Column: Charlie Kirk is dead and more students got shot. Can we talk about gun reform?

I haven’t been able to sleep the past few nights. I’m exhausted and emotionally drained from the constant flow of fresh horrors the U.S. — and world at large — continues to provide.

I did not wake up Wednesday hoping to see Charlie Kirk, or anyone, shot in the throat. Or the news of yet another school shooting, this time in Evergreen, Colorado. Or video of a humanitarian boat bound for Gaza being firebombed. Or reports that Russia had invaded Polish airspace, risking a NATO response that could draw the U.S. and others into a conflict. Or Israel bombing Qatar. Or. Or. Or the countless other waking nightmares we are continuously flooded with.

We were not built to experience nor process this constant stream of fear and hopelessness, rage and anxiety. We aren’t supposed to watch people get murdered on a regular basis — be it Kirk or Iryna Zarutska or Palestinian families.

These events are disturbing and disheartening on their own — but it’s the responses, or lack thereof, that deepen the despair.

Kirk, known on the right for his influence over the “forgotten” conservative youth and on the left for his racist, misogynistic, homophobic takes, was assassinated in a stomach-churning scene on a Utah university campus in front of thousands. 

Almost simultaneously, two high school students were shot by an apparent white supremacist before he turned the gun on himself. 

Some Democratic politicians quickly pointed to both incidents and called for stricter gun laws and wider access to mental health care. This is just what they did in June when Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman, her husband Mark and their dog were shot and killed in a politically motivated attack.

“This is horrific. This is awful,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said of Kirk’s murder. “But are we going to do something or are we going to argue over rhetoric? We have to pass gun safety legislation and stop this.”

AOC reacts to Charlie Kirk shooting, expresses gun violence concerns

Charlie Kirk, a conservative activist and close ally of President Donald Trump, was shot and killed Wednesday at a Utah college event.

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Top Long Beach representatives, however, were more timid in their reactions. In statements issued Wednesday, no Long Beach official took the opportunity to push for increased regulations on guns or access to mental health care.

“Political violence is never acceptable,” Mayor Rex Richardson said, adding that people should be allowed to share “differing viewpoints” in a democracy and that his thoughts are with all those involved.

“Americans must stand united against the horrific attack on Charlie Kirk and denounce all forms of violence,” Rep. Robert Garcia posted on social media, adding that his thoughts are with the Kirk family.

“Violence against one person for their views means we allow violence against anyone for their views,” said Rep. Nanette Barragán, adding that political violence should not be condoned regardless of affiliation.

In a subsequent post about the Colorado school shooting, Barragán did call for an end to gun violence but fell short of calling for any action to make that happen.

Kind words beseeching unity — or at least nonviolent tolerance — are great. But they mean little when they are not backed up with something actionable, something more than words.

A far-right pundit who espoused Christian nationalist views, Kirk was steadfast in his anti-gun control beliefs. In fact, he regularly argued for reducing regulations. To his credit, he stuck by his views to his literal last breath.

“I think it’s worth it to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the second amendment to protect our other God-given rights,” Kirk famously said during a 2023 interview. “That is a prudent deal. It is rational.”

The U.S. reported nearly 47,000 gun deaths in 2023, the most recent year for which complete data is available, according to Pew Research. Of those deaths, 38% were murder, while 58% were suicide and 3% were listed as “other.”

Of all U.S. murders that year, 79% involved a firearm, which was among the highest percentages since 1968 when the Center for Disease Control and Prevention began tracking that data point, according to Pew.

Despite these statistics, two active bills in Congress aim to roll back and prevent gun regulations. S.119 and H.R.563, both somehow titled “No Retaining Every Gun In a System That Restricts Your Rights Act,” would destroy ATF firearm transaction records and prevent future firearm registration, respectively. The bills were both introduced earlier this year and are in committee. They were both authored by Republicans. 

Let me be perfectly clear: No one in the United States should be the victim of gun violence or even have to live in fear that they may be. Not one person. Not even Kirk. I watched the videos of his assassination. It is gruesome. It is hard to stomach. But I can’t help but think of all the school children who have seen that exact same imagery, in person, as their classmates are mowed down by gunmen.

If gun deaths are a necessary evil to maintain freedom in the U.S., if they are “worth it,” as Kirk believed, then why should it be children and teachers paying that price? There have been 230 school shootings since 2018 that resulted in injury or death, with 9 already this year, according to edweek.org. Why should it be those enjoying a concert? Families shopping at a mall or grocery store? It shouldn’t be.

Innocents should not be the cannon fodder used to uphold others’ beliefs. But that’s not how the world usually works.

Now, I have seen some people celebrating Kirk’s death. But I don’t think it’s something to celebrate. Not because I agreed with his politics or thought he was a good person or even because he was a dad, but because it accomplished nothing except galvanizing the right-wing with a martyr. Kirk’s ideas and beliefs cannot be killed with a bullet.

“Social media posts glorifying these attacks threaten to normalize them,” Dalya Berkowitz is a senior research analyst in the Democracy, Conflict and Governance Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, wrote for Politico. “This kind of rhetoric helps violent people justify their actions.”

And as the right comes together, the left is once again fighting over what reactions to Kirk’s death are appropriate. To that, I say: Our empathy is not bottomless. We cannot spend it on people we view as genuinely bad when there are endless innocents and allies who are more deserving.

Regardless, many Democratic politicians outside of Long Beach condemned the killing of Kirk and offered condolences. President Donald Trump, on the other hand, threw gasoline on the fire.

“It’s long past time for all Americans, and the media, to confront the fact that violence and murder are the tragic consequence of demonizing those with whom you disagree day after day, year after year, in the most hateful and despicable way possible,” Trump said. “For years, those on the radical left have compared wonderful Americans like Charlie to Nazis and the world’s worst mass murderers and criminals. This kind of rhetoric is directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in our country today.”

The irony of Trump’s statement, of course, being that his very words are the rhetoric to which he’s referring. This is a man who regularly demonizes others as “the enemy of the American people” and “animals” and “savages,” among countless other inflammatory words, phrases and nicknames.

By contrast, when a would-be assassin allegedly took a shot at Trump ahead of the 2024 election, President Joe Biden simply condemned the act and called for unity.

“There's no place in America for this kind of violence,” Biden said at the time. “It's sick. It's sick. That's one of the reasons why we have to unite this country. You cannot allow for this to be happening. We cannot be like this. We cannot condone this.”

Other conservatives such as Congresswoman Nancy Mace and Fox News talking heads also were quick to take aim at Democrats, saying they “own what happened” and are “at war” with Republicans.

“If you thought you were gonna shut a movement down, you’re gonna get a rude awakening,” Fox host Greg Gutfeld said on air. “You woke us the fuck up.”

This is the same rhetoric they are saying caused Kirk’s murder. So it’s no surprise that his death is already fomenting increased hatred for anyone left of center on the political spectrum, which could quickly evolve into more attacks and gun violence.

On Thursday, four historically Black colleges and universities in the South — Hampton University, Virginia State University, Bethune-Cookman University and Alabama State University — were on lockdown or canceled classes over potential threats. Thursday night, neo-nazis gathered in Huntington Beach in honor of Kirk and were recorded chanting “white man fight back,” providing further irony to Trump’s video statement.

It should be noted that Tyler Robinson, the 22-year-old now in custody for allegedly shooting Kirk, is a white, gun-loving man, who allegedly grew up in a conservative Mormon household. Bullet casings engraved with “Hey fascist! CATCH!” followed by a series of arrows believed to be a reference to a sequence of controller moves for the "Helldivers 2" video game, “If you read this, you are GAY Lmao” and “Notices Bulge OWO what's this??” all point to online meme and troll culture.

Another casing had the lyrics to the Italian folk song “Bella Ciao," which appears in the video game Far Cry 6. But a remix of the song also appears on a playlist for Groypers — a group of alt-right, white nationalist, and Christian nationalist activists led by white supremacist Nick Fuentes. The group had a long-running feud with Kirk, who they say was too moderate and mainstream.

“We could be headed for a cycle of tit-for-tat violence in the U.S. that we haven’t seen, at least in decades,” Berkowitz wrote Friday.

While the term Nazi is certainly overused to describe some of the GOP (the Huntington Beach gathering notwithstanding), it is disingenuous of right-wing pundits to act like this type of rhetoric only exists from left to right, especially when talking about Kirk, who was famous for it.

Almost immediately after it was reported that Kirk had been shot, the internet was flooded with the abhorrent things he has said, which took aim at every group of people except white and wealthy men. Women, Black and brown folks, the LGBTQ community, especially trans people, immigrants — no one was spared his vitriol.

Black women like Joy Reid, Sheila Jackson Lee, Michelle Obama and Ketanji Brown Jackson do not have the “brain-processing power to be taken seriously,” according to Kirk, who added that Black women in power “had to steal a white person’s slot to be taken seriously.”

When asked if, hypothetically, he would force his 10-year-old daughter to carry her rapist's baby to term, Kirk said, “The answer is yes, the baby would be delivered.”

Not even Taylor Swift was immune. When the pop singer’s engagement to NFL boyfriend Travis Kelce was announced, Kirk was quick to react.

“Reject feminism,” Kirk said on his show. “Submit to your husband, Taylor. You’re not in charge.”

It is no surprise that this type of consistent inflammatory rhetoric begets violence, which begets more hateful rhetoric, which begets more violence. It’s a never-ending cycle.

We need action. And we need our leaders — from the local level to Congress — to demand it. Repeatedly. Not just when tragedy strikes, but always.

Every single person in the U.S. deserves to live their life without fear that it will be taken from them in an instant by a person with a differing opinion and a gun. We need gun control, we need mental health care and we need compassion and empathy, despite what Kirk believed.