Dancing on the Knife’s Edge: Violence in the Christian Nationalist Rhetoric of Turning Point Faith’s Founder Charlie Kirk

This paper explores how Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk harnessed Christian Nationalist rhetoric to the evangelical faithful toward reactionary neoliberal political engagement. During the 2020 election, Kirk was a major pundit promoting America as a Christian Nation and Donald Trump’s Make America Great Again populism. Kirk organized buses to the Capitol for January 6 insurrectionists and promoted Trump’s election lies. He took control of the Republican Party in Arizona, where Turning Point is based, and purged moderate Republicans in favor of those who echoed Trump’s lies.[i]

In the aftermath of January 6, 2021, Kirk fully embraced Christian nationalism. He launched Freedom Square, also called Freedom Nights in America, in May 2021 out of Dream City Church in Phoenix, Arizona, which served as a seedbed for Turning Point Faith. Kirk’s stated goal for this initiative was to encourage churchgoers to speak truth and promote biblical values and the traditional family. But as Kirk and Thousand Oaks Pastor Rob McCoy alluded in their Aug. 4, 2021 Freedom Square announcing the official launch, they aimed to embolden pastors to fight against what Kirk has called “the great reset,” a conspiracy-and-apocalyptic-laden narrative that COVID was a smokescreen to usher in a global, authoritarian, communist state.[ii]

Analysis of the first 10 Freedom Square nights illustrates that Kirk danced on the knife’s edge of actively promoting violence. Kirk promoted “spiritual warfare” against the “dehumanizing” and “Satanic” tactics of the “woke left,” public educators, and marginalized identities that he believes threaten American society. He urged attendees to “demand the welfare” of their cities, “take dominion,” and “reclaim the country for Christ” by proscription and even “political extinction.” But Kirk also reminded attendees to seek the “fruits of the spirit,” and to be “self controlled” as they proclaim the truth and expose darkness.[iii]

Kirk mixes Tea Party-style populism with evangelical sensibilities. His Turning Point USA is an educational nonprofit focused on promoting freedom, free markets, and limited government by recruiting young people to start college chapters. TPUSA infamously has encouraged college students to report leftist indoctrination through his Professor Watchlist.

McCoy, who made a national name for himself after he resigned from his city council seat so his church could protest COVID-lock down rules, radicalized Kirk toward Christian nationalism sometime in 2019, according to the work of Matthew Boedy.[iv] Following this radicalization, Kirk briefly ran a right-wing think tank at Liberty University, known as the Falkirk Center. Liberty officials renamed it in 2021, following protests and the resignation of Jerry Falwell, Jr. following sexual scandals.[v][3]

The Freedom Square evenings started with 12-15 minutes of worship music, then a prayer and a call for donations to Dream City’s many outreach charities. Then Kirk took the stage, holding court on his own or in conversation with a guest, usually well-known Christian Nationalists, such as McCoy, Sean Feucht, Gary Hamrick, and David Engelhardt. Each night ended with a question-and-answer session that privileged young people. Viewership on YouTube ranged from a low of roughly 1,800 to a high of 8,000 per episode.

 In his presentations, Kirk promoted the need for attendees to get involved in their communities, citing Jeremiah 29 that they should “demand” the welfare of their cities.

“It’s not enough to just watch Fox News, Tucker Carlson, and buy the pillow, and hope that is going to save Western civilization — promo code Kirk by the way for all you watching at home,” Kirk said in his first Freedom Night May 4, 2021. “It’s time to get into the arena.”

He told attendees to proclaim the truth, citing Ephesians 5:11, that they should have nothing to do with the “deeds of darkness, but expose them.” He then exposed how Critical Race Theory, which Kirk described as “civilization ending stuff,” was taking over Arizona’s schools and promoting racism by focusing on the color of one’s skin.

Kirk continued the tirade against CRT on later evenings, but also attacked feminism, blurred gender lines, and transgender people as “from the pit of hell.” Kirk argued biblical ideals of immigration supported national boundaries and demanded the assimilation of immigrants. He described environmental policies as anti-human and argued people were to take dominion over the earth. He described vaccine mandates as a form of biomedical fascism. Throughout, Kirk used the language of warfare, promoting the idea that attendees are living in “enemy territory” and fighting tyranny.

“I have called for a while that we need a political extinction event of the woke left,” Kirk said March 1, 2022, his most violent statement.

Though he platforms them, Kirk often moderated his guests, and, in the Q&A, warned people to remember the fruits of the spirit, love their friends who are Democrats, and, not to get too caught up in apocalyptic rhetoric that they grow apathetic. He’s thus often dancing on the knife’s edge, using spiritual warfare to keep people motivated but not wanting them to tarnish their claim to be purveyors of light.

[i] Yvonne Wingett Sanchez and Isaac Stanley-Becker, “How a Pro-Trump Youth Group Remade the Arizona GOP, Testing Democracy,” Washington Post, November 4, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/11/04/arizona-gop-turning-point-usa/; Sarah Al-Arshani, “A Former Firefighter Charged in the Capitol Riot Took a Bus Organized by Turning Point USA to DC, Filing Says,” Business Insider, March 2, 2021, https://www.businessinsider.com/man-charged-capitol-riot-went-dc-bus-turning-point-usa-2021-3; Peter Stone, “Money and Misinformation: How Turning Point USA Became a Formidable pro-Trump Force,” The Guardian, October 23, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/oct/23/turning-point-rightwing-youth-group-critics-tactics.

[ii] Kirk, The American Response to the Great Reset,” Turning Point USA, 2022.

[iii] TPUSA Faith Presents Freedom Square with Charlie Kirk. May 4, 2021. Directed by Turning Point USA, 2021. YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2806lyoUPdg. The rest can be found at https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLnZT7Gz_VSN4tCdBVtXhCQL4qtWI2_J8U.

[iv] Matthew Boedy, “Ten Years of Turning Point USA,” Political Research Associates, January 28, 2022, https://politicalresearch.org/2022/01/28/ten-years-turning-point-usa; Tom Kisken, Isaiah Murtaugh, Dawn Megli, Kathleen Wilson, “The Unmasked Rise of Pastor Rob McCoy: Culture War Propels Evangelical to Larger Stage,” October 5, 2022, https://www.vcstar.com/in-depth/news/2022/10/05/pastor-rob-mccoy-propelled-culture-war-covid-19-masks-national-stage-charlie-kirk/10333102002/.

[v] Ruth Graham, “Conservative Activist Charlie Kirk Leaves Liberty University Think Tank,” The New York Times, March 16, 2021, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/16/us/charlie-kirk-liberty-falwell-falkirk.html.