At about 12:20 p.m. Mountain Time on September 10, conservative activist Charlie Kirk was speaking at a “Prove Me Wrong” event at Utah Valley University, part of his “American Comeback Tour,” in front of a crowd of about 3,000, when a single shot rang out. The bullet apparently struck Kirk in the neck, and he was later pronounced dead at the hospital. Since then, law enforcement has been on an intensive manhunt in pursuit of his assassin, who, for the time being, remains at large.
Wednesday, September 10
Campus and local police established a perimeter and began building-by-building sweeps while coordinating with the Utah Department of Public Safety and the FBI. Investigators focused on access points to rooftops and higher floors overlooking the courtyard. Law enforcement began mapping possible routes of access, such as stairwells, roof doors, external ladders, and utility shafts, anything that might have provided a sniper with a line of sight and an escape route. Later in the day, University Spokesperson Ellen Treanor said the gunman shot from the Losee Center, just under 200 yards from the event, roughly 20 minutes after Charlie Kirk started speaking.
Liberty Nation depends on the support of our readers. Donate now!
Officials immediately sought video surveillance from university cameras, private video from attendees, traffic cameras, and door cameras from surrounding buildings. With 3,000 people in attendance, most of them using their phones to take pictures and videos of the event, there is hope that at least some footage will reveal more about the assassin.
Two “people of interest” were taken into custody and interviewed early on, but they were later released, and the manhunt continued.
Thursday, September 11
The search for Kirk’s assassin took a turn on Thursday. Within about 24 hours of the shooting, agents announced that they had recovered what they believed to be the murder weapon. It was described as a high-powered bolt-action rifle. Some reported it as an old Mauser .30-06, while other accounts say a “.30 caliber.” It was found in a wooded area near the campus, along a path the shooter allegedly took when fleeing. The rifle had been hidden, reportedly wrapped or covered in a towel. Authorities said there was one round in the chamber and three additional rounds in the magazine at the time of recovery.
“This morning, I can tell you that we have recovered what we believe is the weapon used in yesterday’s shooting: a high-powered bolt-action rifle,” Robert Bohls, the FBI special agent in charge, said during a press conference early Thursday. “That rifle was recovered in a wooded area where the shooter had fled.” He added, “Investigators have also collected footwear impression, a palm print, and forearm imprints for analysis.”
Forensics on the weapon is underway. The FBI laboratory is analyzing it, along with any spent cartridge case(s) or bullet fragments, to match rifling, firing pin, extractor, and ejector signatures.
The FBI said they have accounted for the shooter’s movements from the time he arrived at around 11:52 a.m. “We have tracked his movements onto the campus, through the stairwells up to the roof, across the roof to a shooting location,” Utah Department of Public Safety Commissioner Beau Mason said. “After the shooting, we were able to track his movements as he moved to the other side of the building, jumped off of the building and fled off of the campus and into a neighborhood.”
Law enforcement released images of a “person of interest,” asking for public assistance. The images show someone who appears to be wearing dark clothing, jeans, sneakers, a baseball cap, sunglasses, and a long-sleeved shirt with an American flag on it. Officials have said the individual looks to be “of college age.” The FBI offered a reward of up to $100,000 for information that leads to the identity and arrest of the person responsible.
Officials told the outlet that “[t]he long-range, high-powered hunting rifle as well as two unspent ammunition cartridges had inscriptions tied to transgenderism and antifacist ideology.”
Furthermore, they aren’t convinced the shooter acted on his own. One or more people may have had a hand in the assassination of Charlie Kirk, “including specific questions asked or statements made to Kirk from the crowd before he was mortally wounded.” One official told Just the News, “There are some activities we believe will turn out to not be coincidences.” In addition, authorities flagged some social media posts and other communications that suggested some had prior knowledge.
An official told the outlet: “We are looking to see if those were guesses based on real threat knowledge and whether there was a connection to ideology or bad actors and to those on the ground that we have suspicions about.”
Special Agent in Charge Robert Bohls, at a press conference, said: “We are and will continue to work nonstop until we find the person that has committed this heinous crime and find out why they did it.” Utah Department of Public Safety Commissioner Beau Mason said that while they decline to release certain details – to protect the ongoing investigation – they are “confident in our abilities to track that individual.” Governor Spencer Cox condemned the violence and called for unity, offering prayers for Kirk’s family.
As for motive, Utah’s governor called the attack a “political assassination,” and multiple outlets have framed it within a broader rise in political violence.
Reuters has tracked more than a thousand politically motivated incidents since early 2021, reporting roughly 150 in the first half of 2025 alone, nearly double from last year. Since January, at least 21 people have been killed in political violence incidents, 14 of them in an attack in New Orleans by a jihadist claiming loyalty to the Islamic State group early on New Year’s Day.
“Extreme political violence is increasingly becoming the norm in our country, and the shooting of Charlie Kirk is indicative of a far greater and more pervasive issue: acts of violence are becoming more common, even without any clear ideology or motive,” Jon Lewis, a research fellow at the Program on Extremism at George Washington University, told the outlet.
”This event is horrifying, alarming, but not necessarily surprising,” Mike Jensen, a researcher at the University of Maryland, which has tracked such violence in a terrorism database since 1970, explained to Reuters in reference to the assassination of Charlie Kirk. “I think we are in a very, very dangerous spot right now that could quite easily escalate into more widespread civil unrest if we don’t get a hold of it. This could absolutely serve as a kind of flashpoint that inspires more of it.”
At the time of this writing, no suspect has been formally arrested in connection with the murder of Charlie Kirk. The person of interest remains unidentified, and police remain cautious in releasing information that might compromise the possibility of prosecuting.
Follow Liberty Nation News for live updates here.