Investigators with the Utah Department of Public Safety scour a residential backyard next to Utah Valley University the day after the fatal shooting of Charlie Kirk in Orem, Utah. Photo / Loren Elliott, The New York Times
Charlie Kirk, a prominent conservative political activist and close ally of United States President Donald Trump, was fatally shot yesterday while speaking to thousands of people at a college in Utah, setting off widespread shock and condemnation.
Law enforcement officials have not found the gunman, but have recovered a high-powered rifle, video, and other evidence.
Here’s what we know about the shooting.
What happened in the attack?
Kirk, 31, was shot in the neck at about 12.20pm local time, some 20 minutes into his speech in a courtyard on the campus of Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah.
He was seated under a tent printed with the slogan for his speaking tour, “The American Comeback”. Blood spilled from his neck as he fell from his chair, videos showed. He was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead.
Officials said that one shot had been fired from the roof of the Losee Centre, a building about 140m from where Kirk was sitting.
Investigators have traced the movements of the shooter as he went onto the roof, fired and then jumped from the building and fled from the campus into a neighbourhood, according to Beau Mason, commissioner of the Utah Department of Public Safety.
About 3000 people were in the crowd, Utah officials said, with six university police officers working on security and Kirk’s own security detail.
Before he was shot, Kirk had been responding to a question about transgender mass shooting suspects, Andrew Piskadlo, who attended the event, told the New York Times.
Has the shooter been found?
No suspects were in custody today and authorities were continuing to search for the shooter and working to determine a motive.
The FBI’s office in Salt Lake City released two images of a “person of interest” in the shooting, wearing a baseball cap, dark sunglasses and a dark shirt emblazoned with the American flag. The person appears to be walking up stairs in one of the images.
The images were captured on campus security cameras shortly before the shooting took place, the Utah Department of Public Safety said in a statement.
The bureau asked for help in identifying the person and offered a US$100,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of “the individual(s) responsible for the murder of Charlie Kirk”.
Investigators said they had recovered the high-powered bolt-action rifle used to kill Kirk. The rifle was found in a “wooded area” through which the shooter fled, they said.
Investigators also collected a palm print, forearm imprints and a footwear impression, said Robert Bohls, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Salt Lake City field office.
Mason said that the shooter “appears to be of college age”.
Was anyone else arrested?
Two people were detained in the chaotic first hours after the shooting, and officials yesterday gave clashing information about the state of the investigation.
One person detained, identified as George Zinn, a local political activist, was later released and charged with obstruction of justice.
Later yesterday, Kash Patel, the FBI Director, announced a second arrest, saying that “the subject for the horrific shooting” had been taken into custody. He congratulated law enforcement, seeming to herald an end to the search.
At a news conference a few minutes later, Utah officials described the individual in custody only as a person of interest who was being interviewed.
Patel then backtracked, saying that the person had been released after being interrogated and that the investigation was continuing. The FBI has asked the public to submit videos and images from the shooting.
Today, a man walked onto the campus of Utah Valley University, which has been closed since the shooting, and ignored police tape to take photographs of the crime scene, the Utah Department of Public Safety said in a statement.
When an agent told him to stop and attempted to identify him, he fled, the police said.
He was arrested and booked into the Utah County Jail on obstruction and trespassing charges, the police said. There was no indication that the man was connected to the shooting itself.
Who was Charlie Kirk?
Kirk, a married father-of-two young children, helped shape the hard-right youth movement that coalesced around Trump.
He was the founder of Turning Point USA, a conservative youth organisation, with over 850 chapters at universities and high schools across the US.
In addition to bringing high-profile right-wing speakers to university campuses, the group provides training and networking for young conservative activists.
His views were in line with many in Trump’s orbit.
He was critical of gay and transgender rights and the separation of church and state.
He endorsed the so-called great replacement theory, which claims that immigrants will displace white Americans.
He supported gun rights and dismissed concerns about climate change.
After Trump won a second term in November, Kirk helped vet potential White House appointees to ensure they had shown unflagging loyalty to the president.
Utah Valley University was the first stop on Kirk’s American Comeback Tour, which was supposed to include stops at universities throughout the country.
What has been the response?
Many Democrats and Republicans quickly denounced the shooting, although some sought to cast blame on their political opponents.
Trump ordered American flags lowered to half-staff until Sunday evening local time and said he would posthumously award the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Kirk.
In a video address from the Oval Office, he said that rhetoric from the “radical left” had contributed to Kirk’s killing, even though investigators have not determined a motive.
He also linked it to other recent attacks on Republicans, including the attempt on his own life last year at a rally in Pennsylvania.
Former President Joe Biden wrote on social platform X: “There is no place in our country for this kind of violence. It must end now.”
Former President Barack Obama echoed the sentiment, writing on social media: “This kind of despicable violence has no place in our democracy”.
In Congress, a moment of silence for Kirk yesterday deteriorated into partisan acrimony.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
Written by: Pooja Salhotra, Yan Zhuang, Isabella Kwai and Michael Levenson
Photographs by: Loren Elliott, Adriana Zehbrauskas
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