How a far-right influencer is using religion to plunder Charlie Kirk’s 'legacy'
Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk and Candace Owens at Texas State University in San Marcos, Texas on October 24, 2018 (Carrington Tatum/Shutterstock.com)
Many right-wing media figures, from Fox News' Jesse Watters to "War Room" host Steve Bannon, continue to blame liberals and progressives for the murder of MAGA activist and Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk — even though Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York), former Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, and countless other Democrats vehemently condemned the murder in no uncertain times. But among themselves, right-wing media pundits are battling over the role that Kirk played in the MAGA movement.
In a video posted by the conservative website The Bulwark on September 18, two of their writers — Sam Stein and Will Sommer — examined the role religion plays in far-right MAGA influencer Candace Owens' efforts to exploit Kirk's "legacy."
Sommer told Stein, "She puts on a pretty good face about being this, like, aggrieved friend who's going to get to the bottom of this…. The fact is that Charlie Kirk's legacy is a very valuable thing — and in particular, the political capital that can be gained from it, and the money and the donors. And so, I think she is making a claim — and Tucker Carlson — to at least a slice of that legacy."
When Stein noted that "religion gets into this in a really profound way," Sommer elaborated on that point.
Sommer told Stein, "Religion here, I think, is something that is really volatile. And I think for some people in MAGA, what Candace Owens says about Charlie's religion is actually even more important than what she said about him and Israel. Because she says: So, Charlie was an evangelical Christian, and we've seen, in the aftermath of his murder, that there's this sense of, like, people saying, 'There's going to be a religious revival. The pews are going to be packed. Everyone's going to become Christian now.' But Candace says: Well, actually, Charlie…. was on the verge of converting to Catholicism."
Stein asked Sommer if there was "any evidence" of Kirk getting ready to become Catholic — to which he responded, "I believe his wife was originally Catholic, although she said, a year ago, she no longer was."
