HANOVER — The conservative activist who was fatally shot during a speaking event at a Utah college on Wednesday was scheduled to speak at Dartmouth College in less than two weeks.
Charlie Kirk, who made his career delivering a combative conservative message to young audiences, was set to debate liberal political commentator Hasan Piker Sept. 25 at the Hanover Inn.
The event was to be sponsored by the student-led Dartmouth Political Union and College President Sian Leah Beilock’s Dartmouth Dialogue project, which regularly hosts speakers on politics and other topics.
Dartmouth students appeared eager to attend the event. It was sold out and had a waiting list.
In a statement on it website this week, the Dartmouth Political Union said the organization was “horrified and heartbroken” by the 31-year-old Kirk’s killing.
“Charlie recently posted a video on YouTube discussing the importance of civil discourse as a means to prevent political violence” the group wrote. “Now, more than ever, it’s important that despite our differences we can see the humanity in those across the aisle. Political violence will never be the answer to political disagreement. When we disagree, we must engage in discourse.”
‘That could have been here’
At campus on Friday, recently arrived first-year Dartmouth students agreed that no one should be killed for their political beliefs and speaking out. The circumstances of Kirk’s death were particularly “scary,” student Ryan Daly said.
“Anytime someone gets assassinated in public, that’s a horrible thing, especially in front of a college,” Daly said “That could have been here.”
Though Daly said he “didn’t always agree with what (Kirk) did or what he says,” he often saw Kirk online. Daly tried to get tickets to the Dartmouth debate, but wasn’t able to before it sold out.
Eli Berkowitz Douglas, who plans to major in government, had tickets to the event.
Berkowitz Douglas, who is Jewish, was “not particularly” a fan of Kirk, but agreed with Kirk on some issues and not on others. “I think a lot of what he had to say about Israel, in particular, is very accurate and correct.” (Kirk generally had been a supporter of Israel and its war in Gaza.)
He disagreed, however, with Kirk’s anti-abortion stance.
“When you consider that he was killed simply for being a run-of-the-mill conservative … that his biggest evil was going around college campuses and maybe being kind of bad at debating, it’s absolutely tragic that he was killed for (being) the not-even-really-evil person that he was,” Berkowitz Douglas said.
When asked if he is worried about attending similar public events in the future, Berkowitz Douglas said, “avoiding things of that nature will only make the problem worse. We need to engage in political discourse, even when it may seem a little scary.”
Another first-year student Mathieu Charrette, said he did not follow Kirk online but often saw his content and “found him entertaining.” He agreed with Kirk on “constitutional freedoms and fundamental rights.”
“It bothers me so much that a man could be killed for what in this country we define as a fundamental right,” Charrette said. “Really everyone on all sides of the political spectrum should have the same access to that right and freedom.”
First-year student Tyler Thick, who was on the waiting list for the speaking event, said he was in his dorm room with a group of friends when he heard about the assassination and was “very stunned, very shocked.”
“It’s just something that we should never have to see in this country and my biggest takeaway is I hope it doesn’t spark a period of political violence,” Thick said Friday.
Thick described himself as not a “big political guy” and said he is “not a big fan of either party,” but often saw Kirk’s content online.
While Kirk’s death was “an abhorrent thing that should never have happened,” he hopes that it will “spark a debate about where we are as a nation” rather than discouraging discussion.
Owen Courcey, a freshman who plans to study government or economics, was looking forward to the event. Though he disagreed with much of Kirk’s opinions he said he feels the debate would have been ” a good thing for people to hear,” he said.
“One of the things that I like about Dartmouth is the institutional neutrality, and I appreciate that they bring in the diverse perspectives that they do,” Courcey added. “I think it’s a tragedy that we don’t get to hear that and just that hearing an opinion different than yours makes you react violently, I find that upsetting.”
Dartmouth adopted a policy of “institutional restraint” in December 2024 that dictates that the college will limit any statements on social and political issues with the goal of increasing freedom of expression within the community, according to Dartmouth’s website.
Genevieve Waters, a first-year student from South Florida, said she disagreed with Kirk’s views and “didn’t think that he presented his arguments very well.”
She sees this moment as a chance to think about gun violence and gun control and noted, “I just don’t think that anyone needs to die for speaking out.”
“It’s crazy every time there’s a mass shooting, it just feels like it’s the same thing happening over and over, and there’s not a lot being changed,” Waters said.
Waters noted that the amount of coverage of Kirk’s death has been substantial compared to mass shootings on college campuses.
“I think that is a little bit alarming to just see the masses come together and celebrate this man’s life but not celebrate the lives of these students that are being killed in the same gruesome ways,” Waters said.
The risks of being a public figure
Nationally, Kirk’s death has sparked conversations about political violence and the political climate.
State Rep. Russell Muirhead, D-Hanover, who is also a Dartmouth government professor, said it seems unwise to “run to conclusions about this moment being vastly more violent than every other moment.”
The U.S. has a long history of political violence, Muirhead said. He pointing to historic events and recent events, including the murders in Minnesota State Rep. Melissa Hortman, a Democrat, and her husband, Mark, in June and the assassination attempt on President Donald Trump in Pennsylvania during the 2024 campaign.
“This is a country where if somebody wants to shoot somebody else, they’re going to be able to,” Muirhead said. “If we look back to Lincoln, the first speech he ever gives in 1838 is a condemnation of mob violence, which he thinks is threatening to destroy American democracy.”
But there’s been a clear change in American politics in recent years that he attributes to politicians and activists building their followings through social media, Muirhead argued. Political leaders today “get rewarded for stirring peoples passions and exciting their fears,” Muirhead said, when historically leaders were “rewarded for being calm and statesman-like.”
In general, this creates a feeling that “the other side is a threat, they’re not just opponents, they’re enemies,” he added.
What history doesn’t tell us clearly, Muirhead said, is what might happen next in U.S. politics: “Whether our politics becomes one of even more angry and violent passions or whether it becomes one where there’s more deliberation and more respect depends entirely on the tone that’s set by those in power.”
The “risks of being a public official now are much greater than in the past,” said Muirhead, who is now in his third term as a state legislator. “I think people who appear in public are thinking more about what kinds of spaces are secure and what kinds aren’t.”
For their part, Dartmouth officials “in light of recent events, are reviewing our security processes to ensure they are coordinated to maximize safety precautions,” college spokeswoman Jana Barnello said Thursday.