Far right Trump cheerleader Charlie Kirk, who spoke in Grand Rapids in 2020, is also endorsing US military occupation of cities across the US

MAGA influencer Charlie Kirk celebrated President Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day” takeover of the nation’s capital by calling for the Trump administration to unleash a “full military occupation” of other large American cities “once we liberate” Washington, D.C. 

During his podcast on Monday, Kirk – one of the president’s most loyal media acolytes and founder of the MAGA youth organization Turning Point USA – urged Trump to send more American military forces into other cities in short order, claiming it would create favorable press coverage, according to an article on The Independent.

Kirk was saying that “we have a big teenage problem of crime in our country,” and suggested that teenagers get long prison sentences for auto theft. Kirk, who in many ways is a younger version of Donald Trump, who engages in all sorts of outlandish rhetoric, but has a populist following of primarily white youth. 

People might remember that Charlie Kirk was in Grand Rapids in 2020 stumping for Trump at a rally in Rosa Parks Circle hosted by Students for Trump. 

Kirk founded Turning Point USA in 2012, according to SourceWatch. Turning Point USA makes the following claim on their website: 

Since its founding, Turning Point USA has embarked on a mission to build the most organized, active, and powerful conservative grassroots activist network on high school and college campuses across the country. With a presence on over 2,000 campuses, Turning Point USA is the largest and fastest-growing youth organization in America.

According to SourceWatch.org, Turning Point USA has ties to the Koch Brothers, the fossil fuel industry and the Trump family. 

However, the most overt aspect of Turning Point USA and its founder, Charlie Kirk, is their use of racist propaganda and its relationship to White Supremacists groups across the country.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, in one article, documents several examples of Turning Point USA leaders making racist comments:

TPUSA’s flirtation with racists and racism is well documented. In a December 2017 expose in The New Yorker, reporter Jane Mayer was provided screenshots of a text message from TPUSA’s (now former) national field director, Crystal Clanton, that read, “i hate black people. Like f— them all… I hate blacks. End of story.”

Kirk himself has been criticized for his anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim tweets, and he habitually tweets out racist dog-whistles with statements like, “It would take 40 years worth of blacks killed by cops to equal the number of black [sic] killed by other blacks in one year.”

In an article for Newsweek, TPUSA founder Charlie Kirk rails against Black Lives Matter and their unfounded use of rioting in response to the police murder of George Floyd.

In another public talk, Kirk said that there is no such thing as systemic racism in police departments. In fact, Kirk says, “cops are more likely to be shot by Black people,” as stated in this video.

In this brief exchange, Kirk talks about why he likes Immigration and Customs Enforcement and in yet another video Kirk defends building the Wall along the the US/Mexican border. In both instances Kirk uses false information.

It is worth noting that when Kirk was in Grand Rapids in 2020, there were, according to the Turning Point USA Chapter Map, TPUSA chapters at Forest Hills Eastern High School, Forest Hills Northern High School, GVSU, Hope College and West Ottawa High School, all predominantly white schools.