Charlie Kirk memorial live updates as service honors conservative activist

Trump told journalists that it was a “very difficult day” when he left the White House on the way to Glendale, Arizona, Sunday morning for the commemorative service of Kirk.

“We are going to celebrate the life of a great man today,” said the president, adding that something like it could have happened is not even credible. “”

Trump said about Kirk’s wife and family whom he planned to continue “giving them my love”.

“You can’t say anything,” said the president. “You are talking about the great things he has done. I mean, he was incredible – had a huge influence for a young man who was … did a great job. He did a great job.”

Trump said Kirk “had a grip on young people because they loved him, they respected him.”

In an interview with the New York Times that was published on Sunday, the widow of Charlie Kirk, Erika Kirk, said that when she arrived at Utah hospital after being shot, she was warned to see her body. But, she said she said to the officials, “I want to see what they did to my husband.”

“His eyes were semi-open,” Kirk told Times. “And he had this knowledge, Mona Lisa half semi-scile. As if he had died happy. As Jesus saved him. The ball came, he blinked and he was in paradise.”

She said she didn’t kiss her before leaving that morning, and she kissed her then.

Erika Kirk told the Times about the way she and Charlie met and their relationship.

“I’m not saying it was perfect, in a way,” she said. “But I knew my expectations and my role, and he knew his. I was not going to be the throbbing woman to whom he would not want to go home. I wanted to create a sacred landing space for him. And I think that is why he was always impatient to go home.”

Erika Kirk also said that she did not want to be the one who had decided if the alleged shooter had obtained the death penalty.

“I’m going to be honest. I said to our lawyer, I want the government to decide this. I don’t want this man’s blood to my big book,” she said. “Because when I arrive in paradise and Jesus is like:” Uh, an eye for an eye? How is we doing it? “And that prevents me from being in paradise, being with Charlie?”

Charlie Kirk’s commemorative service takes place at the State Farm Stadium – normally at the Cardinals of the NFL Arizona. The stadium, which is located in Glendale, near Phoenix, can accommodate more than 63,000 people.

But the police planned that more than 100,000 people could prove to be, so the organization of Kirk, Turning Point USA, also reserved the place next door, the Desert Diamond Arena, to overflow. Desert Diamond can accommodate around 18,000.

The organizers said that there would be close security for the event, with a “TSA level projection” for the crowd.

Federal authorities have appointed commemorative service as a special event assessment of events (SEAR) Level 1, said a senior manager of the Ministry of Homeland Security. This designation is used for “important events with national and / or international importance which require in -depth federal interinstitutions support”, such as the Super Bowl.

Read the rest here.

By Joe Walsh, Nicole Sganga

President Trump and Vice-President JD Vance should both speak to Charlie Krik, just like his widow, Erika Kirk.

Other speakers include:

• Chief of the White House Staff Susie Wiles
• Secretary of State Marco Rubio
• The Secretary of Health and Social Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
• Defense secretary Pete Hegseth
• TULSI Gabbard national intelligence director
• Donald Trump Jr.
• TUCKER Carlson
• Stephen Miller
• Sergio Gor

Additional speakers should also be announced.

One of the speakers marked with the Memorial will be Erika Kirk, the widow of Charlie Kirk, who took the direction of Turning Point USA after his death.

The couple got married in 2021 and had two young children.

Erika Kirk grew up in the Phoenix region and won Miss Arizona USA in 2012. She attended Arizona State University, obtained a master’s degree in Liberty University and pursues her doctorate in biblical studies.

It was a frequent presence during the events of Turning Point USA, where it spoke of politics, religion and its conservative opinions on family and marriage. She also founded a “confessional clothing line” called Proclaim and a ministry called Biblein365.

During an appearance on “The Charlie Kirk Show” earlier this year, Erika Kirk said that she was more conservative than her husband – and he accepted.

In her first public remarks after her death last week, she said that “the movement that my husband built will not die”.

Thursday, the board of directors of Turning Point USA announced that it had selected it unanimously as Its new CEO and Chairman of the Board of Directors.

Charlie Kirk was the chief of Turning Point USA, a group for young conservatives he co -founded in 2012, at the age of 18. Originally from the Chicago region, Kirk briefly attended the community college but abandoned to pursue full -time political activism.

It was a frank and omnipresent presence in politics, especially for the youngest together. He organized a daily radio program and a podcast, broadcast his message on social networks and visited dozens of university campuses each year, where he was known to organize rapid shooting debates with left -wing students.

Kirk has often attracted controversy for his opinions. He supported the false allegations of Mr. Trump’s electoral fraud after the 2020 elections, and his group maintained a “list of supervision of the professor” of university instructors accused of having spread “left propaganda”.

He married anti-trans rhetoric and amplified the “big replacement” plot, the assertion that there is a plot to replace the whites with minorities.

Turning Point USA, a non -profit organization, says it has chapters in thousands of secondary schools and colleges, and the group’s political arm, Turning Point, engages at the base of the base.

Kirk’s support for President Trump dates back to his first campaign in 2016, and he remained an ally with Trump after leaving his duties under a controversial cloud following the riot of Capitol in January 2021.

In the 2024 presidential race, the organization of Kirk, Turning Point USA, was largely credited with having helped to energize and mobilize young conservative voters of Mr. Trump.

Kirk also approached Donald Trump Jr. after being an assistant in the 2016 campaign.

“Charlie was not only a friend – he was like a little brother for me,” wrote Trump Jr. on X.

Vice-President JD Vance awarded Kirk to have presented him to Donald Trump Jr. before Vance appeared in the Senate in 2022, and to defend “in public and private” so that the president chooses Vance as a running mate last year.

After the assassination of Kirk, Vance accompanied the Kirk coffin when he was transported from Utah to Arizona aboard the vice-president, Air Force Two.

• What: Commemorative service for Charlie Kirk
• Date: Sunday September 21, 2025
• Time: 11:00 a.m. local time; 2 p.m. HE
• Location: Stadium of the State Farm to Glendale, Arizona
• Online stream: Live on CBS News 24/7 on your mobile or streaming device

Note: Streaming plans are subject to modification.