In the wake of the killing of a young conservative political star, Montana’s Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte and 2024 Republican candidate for president, Vivek Ramaswamy, honored his legacy in forward-looking speeches at Montana State University’s Brick Breeden Fieldhouse Tuesday evening.
Charlie Kirk, a right-wing political darling and leader of the Turning Point USA movement, was originally slated to speak at the MSU event and be introduced by Gianforte. He was shot and killed at an event at Utah Valley University on Sept. 10.
“I worry that September 10th is going to represent a form of generational trauma that isn’t going to heal easily,” Ramaswamy said in his remarks. “It’s going to last for a long time to come, and the question for us now is: What [do] we actually do about it?”
His assassination has invigorated Turning Point USA and the Christian youth conservative movement it helps lead. Kirk was a close ally of President Donald Trump, and the crowd of roughly 3,100 people was filled with MAGA hats and other Trump apparel. Kirk helped lead an effort to get Trump re-elected in 2024, while often making incendiary statements attacking the Civil Rights Act, Islam and transgender people.
Kirk’s scheduled visit to MSU was supposed to be part of a series where he spoke at colleges across the nation, but it has since been rebranded and is continuing on with speakers such as Ramaswamy, Tucker Carlson and other Republican governors.
Gianforte called Kirk a friend, and said he had known him since he was 18. Kirk visited Montana multiple times, and on one occasion he and Gianforte spent three days hiking in Hyalite Canyon just outside downtown Bozeman, the governor said.
Gianforte’s remarks struck a religious tone, encouraging those who do not know God to talk to someone in the audience who does.
Since Kirk’s death, there has been a spike in Turning Point USA participation across the country.
“God is using this to bring reconciliation to campuses and high schools across the country,” Gianforte said of the uptick in registration.
Ramaswamy, who is now a Republican candidate for the governor of Ohio, broke from the typical GOP message Tuesday evening by saying that the right should embrace those on the other side of the aisle and “pray for them.”
“We conservatives have an obligation, and now more than ever, to stand up for truth over falsehood. To stand up for the truth that God is real, to stand up for the truth that there are two genders, to stand up for the truth that reverse racism is racism, that an open border is not a border, that the nuclear family is the greatest world of governance known to the history of mankind,” Ramaswamy started.
But he added that conservatives don’t have to view those who disagree with them as “enemies who must be conquered, but instead as our fellow citizens who have lost their way and must be shown the light not to berate them and banish them, but to pray for them, and even on rare occasions, to actually persuade them.”
Multiple law enforcement agencies assisted with the event, including the University Police Department, Gallatin County Sherriff, Montana Highway Patrol and officers from Helena and West Yellowstone were also seen at the event. There were also a team of snipers on top of the grocery store roof across the street from the stadium.
MSU declined to say how many total law enforcement officers were staffing the event, nor did they say how much the increased law enforcement presence would cost the university.
In recent weeks, some conservatives on social media have been bringing attention to people who make derogatory and hateful statements about his death, often calling for the firing of these people from their workplace.
A professor is currently on leave from MSU-Northern for her social media comments about Kirk.
A Montana State University-Northern associate professor was placed on leave after making social media comments following the death of Charlie Kirk.
Gianforte, however, said in a Facebook post that he swore an oath to uphold state law and the Montana Constitution “including the freedom of speech, regardless of how vile it is,” a point that he reiterated in an interview Tuesday evening.
“Now is a time to heal as a nation, not divide,” the post continued. “While I am sickened by what I’ve seen on social media, I must and will uphold my oath to the Constitution and the laws of our state.”
In 2023, Gianforte signed a bill into law that bars employers from firing or disciplining an employee for legal expressions of free speech, which the governor cited in the Facebook post.
Kirk too was a champion of free speech: He was known for his debate style, where he would encourage people who disagreed with his viewpoints to come ask him a question in front of an audience, a spectacle that helped propel his movement.
In his speech Tuesday evening Gianforte told people not to “retreat in the dark corners of social media,” and encouraged in-person interactions and debate with people who have differing viewpoints, a nod to the hallmark feature of Kirk’s methods that helped put him on the map.
Victoria Eavis is a reporter for the Montana State News Bureau. She previously worked for the Casper Star-Tribune in Wyoming, covering state politics and Liz Cheney’s fall from power. She can be reached at victoria.eavis@helenair.com.
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