One of the vilest videos to come out of the Charlie Kirk assassination has gotten a whole new twist.
Footage of the shooting making the rounds on social media showed a tall, bearded man appearing to celebrate in the immediate aftermath of Kirk’s shooting on Wednesday at a college campus in Orem, Utah, stirring disgust on social media.
Now, as the New York Post reported, a man claiming to be that figure has come forward, with an explanation for his actions that’s already stirring a reaction of its own.
The man is caught on video standing and chanting “USA, USA” as the fatally wounded Kirk is surrounded on stage in the background (and his assassin slips away off camera).
This guy cheered after Charlie Kirk was assassinated. I have no words left pic.twitter.com/I2nWvTyLKG
— Lucy (@TheLucyShow1) September 11, 2025
“This guy cheered after Charlie Kirk was assassinated,” one user wrote on the social media platform X. “I have no words left.”
But a man claiming to be the individual in the video took to X on Thursday and Friday to argue that his actions weren’t what they appeared to be.
Identified in the X account as “David,” the man said in Friday’s video that he’d attended the event at Utah Valley University with a friend.
— David (@RtothepowerofX) September 12, 2025
After the shot that felled Kirk, “David” said in the post, published about 2:00 p.m. Eastern, that he initially thought it was fireworks but saw no smoke in the air.
When his friend announced that Kirk had been wounded, “David” said he saw Kirk’s security team in action and decided to try to help — in an unorthodox way.
“Realizing the situation was dangerous, I stood and shouted ‘USA,’” he said. “Not as a provocation but to project strength, encourage others, and create a distraction that might help calm panic or even save lives.
“At that moment, no one knew whether this was a lone shooter or something coordinated.”
Without elaborating, the man claimed he had a “background as a soldier” that helped him to remain calm in a stressful situation. He said he “would never wish to celebrate harm to anyone.”
He returned to the soldier theme in a post published about 45 minutes later, declaring that Kirk was one of his “soldiers” and decrying the “mockery” in political dialogue.
— David (@RtothepowerofX) September 12, 2025
“I am absolutely sick of all of my soldiers, including Charlie, dying so you guys can mock each other,” he said.
He later called out pundits on the left and right by name as contributing to the problem: HBO’s liberal John Oliver, and conservative commentators Matt Walsh and Steven Crowder.
“This is John Oliver. This is Matt Walsh. This is ‘Louder with Crowder.’ This is all the mockery that’s existed on both sides of the equation,” he said.
In his X post published Thursday, he acknowledged the antagonism the video has stirred, but said critics need to know the full story.
And he promised, strangely, that not only was the full story coming, but that it would be convincing.
“There is allot of rage directed at me but I promise you’ll understand when I speak and I eagerly await a return to silence,” he wrote. “Some are upset because I smile, some because I chear and others because they don’t have the information yet.”
Judging by the response to his last video Friday, the man was not making a lot of headway in winning followers to his point.
A barrage of comments greeted it, including anti-Semitic remarks from users who inferred — rightly or wrongly — that “David” is Jewish. (Kirk, a vocal proponent of his own Christian beliefs, was an outspoken supporter of Israel whose death was publicly mourned by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as Fox News reported.)
Many of the responses included obscenities that made them unprintable. And virtually none were supportive.
This one caught the general spirit without insults, profanity, or threats:
What you did was dumb. Just own up and apologize
— AJ (@saucier_austin) September 12, 2025
“What you did was dumb,” the user wrote. “Just own up and apologize.”
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