WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Tuesday posthumously awarded America's highest civilian honor to Charlie Kirk, the assassinated activist who inspired a generation of young conservatives and helped push the nation's politics further to the right.
Receiving the award on Kirk's behalf was his widow, Erika. Her voice cracking and often falling to a whisper as she wiped away tears, Erika Kirk talked about her late husband's life, political beliefs and legacy.
“Thank you, Mr. President, for honoring my husband, in such a profound and meaningful way. And thank you for making this event a priority," she said. “Your support of our family and the work that Charlie devoted his life to will be something I cherish forever.”
The ceremony coincided with what would have been Kirk’s 32nd birthday. It came about a month after the Turning Point USA founder was fatally shot while speaking to a crowd at Utah Valley University.
In a sign of Kirk's close ties to the administration, he was the first recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom in Trump’s second term. The president also spoke at Kirk’s funeral in September, calling him a “great American hero” and “martyr” for freedom, while Vice President JD Vance accompanied his body home to Arizona on Air Force Two along with Erika Kirk.
“We’re here to honor and remember a fearless warrior for liberty, beloved leader who galvanized the next generation like nobody I’ve ever seen before, and an American patriot of the deepest conviction, the finest quality and the highest caliber," Trump said during the medal ceremony.
Of Kirk's killing, the president said, “He was assassinated in the prime of his life for boldly speaking the truth, for living his faith and relentless fighting for a better and stronger America."
The Presidential Medal of Freedom was established by President John F. Kennedy in 1963 for individuals making exceptional contributions “to the security or national interests of the United States, world peace, cultural or other significant public or private endeavors.”
Trump returned to the U.S. in the pre-dawn hours Tuesday after a whirlwind trip to Israel and Egypt to celebrate a ceasefire agreement in Israel's war with Hamas in Gaza that his administration was instrumental in brokering. The president joked that he almost requested to reschedule the ceremony because of the trip.
“I raced back halfway around the globe," Trump said. “I was going to call Erika and say, ‘Erika, could you maybe move it to Friday?' And I didn’t have the courage to call. But you know why I didn’t call? Because I heard today was Charlie’s birthday.”
Argentine President Javier Milei, who had been visiting with the president at the White House earlier, stayed on to attend the ceremony.
Trump has awarded a string of presidential medals going back to his first term, including to golf legend Tiger Woods, ex-football coach Lou Holtz and conservative economist Arthur Laffer as well as to Yankees Hall of Fame closer Mariano Rivera and conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh, the latter of which came during the 2020 State of the Union. He awarded posthumous medals to Babe Ruth and Elvis Presley.
This term, Trump has also announced his intentions to award the medals to Rudy Giuliani, the former New York City mayor and a close former adviser, and to Ben Carson, who served as Trump's first-term secretary of Housing and Urban Development.
Kirk founded Turning Point USA in 2012 and Trump praised him as one of the key reasons he was reelected last year.
But Kirk's politics were also often divisive. He sharply criticized gay and transgender rights while inflaming racial tensions. Kirk also repeated Trump’s false claims that former Vice President Kamala Harris was responsible for policies that encouraged immigrants to come to the U.S. illegally and called George Floyd, a Black man whose killing by a Minneapolis police officer sparked a national debate over racial injustice, a “scumbag.”
As Tuesday's ceremony was underway, the Trump administration said it had revoked the visas of six foreigners who U.S. officials deemed had made derisive or mocking comments about Kirk’s assassination. The six who had their visas revoked were from Argentina, Brazil, Germany, Mexico, Paraguay and South Africa.
The move comes as the Trump administration and its supporters have zeroed in on people who made critical comments about Kirk, leading to firings and other discipline.
Trump wrote in a social media post hours before it started that he was moving the ceremony from the White House’s East Room to the Rose Garden to accommodate a crowd he said would be “so big and enthusiastic.”
Trump paved over the grass there and put in a patio area, and talked happily about the medal ceremony being one of the first major events in the new space. He noted how the weather had cleared up after it was expected to be raining, saying: “I was telling Erika, God was watching. And he didn’t want that for Charlie.”
Kirk’s widow said she asked their 3-year-old daughter what she might have given her father for his birthday, and she responded a stuffed animal and a cupcake while saying he hoped he'd get a birthday surprise. Erika Kirk said her husband was sometimes hard to buy presents for, but the medal was the perfect gift.
Erika Kirk said her husband might one day have run for president "but not out of ambition. He would only have done it if that was something that he believed that his country needed from his servant’s heart.”
She said God began a “mighty work” through her husband, and she intends to see it through. She finished her remarks by saying Charlie’s story reminds us that “to live free is the greatest gift but to die free is the greatest victory.”
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This story has been corrected to show Kirk's widow's name is Erika, not Erica.
___ Associated Press writers Michelle L. Price and Matthew Lee contributed to this report.