The Turning Point USA college tour returned to Utah on Tuesday for its largest stop since the assassination of co-founder Charlie Kirk in September.
The event, hosted at Utah State University in Logan, was just two hours away from the site of where Kirk was shot in Orem. But a large crowd rallied behind MAGA ideals and celebrated the life and legacy left by the conservative advocate.
“Nobody should have to witness and go through what I went through, what my family and those 3,000 people went through at” Utah Valley University, former Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) told the audience, according to The Associated Press.
“I will never unsee that. I will always feel it.”
Speakers promoted Kirk’s mission, a message dedicated to conservative values such as homeschooling, gun rights and the nuclear family.
“We are about to raise the most conservative, Christian generation America has ever seen,” podcast host Alex Clark said, Newsweek reported.
Clark’s words echoed the rhetoric of Kirk’s widow, Erika, who told the country her husband did not die in vain. Some in recent weeks, including President Trump, have claimed that Kirk was a “martyr” for political change geared toward the conservative movement.
During the Tuesday event, Utah Gov. Spencer Cox (R) argued that Kirk’s death was an attack on free speech and an attempt to silence those who disfavored Turning Point USA’s political ideology.
“This was more than just an attack on Charlie Kirk, this was an attack on free speech, on America, on American ideals,” Cox said, per Newsweek.
“This idea that speech is violence is so wrong, and it goes a step worse than that because then they think violence is speech.”
However, Cox claimed that Kirk’s life was devoted to peaceful debate and dissent.
“He treated those with differing views with love, with respect, with dignity — that is not soft,” Cox said in remarks at his alma mater. “There are people in our party who don’t want us to do what Charlie did, and we cannot fall prey to that.”
Democrats have shared condolences for Kirk’s death and condemned political violence following the shooting. The political climate, however, has remained heated alongside recent school shootings and attacks on government buildings.
While Democrats and Republicans trade barbs amid a government shutdown, some in the GOP have blamed the left for increased tensions and encouraged opposing party members not to publicly condemn Republican actions with divisive rhetoric. Some Democrats have pushed back on those claims and have said Republicans are the ones raising the temperature.
“If you use the worst possible rhetoric, you’re going to trigger some people to engage with violence,” Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) said to the crowd.
“This kind of demonization kills trust in your government, and trust in your fellow man gets weaker,” he added.