Attendees at the event where Charlie Kirk was assassinated on Wednesday said they were surprised there wasn’t a heavier security presence given the controversy surrounding the conservative activist.
Kirk was killed by a single gunshot wound to the neck during an outdoor debate-style event at Utah Valley University.
The shooter, who as of Thursday morning remained at large, fired from the roof of a building about 200 yards from where Kirk was sitting under a tent in an outdoor amphitheater.
Emma Pitts, a reporter covering the event for Deseret News, told a colleague that she wasn’t subjected to any security checks before entering the part of campus where Kirk was speaking.
She said she was surprised not to be searched considering how controversial Kirk is.
“There’s a part of me that is scared covering events like this because they are so public and people are so angry,” she said. “Nobody scanned our equipment, nobody scanned our bags, there was no security like that.”
The Turning Point USA founder was well known for his inflammatory rhetoric. He once described Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. as “awful” and “not a good person,” and called George Floyd, the unarmed Black man who was killed by a Minnesota police officer in 2020, a “scumbag.”
During his campus tours, he regularly told young women to marry and “submit” to their future husbands. After pop star Taylor Swift announced her engagement to NFL great Travis Kelce, Kirk told her: “Reject feminism. Submit to your husband, Taylor. You’re not in charge.”
He also advocated getting as many guns in as many people’s hands as possible—including children—and said that it was “worth” it to have gun deaths if it meant protecting the Second Amendment.
A longtime ally of President Donald Trump, he has catapulted to fame since the president’s re-election victory in November, when his activism was widely credited with helping Trump flip Arizona.
Some people attending Wednesday’s event said they expected to have to go through metal detectors and have their bags searched to see such a prominent public figure.
One source told Deseret News that he had even thrown away a metal toothpick on his keychain in anticipation of the presumed checks.
“The way I looked at it, anyone could bring a gun in there and nobody would have known,” he said.
In May, Utah passed a law allowing open carry of guns on college campuses, the Wall Street Journal reported. Anyone with a concealed carry permit is allowed to carry on gun UVU’s campus, where Kirk was shot.
UVU’s Police Chief Jeff Long said six police officers were working Wednesday’s event, along with an undisclosed number of plainclothes officers. He estimated the crowd was about 3,000 people.
Kirk also brought his own security team, which is deeply experienced at securing events at college campuses, Long said. His department worked closely with Kirk’s security chief, he added.
The Daily Beast has reached out to UVU for comment.
The post Charlie Kirk Event Attendees Blast Security Failures After Shooting appeared first on The Daily Beast.
