Erika Kirk forgives husband’s killer at memorial service: ‘It’s what Charlie would do’

Erika Kirk, the widow of slain Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk, remembered her husband’s legacy at a memorial for him Sunday — and revealed her thoughts about his alleged assassin. 

Tyler Robinson, the 22-year-old suspect charged in Charlie Kirk’s Sept. 10 death, was much like the other young men that Charlie Kirk encountered, Erika Kirk said. 

Charlie Kirk “wanted to save young men, just like the one who took his life,” she said. 

“Our Savior said, ‘Father, forgive them, for they not know what they do.’ That young man … I forgive him,” Erika Kirk said. “I forgive him because it was what Christ did, and it’s what Charlie would do.”

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Speaking to a crowd at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, Erika Kirk thanked the audience for honoring her husband.

She began her speech by quoting one of Charlie Kirk’s favorite Bible verses, Isaiah 6:8: “Here I am, Lord. Send me,” and recalled a time that Charlie Kirk repeated it at the end of a conference.

“After Charlie finished, I met him backstage and I spoke to him … I said, Charlie, baby, please talk to me next time before you say that statement,” she said. 

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“Because when you say something like that, there is so much power in that verse … God will take you up on that, and He did.”

Charlie Kirk was quickly rushed to a hospital after being shot at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah, Sept. 10. At his Sunday memorial, Erika Kirk described the moment when she arrived to “do the unthinkable” and see her husband’s corpse.

“I look(ed) directly at my husband’s murdered body,” she said. “I saw the wound that ended his life. I felt everything you would expect to feel. I felt shock. I felt horror and a level of heartache that I didn’t even know existed.”

“But there was something else too. Even in death, I could see the man that I love. I saw the one single gray hair on the side of his head, which I never told him about,” she laughed. “Now he knows. Sorry, baby, telling you now.” 

Erika Kirk added that she sensed “great mercy from God” in her husband’s death when she viewed his body and saw a faint smile.

“I also saw on his lips the faintest smile … it told me Charlie didn’t suffer. Even the doctor told me it was something so instant that even if Charlie had been shot in the operating room … nothing could have been done. There was no pain.”

Erika Kirk also opened up about their marriage, revealing the private ritual that kept it strong even amid her husband’s constant travel.

“Someone once asked me how Charlie and I thought we kept our marriage so strong when he was busy traveling,” she said. “Our little secret: It was love notes. Every Saturday, Charlie wrote one for me, and he never missed a Saturday.”

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“And in every single one of them, he’d tell me what his highlight was for the week, how grateful he was for me and our babies,” she added. “And always at the end, he would always end it with asking the most beautiful question, ‘Please let me know how I can better serve you as a husband.'”

Above all, Erika Kirk emphasized her husband’s faith and how he practiced his Christian faith, revealing that he enjoyed journaling to remember important moments in his life.

“And one of the things he wrote in his journal was this, ‘Every time you make a decision, it puts a mark on your soul,'” she said.  “To those of you out there who just made that decision, and took the first step toward a spiritual life, I say thank you and welcome.”

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She also emphasized how Charlie Kirk did “100% of what he could every day,” and that he left Earth “without regrets.”

“There was nothing that was too hard or too painful or nothing that he just felt like he didn’t want to do,” she said. 

“Charlie died with incomplete work, but not with unfinished business,” she said. “And I will miss him. I will miss him so much. Because our marriage and our family were beautiful.”

Toward the end of her speech, the widow concluded by saying she was honored to be the new Turning Point USA CEO and that her husband’s mission “is my mission.”

“Everything that Turning Point USA built through Charlie’s vision and hard work, we will make ten times greater through the power of his memory,” Erika Kirk said.

“No assassin will ever stop us from standing up to defend those rights.”