Former “Tonight Show” host Jay Leno said the murder of conservative media star Charlie Kirk marked “the death of free speech” — warning that America has reached a point where arguments are being settled with bullets instead of words.
Leno, 75, phoned into “The Tim Conway Jr. Show” on KFI 640 in Los Angeles on Wednesday night, hours after Kirk was fatally shot during a speaking event at Utah Valley University.
“It’s not a random shooting,” Leno told Conway.
“I mean, it’s the death of free speech, to think that you are so illiterate and so stupid you can’t answer verbally, and you have to shoot somebody with a gun to win the argument.”
Leno’s interview was first reported by the news site Mediaite.
Authorities said Kirk, 31, the founder of conservative nonprofit Turning Point USA, was shot and killed during his appearance on the Orem, Utah, campus. The suspected gunman was identified as 22-year-old Tyler Robinson.
Conway lamented that Kirk’s two young children could be exposed to video clips of their father being asssassinated that have gone viral on social media.
“His young kids… they’re going to be watching the internet forever and accidentally running across that footage,” Conway said.
“Because their last name is Kirk, and 20 years from now they’ll be putting their name in and that Charlie Kirk video will come up. That’s what they have to look forward to their whole lives. It’s horrible. It’s the worst.”
Leno said the killing underscored how far the nation had drifted from an earlier era of civil political arguments. He recalled his time at Emerson College in the early 1970s, where debates between public intellectuals like James Baldwin and William F. Buckley drew packed halls.
“Those days are gone,” Leno said.
“This is a political assassination of a man who I didn’t necessarily agree with, but I certainly enjoyed listening to. Because, ‘Oh, I didn’t know that, okay’ — and I didn’t have to agree on everything \[with Kirk]. I mean, we’re at a point in this country where, if you don’t agree with everybody on everything, you take out a gun and you shoot them?”
Kirk, a conservative firebrand who turned Turning Point USA into one of the right’s most influential youth groups, was a frequent presence on college campuses and in media circles. He built his organization into a major player in Republican politics and was known for his combative style.
Conway predicted that Kirk’s voice would not be silenced by the violence.
“I think this is going to have the exact opposite effect that the shooter wanted,” Conway said.
“I think this movement of Charlie Kirk’s is going to explode.”
