In an interview with Fox News Channel’s Jesse Watters, Turning Point USA CEO Erika Kirk, widow of the late conservative activist Charlie Kirk, revealed that she sent a message to Jimmy Kimmel after the comedian landed in hot water for on-air comments about her husband’s alleged killer.
“Through our team, I responded, ‘Tell them thank you, we received their note. This is not our issue, not our mess,’” Erika said, regarding overtures she said Sinclair Broadcasting made following Kimmel’s comments.
Kirk, 31, was speaking outside in his signature tent during an event at a Utah college in September when he was fatally shot. The alleged gunman has been identified as 22-year-old Tyler Robinson.
“We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them, and doing everything they can to score political points from it,” said Kimmel on his long-running late-night talk show “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” shortly after the shooting.
While voices from both the left and right claimed Robinson was motivated by the ideals of their political opponents, evidence shows that his political affiliations weren’t necessarily clear cut. At least some reports indicate he had recently moved further left politically.
Following Kimmel’s comments, his show was pulled from broadcast by Sinclair and other groups. After discussions with ABC, the network that runs “Jimmy Kimmel Live!”, the show returned to air a ratings surge.
“We felt some of the comments were ill-timed and thus insensitive,” said Disney of Kimmel’s comments.
Erika Kirk told Watters in their interview – set to air on Fox News Channel in full Wednesday – that Sinclair asked if she wanted an apology from Kimmel. However, she said she believed an apology “should come from the heart rather than obligation,” Fox said.
“It’s important to me as a human, and that is, you understand that it was never my intention to make light of the murder of a young man,” said Kimmel in his first monologue back on air. “I don’t think there’s anything funny about it.”
Both President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance were close with Kirk and they both criticized Kimmel’s comments, even after he returned to broadcast. Kimmel said in a recent interview with Bloomberg that he would be interested in having the president on his show.
Erika, who took over the organization her husband founded in the wake of his death, is also “slated to receive the first-ever Charlie Kirk Legacy Award at the seventh-annual Fox Nation Patriot Awards at The Tilles Center for the Performing Arts in Brookville, New York, on Thursday,” the outlet said.