I Was Told Early - Charlie Kirk "He's Gone"

I know someone who worked close with Charlie Kirk for many years. He was there, five feet from Charlie when he was shot at UVU. I put up a tweet, then pulled it down. We need to stop creating political silos. It's ok to pursue truth, but even truth needs checks, to verify its veracity.

 Raw Transcript

Well, a somber day, September 10th,
2025.
Charlie Kirk, political commentator,
shot, killed, murdered
of all places in Oram, Utah at Utah
Valley University. Um
I the political violence is
getting out of hand
and you know most of these people are on
the fringe uh with mental illness or
they've allowed themselves to get all
riled up and bought into a silo of
information on their side of the
political aisle. And we've got to find a
way to get out of this. I I don't know
how we're going to do it. Uh because the
politicians rev everybody up. Uh
organizations, media, everybody revs
everybody up on these things and makes
lies and pushes everything to the
extreme. Everything is straw manned on
the opposite side.
Um but God, what a what a sad and and
tragic day. Charlie Kirk, who I believe
is only 31 years old,
leaves a wife and kids uh behind.
um just absolutely tragic. I had heard
about this early on. I had a
confirmation from somebody who has
worked with Charlie for
many years um
who was just a few feet from Charlie
when he was shot.
And I was told what had happened and
told the status of Charlie. I actually
tweeted it out
and then thought to myself, well, is
this the right thing? after a bit. Is
this appropriate? Um
to put the information out there because
I for all I knew the family didn't even
know at that point,
but uh this is a very credible source
who was there and had said that he was
gone.
Uh so
um what do we do about this? What what
do we do? Because the natural reaction
for those that are on the right is to
retaliate, is to get angry, to get mad
about it. I'm angry. I'm mad about it.
Uh I I'd be angry if it was on the other
side. It's
it's completely unacceptable.
And the news media
has got a major role to that that is
played in this in in rally ringing
people up. And I don't see where it's
going to stop. I think it's going to get
worse. I think that people are going to
double down. You have the Black Lives
Matter account just uh this morning or
last night tweeting out uh in regards to
the video on the Ukrainian the young
Ukrainian woman who was knifed and
murdered in a very similar type fashion
in terms of the the location of where
Charlie was hit and killed. And she bled
out and died. And uh the Black Lives
Matter account came out, official Black
Lives Matter account came out and said
it is time for violence, for the
oppressed to show violence. That's the
reaction to these types of things. They
believe in this. They have it. It is a
all means are justified for the end. And
the disgusting coverage from MSNBC and
other outlets.
Only because Charlie is on the right do
they say the things that they say. A
right-wing commentator, of course, if
this was Joy Reed or any other leftwing
commentator, they would not even put in
leftwing. They had to identify Charlie
as a right-winger instead of a human
being. And of course, for many of us,
our our thoughts go to President Nelson
and the and the the preaching and
teaching about peacemaking
and how are we going to navigate these
types of things? How do you create peace
in this type of an environment?
Are you passive?
Do you fight but hold your truth?
And when I say fight, I mean with words.
But these types of things, if they keep
happening, there is going to be a
tipping point where things could get
really bad. I pray for Charlie's wife
and his kids and all of his family and
friends and those that were close to
him. What a tragic, horrible
thing to happen. I do have one
suggestion with these things. Stop
living in a silo. We have now the means
where we're not just getting fed
propaganda from one, you know, two or
three television stations, but if we
choose, unfortunately, we can get
hundreds of different channels of just
preaching to the choir. We're the choir,
right? And finding information that will
preach to us about what we want to hear.
And that's a dangerous thing. If you're
on the left, find a few things you can
work with, a few media sources on the
right that you can handle and that you
can work with to get some perspective
and a check on your own thinking. If
you're on the right, find a couple of
sources on the left that you can work
with that are intellectual,
that have some grounding,
and that offer a check on what you hear
day in and day out on the right. The
last identity we want to be is Democrat
or Republican. I think again of of
President Nelson's identity hierarchy,
as I call it, right? We're first
children of God, a child of God. For us
Latter-day Saints, a child of the
covenant, and then a disciple of Christ,
those three things are first and
foremost.
Everything else, everything else, sexual
orientation, race, even gender,
everything else. Certainly political
persuasion and and members of a certain
political party are well below those and
we need to find a way to work with those
first three when when we are dealing
with others and talking with others.
But today we have the ability, the
choice to just select what newsletters
we get, to select what stations we
listen to, what YouTube channels we
listen to, and and if we put them all in
the exact same category, so that we're
just being fed the same thing over and
over again, and our world becomes very
monotone
in in what we're hearing and seeing and
believing,
then that's a problem, right? That
that's a problem. How many people that
are listening to this listen on one side
to Fox News more than they do study the
scriptures and listen to general
conference talks or listen to inspiring
things and and read inspiring books and
classics? How how many on the left
listen more to MSNBC and CNN? Well,
actually all the rest of media
practically and and just and just
regurgitate that over and over again as
compared to again the reading the
scriptures and focusing in on the uh uh
the the the talks uh at general
conference
and and positive good books.
I believe that everything is political.
I think the Book of Mormon is actually a
very political book, extremely political
book. The Bible is a very political
book. But there is a difference between
understanding politics
and how it engages with culture,
religion, family, beliefs, and worldview
and dipping yourself more than a toe
into an agenda
and and and bathing yourself, immersing
yourself in in a party or in a candidate
and and becoming something that is below
that line in the identity hierarchy
and seeing others as other right seeing
others as other as something something
below human sometimes even
I think going forward these you know
Charlie did these things these debates I
haven't seen many of them or watched a
whole lot of them but it's you know he
does them outside and I think that those
days are gone right if you're going to
go do something like this first of all I
don't see anybody any universities may
be bringing on political commentators
for a while,
but if you're going to bring on a a
political commentator, you're going to
need to do it inside. And there's got to
be real security. You've got to have
people passing through
uh metal detectors. And I mean, what
else do you do? How else do you do this?
You can't keep moving forward with with
no protection like this.
And the sad thing is is as we're trying,
we're already battling with free speech,
this hampers it even more. And no, this
is not a gun issue. It's not a gun
issue. It's a mental health issue. It is
a cultural issue.
Ultimately, the answer is the gospel.
Ultimately, the answer is the gospel.
And unfortunately, as optimistic as I
like to be about certain things, I think
that uh
well,
I think there's going to be a lot more
adversity coming for goodness in the
future.
The gospel is true and we're living in
some very interesting times.
Again, prayers out to Charlie's family.
Thanks for listening.