One Year After Charlie Kirk’s Death, Can Faith Hold Turning Point Together?

(RNS) — In the days after Charlie Kirk was shot and killed at Utah Valley University on Sept. 10, 2025, Leona Salinas, Turning Point chapter president at Texas State University in San Marcos, Texas, fielded dozens of urgent inquiries from peers eager to join the political organization, she said.

That surge was part of a larger wave, according to Turning Point USA, which in December announced that 140,000 students requested to get involved after Charlie Kirk’s assassination — an awakening leaders described as both political and spiritual.

“I’ve never seen anything like it. It was a revival,” said Kristan Hawkins, Students for Life president, about the response to Charlie Kirk’s death.

One year later, it’s hard to know if that uptick in engagement had staying power. In recent fundraising appeals, Turning Point, now under the leadership of Charlie Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk, who took over as CEO after her husband’s death, cites more than 1,500 college chapters, 3,500 high school chapters and 11,000 church partnerships. But some students said the enthusiasm they encountered last fall has waned. According to Salinas, initial interest in her campus Turning Point chapter dwindled amid the spread of conspiracies from conservative influencer Candace Owens, a former Turning Point employee who has insinuated to her millions of followers that Erika Kirk, the state of Israel, and others close to Charlie Kirk were involved in his killing.

“It’s created this ginormous divide amongst students,” said Salinas. “‘What do you think of Erika? What do you think really happened to Charlie? Do you think Israel had anything to do with this?’ I’m telling you, every single chapter when tabling gets asked that question several times a day.”

Over the past year, Turning Point has responded to Charlie Kirk’s death and the growing fissures in the conservative movement by aiming to build on the religious and political zeal that surfaced after his assassination. In speeches and through its faith-focused programming, the organization has described its founder as a martyr and its political efforts as part of a spiritual battle between the godly and demonic. That message extended Charlie Kirk’s own argument that to “reclaim the country for Christ” requires political action. By continuing to cast political alignment as a biblical mandate, Turning Point is testing whether that strategy can unite a splintering movement and sustain the organization’s mission, even without its founder.

“All of you in this room are those people who I am so proud to have in my army as I go through this battle against Satan,” Erika Kirk said to student Turning Point leaders at the Chapter Leadership Summit in July.

Religious language wasn’t always a mainstay of Turning Point. When Charlie Kirk first founded the organization in 2012, it focused on fiscal responsibility, free markets, and limited government. By 2015, the group had become known for its campus organizing and watchlist of professors they said were anti-conservative. Then, in 2021, the group launched TPUSA Faith, which offered programming that addressed conservative Christian faith and culture war issues at monthly megachurch events, pastors’ summits, and in online curricula.

Meanwhile, Charlie Kirk, who was raised Presbyterian, was speaking more publicly about his evangelical faith and on topics like abortion, trans rights, and diversity, equity, and inclusion. In the run-up to the 2024 election, he threw the full weight of TPUSA’s organizing power and evangelical clout behind Donald Trump, describing Trump as

Though Charlie Kirk amassed millions of followers in his lifetime, in death, he reached millions more, especially after Erika Kirk’s tearful declaration that she forgave her husband’s alleged killer.

“You really saw the gospel preached at that memorial,” said Christina Littlefield, associate professor of communication and religion at Pepperdine University, referring to Erika Kirk’s forgiveness. “I think that earned her respect from a lot of Christians who would otherwise not agree with anything TPUSA is doing.”

To build on that momentum, in January 2026, TPUSA Faith launched its “Make Heaven Crowded Tour,” a series of nearly 30 evangelistic gatherings hosted at local churches across the U.S. At the first stop in Riverside, California, Erika Kirk described the tour as a way to bring a “slice of heaven from that memorial for my husband” to “everyone around this country.”

The free two-hour events featured worship led by a local praise team, speeches from pastors and thought leaders — including evangelical pastor Greg Laurie, conservative activist Riley Gaines, Duck Dynasty star Willie Robertson and content creator Bryce Crawford — and concluded with an altar call.

“A lot of the people coming to these are people that have been caught in that moment where they saw the horror of what happened, and then they saw, I think, the response of Erica’s forgiveness,” said Pastor Lucas Miles, an evangelical pastor based in Indiana who was chosen by Charlie Kirk to head TPUSA Faith in 2024.

He added that during the tour, the focus was meeting people’s need for Jesus — but he also heard attendees share their top political concerns, including their desire for hardline immigration policies and objections to the “contagion of transgender ideology” and the “rise of Islamists in America.”

Though Turning Point’s political lobbying efforts fall under the separate 501(c)4 entity Turning Point Action, “everything is downstream of theology,” said Miles, including people’s decisions about their families and their politics. The message that conservative political views are a natural outgrowth of Christianity is ubiquitous at Turning Point, as is the idea that winning the culture wars involves winning both votes and souls.

“The only worldview you’re going to get God-given moral rights from … is the Christian worldview,” said Frank Turek, a Christian apologist and friend of Charlie Kirk who was featured on tour. “Charlie understood that, and that was the basis for everything he did.”

At Turning Point events throughout the year, newcomers were often met with strong religious messaging that built on the spiritual language Charlie Kirk was using before his death. Erika Kirk’s speeches reinforced the idea that those who joined the organization had entered a spiritual war.

“He will never win,” said Erika Kirk, referring to Satan, in December during her opening speech at TPUSA’s annual America Fest. “We know we’re on the winning side. God is so good.”

The spiritual war against Satan, according to Erika Kirk, is waged in the home, on college campuses and in the voting booth. At a Turning Point Action political rally in April where Donald Trump was the headliner, she noted that building a movement requires both “getting out the vote” and “spiritual revival.”

At June’s Women’s Leadership Summit in San Antonio, Erika Kirk contrasted feminism with the “divine” callings of marriage and motherhood — and, when she was interrupted by a heckler, reminded the attendees to “pray for your enemies,” noting that the real enemy was Satan.

And at the TPUSA’s Chapter Leadership Summit for student leaders in July, Erika Kirk encouraged attendees to appeal to the Holy Spirit for courage when they face backlash on their campuses, instructing them to be a “happy warrior,” even if a “Muslim” or “gender-confused person” is “spitting on you” or “cussing at you.”

“We are on enemy-occupied territory, and the devil would love nothing more than to be in the middle of your head to dictate your fear, to dictate whether or not you continue forward having a chapter,” said Erika Kirk.

In Littlefield’s view, this messaging is “70% typical evangelical messaging” that then frames political talking points as part of the Christian gospel.

“The real mission is the conservative ideology,” she said, “but they’re now using Christianity as the vehicle to really deliver that ideology.”