The assassination of Charlie Kirk is shocking on every level. He was shot in public, in front of a large crowd, and on video. The 31-year-old husband and father of two was not an elected official, but the most successful conservative activist in a generation. The attack didn’t just deprive a family of its center. It struck at the ties that hold a free society together: open assembly, civil debate, viewpoint diversity. Like every terrorist act, the shooting was meant to instill fear—in this case, fear of speaking out, of exposure, of making a difference.
Yet Kirk’s murder did not happen in a vacuum. Political violence in America is on the rise. Some of it targets officials: the congressional baseball shooting, the attempted assassination of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, the two attempts on Donald Trump’s life, arson at the Pennsylvania governor’s mansion, the killing of Minnesota state representative Melissa Hortman. The rest is aimed at private citizens. Shooters attack Christian churches and schools. A Hamas sympathizer is accused of gunning down an American Jew and her German Israeli boyfriend outside a Jewish museum in Washington. Luigi Mangione faces trial for the murder of a healthcare executive.
