Erika Kirk, the widow of Charlie Kirk, bravely went on stage with Vice President JD Vance Wednesday and took part in her first Turning Point USA campus event since the assassination of her husband at a similar event seven weeks ago.
“When our team asked my dear friend, Vice President JD Vance, to speak today, I really prayed on it because, obviously, it’s a very emotional, emotional day,” Kirk told an arena packed with students at the University of Mississippi.
“But I could just hear Charlie in my heart,” she continued. “I could just hear him say, ‘Go reclaim that territory, babe.’”
“The battle’s already won. God’s love conquers. And that’s why I’m here today.”
Kirk, who was named president of the influential conservative activist group in the wake of her husband’s shocking murder last month at Utah Valley University, described being on campus as a “spiritual reclaiming of territory.”
“The more that I am coming to grips with the permanency of this nightmare,” she continued, “the more that I’m starting to realize and witness that the enemy – he doesn’t want you.
“He wants your territory. He wants your influence.”
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Kirk, a mother of two young children, thanked the 10,000 students in attendance for their prayers and support.
“You guys have no idea how helpful it is to have all you in my life … you make me feel even more connected to my husband,” she told them.
“He didn’t leave us empty handed. He built a machine. And all of you are a part of that.”
Erika Kirk described Vance, who was among those to serve as a pallbearer when he flew Charlie Kirk’s body aboard Air Force Two from Utah back home to Arizona, as “a very, very dear friend.”
“No one will ever replace my husband – but I do see some similarities in JD,” she said.
The vice president received a loud ovation when he took the stage to deliver brief remarks and engage in a question and answer session with students for over an hour.
One female student pressed Vance on several topics, including immigration and his wife, Usha’s religion during one of the most contentious exchanges of the evening.
“Yes, my wife did not grow up Christian,” the vice president said. “I think it’s fair to say that she grew up in a Hindu family, but not a particularly religious family in either direction.”
“Everybody has to come to their own arrangement here … we decided to raise our kids Christian,” Vance continued, explaining how they are balancing their intercultural marriage.
The vice president said he hopes his wife one day decides to become a Catholic but “if she doesn’t, God says everyone has free will.”
“That doesn’t cause a problem for me.”
In the same back-and-forth, Vance also explained that he would like to severely restrict legal immigration into the US until migrants already in the country better assimilate.
The vice president described Charlie Kirk as the “most effective person in politics that I have seen,” and revealed that the late Turning Point USA founder called him to express concerns before President Trump ordered airstrikes on nuclear facilities in Iran.
“He was mad,” Vance said of the phone call.
He said Charlie Kirk told him: “JD, I’m really worried – really worried – that what is happening in the Middle East right now is going to lead to a protracted military conflict.”
Vance touted that the strikes on Iran did not result in a prolonged military conflict with Iran, and he credited Charlie Kirk with reminding him how important that issue is to Americans.
“I really believe that one of the reasons why the president of the United States knocked out the Iranian nuclear facilities, but never got the United States into a protracted military conflict and never lost a single American in a Middle Eastern conflict is because we had the wisdom and the good sense to recognize that the American people are done with American troops dying in unnecessary foreign conflicts … but Charlie Kirk reminded me of that,” the vice president said.
