Students at Seton Hall are used to notifications about troubling news events interrupting their classes, extracurriculars, and work. But the news that broke on Wednesday afternoon was especially shocking: the murder of Charlie Kirk, one of the country’s most well-known political activists, on a college campus in Utah.
Kirk, a conservative media personality and close ally of President Donald Trump, was seated before a large outdoor crowd at Utah Valley University, the first stop on his “American Comeback” speaking tour, when he was fatally shot in the neck.
Kirk had been debating with an audience member about transgender people and mass shootings when a shot was fired from the campus’s Losee Center, about 150 yards from where Kirk was positioned. Kirk keeled over as the 3,000 people in attendance frantically dispersed.
Blaine Chesnut, a junior business analytics major, was leading a meeting for the high school baseball team he coaches when a player informed him of Kirk’s death. He was saddened by the loss.
“He was one of the only politicians on either side who was so open to people talking about their views, no matter if they were his views or not even close to his views,” Chesnut said. “He accepted all kinds of backgrounds and points.”
Justin Del Valle, a senior theater major who works on Campus Nightly News for SHU TV, was sitting in the TV studio, writing the night's headlining story, when his show director announced that Kirk had been shot.
Like many others, Del Valle viewed one of the bystander videos of Kirk’s assassination, which spread widely on social media.
Although he says he “never agreed with the rhetoric he preached and the way he went about preaching,” Del Valle was deeply disturbed by Kirk’s murder and how accessible the graphic footage of it was.
“It’s a strange feeling to mourn for someone you heavily disagree with in every aspect of politics or philosophy,” he added.
Cheno Allen, a junior theater and pre-law major, discovered the news from an Instagram notification. He too saw footage of Kirk’s murder on his social media feeds. Allen, however, had not previously heard of Kirk, but following his death, did some research on his work.
“I started watching his videos and I understand why people took offense,” Allen said. “But you shouldn’t kill a man over it.”
Chesnut echoed Allen’s sentiment.
“Just because someone has different views than you doesn’t mean violence should ever come into your mind,” Chesnut said. “At the end of the day, no matter what your views are, we’re all human beings.”
“That was a human life that was just lost,” Chesnut added. “Not just a Republican, not just a public figure. It was a human life.”
Students broadly agreed that political violence is unacceptable.
“Our politics should never result in violence against one another,” Del Valle said.
For some students, the fact that the fatal shooting took place on a college campus hit close to home.
“The biggest fear of all of those college students just came true,” Chesnut said.
“This was a school shooting,” Del Valle said. “People title it an assassination or a political attack, but at the core of what happened yesterday, it was a school shooting.”
Del Valle acknowledged that Kirk’s death is a tragedy but said it is also part of a larger trend of gun violence in the United States. “We must…feel the same empathy for [those] who have died as an effect of school shootings across America,” he said. “There have been so many [school shootings] that we’ve stopped counting. There was another the same day in Colorado… My stance has always been abolish guns. Gun control has been on my mind since we were educated on how to hide.”
Allen shared similar thoughts.
"Put down the guns,” he said, adding that he hoped political leaders would “put out a statement that we need to have more peace and more gun control.”
However, Allen expressed skepticism about any changes to gun laws in the United States.
“I think there’s probably going to be more open carry,” he said. “I think people are going to do crazier things.”
Chesnut worried that stricter gun laws wouldn’t prevent political violence.
“Unfortunately, if you make all guns illegal, people are still going to get them,” he said. “And, unfortunately, it’s going to make people even smarter about how to get guns.”
However, he encouraged increased safety measures at public events.
“I feel like there needs to be better preparation for events like this, because everyone knew there was going to be a lot of people,” Chesnut said.
He suggested using drones to survey the surrounding areas of public events.
“I feel that drones can be one of the best safety measures that can be taken,” Chesnut said. “If the police were able to use drones to survey the area just to make sure no one was doing what happened, you know?”
For those who are affected by the videos posted online of Kirk getting shot, please reach out to SHU resources for support. Reach out to Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) at 973-761-9500, or call the 24-hour emergency number at 973-275-HELP (4375) for a psychological emergency. Students also have access to Uwill, an online teletherapy resource.
Megan Pitt is the head editor for The Setonian’s News section. She can be reached at megan.pitt@student.shu.edu.
