The assassination of Charlie Kirk was an attack on the most basic of American principles: the freedom to hold an opinion, to speak it openly, and to engage with others who disagree—without fear of being gunned down in front of 3,000 college students. That’s what happened, and that’s why this moment is seared into our national conscience.

Charlie is gone, but his voice lingers—and in his absence millions of Americans are rising up. They are dead-set on ensuring that his sacrifice is not in vain. His death marks a watershed moment that will forever alter America.

If the left continues down its current path—stoking political violence and cheering when opponents are murdered—America as we know it will cease to exist. A society that treats disagreement as a death sentence is not free, and it’s not sustainable.

Charlie’s death has ignited a movement far bigger than himself. Turning Point USA, the organization he built, has experienced an explosion of support. Before the assassination, TPUSA had 900 official college chapters and about 1,200 in high schools. Since that fateful shot, more than 32,000 people have inquired about starting new chapters. Thirty-two thousand. The revival is real, and it is Charlie’s blood that waters it.

Americans—on the left and the right—are waking up. They see this moment as a wrong that must be righted. Even voices from within the Democratic Party, like Batya Ungar-Sargon, have begun to speak out: “There has to be a reckoning in this country—there has to be a condemnation of political violence, yes, but especially of the kind of rhetoric that stokes this kind of political violence.”

Charlie saw this storm coming. That’s why he dedicated his short life to conversation, to showing his opponents that conservatives are human beings with reasonable opinions, not the caricatures painted by the media. “I am not a Nazi, I am not a fascist, I am not the dangerous enemy that the left wants to pretend I am,” he once declared.

But the left couldn’t win in the marketplace of ideas. So they made conservatives into villains. They branded debate as hate. And what did that lead to? Maxine Waters instructing constituents to harass political opponents.

Contrast that with Charlie—who invited everyone to engage with him, sitting beneath a sign that read “prove me wrong.” His assassin proved nothing. He only revealed the moral bankruptcy of an ideology that convinces young radicals that their political adversaries are the equivalent of Adolf Hitler.

In the aftermath, too many Democrats have refused responsibility. Elizabeth Warren, J.B. Pritzker, and others immediately pivoted to Trump and January 6th. Predictable. But even Charlamagne tha God recently pressed Representative Jasmine Crockett to stop dodging and acknowledge reality.

There can be no “but” after condemning political violence. America just witnessed the execution of a young father and husband. To see any portion of society celebrate that horror is to see how far the rot has spread.

This is the fruit of cancel culture. First, dissenting opinions were deplatformed. Trump, Project Veritas, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Dr. Peter McCullough, and yes, Charlie Kirk—all silenced. Parents who pushed back at school board meetings were smeared as “domestic terrorists.” Even pregnancy resource centers were targeted by pro-abortion radicals like Jane’s Revenge, who left threats reading: “If abortions aren’t safe, then you aren’t either.”

And now, it’s blood on the floor of a college auditorium. Reports confirm the shooter lived with a transgender partner, carried anti-fascist slogans etched into his ammo, and came from a conservative family but embraced far-left beliefs. The question Charlie was answering when he died was about mass shootings committed by transgenders. The symbolism is as chilling as it is grotesque.

The message is unmistakable: left-wing political activism has curdled into a toxic creed. But Americans are beginning to reject it.

From CBS’ 9-News came this:

“Speech is not violence. It’s an alternative to it. Shooting someone you disagree with—that’s violence.”

The murderer believed the opposite—that words could be killed with bullets. But in doing so, he immortalized Charlie’s words instead. Clips of Charlie’s debates are flooding social media, and people are seeing what the media never showed them: a young man who defended his beliefs with dignity and welcomed disagreement with open arms.

The most haunting moment of all comes from the man who was standing in line to ask Charlie a question when the shot rang out.

His words are a reminder that civility has been discarded—but not beyond recovery. If Americans choose to value free speech, if they stand against cancel culture, civility can be renewed.

That’s what Charlie would want. That’s what America needs. And that’s what millions are now demanding.