. The S&P’s price-to-book ratio now tops the dot-com bubble. This is not sustainable growth; it’s speculation on steroids.

The housing bubble must pop

Housing has become the last pillar propping up the economy. Thanks to years of near-zero rates, federal subsidies, and trillions in mortgage-backed securities, the housing market ballooned to $55 trillion — $20 trillion more than in 2020.

But affordability is gone. The frozen market now shows cracks as prices fall in half the country. This is the moment to let it reset. Instead of lowering lending standards or declaring housing “emergencies,” the Trump administration should allow prices to match real wages.

Americans can’t keep using housing as a savings account or demanding 25% annual stock returns while complaining about inequality. You can’t have both free markets and endless asset bubbles.

RELATED: No peace without steel: Why our factories must roar again

Photo by sdlgzps via Getty Images

Stop feeding the beast

Wall Street already salivates over another round of stimulus to keep the AI bubble inflated. Evercore ISI predicts the S&P could hit 9,000 by 2026, even while warning this could become the “biggest bubble ever.” By then, the economy would be addicted to corporate welfare, and taxpayers would foot the bill for the richest companies in history.

Enough. A nation cannot live on financial tricks and asset bubbles forever. Let the recession come. Let the bubbles burst. Only then can America rebuild a market economy rooted in work, savings, and production — not in debt and fantasy.

Won’t somebody finally stand up and shout stop?

​Opinion & analysis, Opinion, National debt, Broken families, Recession, Economy, Main street, Wall street, Stock market, Assets, Inflation, Interest rates, Jobs, Unemployment, Layoffs 

Among those who loved, respected, and were grateful to Charlie Kirk for everything he did is BlazeTV host Alex Stein — who in a rare moment appears to be all out of jokes.

“People don’t understand that Charlie Kirk could have canceled me a million times. A million times. I did some very boneheaded things. And he always stuck with me, even when I was not representing Turning Point in the best light,” Stein says through tears on “Prime Time with Alex Stein.”

“I am having trouble right now finding anything positive about this situation because I know there’s people out there, and it’s very true that Charlie’s legacy will live on forever, but the world is significantly worse today without Charlie Kirk than it was yesterday,” he continues.

“And Charlie had my back so much, and he didn’t have any motivation other than he actually believed in the First Amendment. He believed in the Second Amendment. He believed in the whole entire Constitution,” he adds.

While Stein says that everyone he has met in politics “has some sort of skeleton in their closet,” Kirk was “the closest thing to perfection when it comes to a human being and following God’s commandments and defending the Constitution.”

“There’s no better example in the entire universe than Charlie Kirk. And when you are perfect like that and when you don’t have skeletons in your closet and you cannot be blackmailed, they will publicly execute you in front of thousands of people, and they will make you scared on purpose,” Stein says.

Kirk was a husband and a father to two children, the founder of Turning Point USA, and only 31 years old.

“When you’re a 31-year-old man, father, that has accomplished more than 99.9% of the population, and you’re brutally murdered in front of your wife and two kids, that is a sick world that not even the most sinister Hollywood scriptwriter would write and produce,” Stein says.

“And that’s the current reality in which we live in. And nothing feels real. Me sitting here and saying Charlie Kirk is dead does not feel real,” he continues.

Not only is his death devastating to those who loved him, listened to him, were inspired by him — but Stein believes this will have a “ripple effect on society” that the leftists cheering on his death do not understand.

“Charlie Kirk would have been president of the United States of America,” he says, adding, “No doubt in my mind.”

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​Video phone, Upload, Free, Video, Camera phone, Sharing, Youtube.com, Prime time with alex stein, Alex stein, The blaze, Blazetv, Blaze news, Blaze podcasts, Blaze podcast network, Blaze media, Blaze online, Blaze originals, Charlie kirk, Charlie kirk assassination, Charlie kirk tpusa, Turning point usa, Charlie kirk martyred 

The Old Timer lives to rock his chair another day. In the latest of Cracker Barrel’s many reversals, the company assured customers the old interiors were here to stay. The physical has triumphed over the digital, the “realer” country store representation retained over gray-washed abstraction, and America is quite pleased. The country has managed to hold onto a facsimile of its tangible past, and this is not nothing.

Or is it?

We are nostalgic for being able to engage in the present sufficiently that we create memories.

The controversy over the Cracker Barrel logo reflects a new mood of victory on the resurgent New Right. A sense of humiliation felt over a decade of brands going woke has been replaced by a feeling of power that this pattern is being reversed. But what is the real meaning of this kind of social media activism? Is it really a victory, or rather a victory lap?

Pessimistically, one might say concern over corporate iconography testifies to a form of nostalgia shading into what writer Mark Fisher called Disneyfication. Analyzing Philip K. Dick’s novel “Time Out of Joint,” Fisher quotes Fredric Jameson’s “Postmodernism, or, the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism”: “the peculiar ache of nostalgia that ‘Time Out Of Joint’ engenders, a nostalgia for the present, which Dick achieves by constellating stereotypical images of the decade he was writing at the end of: ‘President Eisenhower’s stroke; Main Street, U.S.A.; Marilyn Monroe; a world of neighbors and PTAs; small retail stores (the produce trucked in from outside); favorite television programs; mild flirtations with the housewife next door; game shows and contests; sputniks directly revolving overhead, mere blinking lights in the firmament, hard to distinguish from airliners or flying saucers.'”

Cracker Barrel, though presenting itself as a portal to some bygone poultry farmer’s smoking lounge, now actually offers “a nostalgia for the present.” It offers this via immediacy, personal memory, and normalcy.

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The optimistic perspective on this Disneyfication? Digitality is defined in a sense by its lack of presentness. Time-stamped posts position the viewer in an exact relationship to the past, old thoughts bombarded constantly by new ones. One is constantly aware that they have missed something and always reminded they are about to miss even more (or encounter and quickly forget). Cracker Barrel, as a restaurant primarily reserved for family gatherings and social affairs, necessitates that one wipe his blue-light bleary eyes and look up. This immediacy separates it from the YouTube-fare of many other chains and accordingly sees us clinging to it all the more.

Presentness is a requirement to actually engage with the past. Our digital moments seldom become memories, and even more infrequently, memories we bother revisiting. By virtue of Cracker Barrel being an accessible space with an architecture of interaction (wall-items to discuss, games to play, widely palatable food, et cetera), it enables fond family-memory formation. We are nostalgic for being able to engage in the present sufficiently that we create memories.

America is now packed to the gills with all forms of unfamiliar tongues, peoples, and pastimes. Cracker Barrel stands out as a shelter with which the present can be fully enjoyed, removing the diner from recriminations over a Main Street now unrecognizable and inuring us against the tornadic spasms of culture outside its thick double doors. It is a bubble, which, in its wobbly fragility, serves as a funhouse mirror, reflecting a present that could be simple, light, and normal. Inside this sudsy salon is a miniature Target clad in kitsch, a menu that does not embarrass you to order from, and an encampment wherein deleterious social change seems to vanish. It answers a prayer that the country, right now, could be so clean-cut and corralled.

The New Right’s push to retain spaces like Cracker Barrel may blossom into a proper creative drive. Perhaps this is not actually required — it may just need to keep clutching the rocking chair tightly. As many feel their professional and personal lives slipping into the virtual, culturally designated “real world” oases will abound. But the simulacra of these spaces will proliferate, too. Perhaps the restaurant is a welcome reprieve from screen-world. In fact, it may be the definitive escape from the digital world. Or maybe it is just the digital world at an earlier stage of development, repackaged as a comforting and familiar experience.

​Tech, Cracker barrel 

Disney still prints money, but creatively it feels like a company on borrowed time. Marvel and Star Wars once powered revenues, yet a collapse in quality and a relentless release schedule have dulled both brands. The animation studio that set the global standard now leans on sequels and live-action remakes.

Worse, Disney struck a devil’s bargain by cultivating the “Disney adult.” By chasing the childless consumer, the company bought short-term profits while starving its future. At this rate, the company will have no next generation to buy into its nostalgia-based market.

Disney once sold childhood to children and, by doing so, sold a future to parents. By pivoting to the childless super-consumer, it sold out both.

Walt Disney’s dominance came from talent and timing. He had a gift for stories that delighted children and amused their parents. He also built in an era when mass media suddenly reached every living room, the postwar baby boom swelled the audience, and families had disposable income for the first time. Walt converted that moment into a network of theme parks that became rites of passage. In America, childhood meant Disney, and Disney meant childhood.

The empire grew after Walt’s death. Parks multiplied. The company expanded into television, music, sports, and games. Disney stretched its reach to older kids and teens, building an ecosystem where a child could live almost entirely inside one brand. That was the genius: Every formative memory wore a set of mouse ears, and nostalgia was guaranteed on the back end.

But invention is hard. Replicating Walt’s spark isn’t a system you can scale. Disney wanted every demographic and every dollar. Children had been the untapped market, but kids don’t control income; parents do. Marketing directly to adults looked unrealistic — until executives realized nostalgia could do the work.

Nostalgia as strip mine

Nostalgia feels like striking gold. You don’t need to create; you need to repackage. Decades of artistry built so much goodwill that the faintest echo could trigger warm feelings: a musical cue, a costume redesign, a cameo. For young adults who discovered the world is harsher than childhood promised, revisiting Disney’s stories and parks delivered comfort on demand.

That same generation had fewer children, often none. The old route — enchant the kids to unlock the parents’ wallets — narrowed. Disney pivoted. Sequels, reboots, and remakes pushed out originality. Marvel briefly rescued the strategy, but social justice sermons plus a firehose of content burned out the audience. Lucasfilm looked like another bottomless mine, yet once the initial excitement faded, fans saw the studio couldn’t craft new myths. The product kept coming; the magic didn’t.

From children’s parks to adult playgrounds

The parks followed the money. Regular attendance became a status symbol among young adults eager to flaunt luxury consumption online. Disney obliged, hiking prices and layering on exclusive experiences squarely aimed at childless visitors with cash to burn. Elite dining clubs, after-hours parties, and “premium” line-skipping converted nostalgia into a subscription lifestyle. Even Walt’s no-alcohol rule vanished. Spaces designed for families became curated playgrounds for nostalgic adults.

Nothing exposed this shift like the Star Wars hotel. The Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser promised full immersion — actors in character, missions, staged set pieces, and themed cabins — at an eye-watering starting price of $5,500 for two nights for two people, but often much more. Families had no chance. The corridors filled with adults paying thousands for a few days of role-play and an Instagram dump. When the novelty faded and the numbers stopped working, Disney shuttered it.

RELATED: Disney’s woke ‘Snow White’ on life support

Photo by Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic

Eating the seed corn

For a while, the nostalgia economy worked. Remakes still posted strong weekends. Parks extracted more revenue per guest. But the company stopped enchanting children. Re-skinning “Beauty and the Beast” or “Aladdin” keeps cash flowing for a season; it plants nothing for the future. You can only harvest memories if children are making new ones now. Disney has been eating seed corn instead of planting for tomorrow.

That creative retreat shows up in the audience. The company trains adults to consume experiences rather than build households. Disney adults don’t just buy tickets and merch; many postpone or abandon the basics of civilization — marriage, kids, a home — so they can keep chasing the next “exclusive.” Some even treat continuing their bloodline as evil. Disney is not solely to blame for this wider phenomenon, but it reinforces it and profits from it.

None of this means Disney’s executives are uniquely foolish. They followed the incentives. The audience that most reliably spends money was the one you made last generation: the kid who grew up inside Disney’s ecosystem and never left it. Social media turned that audience into free marketing. Wall Street demanded predictable growth, and nostalgia delivered on time. The trap is that nostalgia always cannibalizes tomorrow to feed today.

The moral is bigger than one company. A civilization that feeds on recycled memory while sneering at renewal is a civilization drifting toward hospice. Disney once sold childhood to children and, by doing so, sold a future to parents. By pivoting to the childless super-consumer, it sold out both.

​Opinion & analysis, Opinion, Disney, Disney remake, Live action remake, Woke hollywood, Nostalgia, Marvel, Star wars, Children, Galactic starcruiser, Snow white, Marriage, Family, Entertainment