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Charlie Kirk, one of the most recognisable faces of the American right, was shot dead while hosting a college event in Utah on Wednesday. Kirk was a prominent social media influencer, embodying traditional conservatism and tailoring it to the youth of red America. He was known to have particularly extreme views on hot political topics such as gun control, abortion, gay rights and family values. He was also one of Donald Trump’s most ferocious defenders, with the President announcing his death on X, saying, “No one understood or had the Heart of the Youth in the United States of America better than Charlie." Once again, a high-profile story of gun violence has dominated the global news cycle, under the radar yet on the same day another shooting was carried out at a school in Colorado, where two students were critically wounded. Whilst Kirk was certainly a polarising and controversial figure, you have to look no further than widely shared clips of the shooting to be affected by the brutality at which his life was taken. MAGA wasted no time seizing on Kirk’s death for political gain, casting it yet another example of the “establishment” silencing voices of “common sense.” What they refuse to confront is the deeper tragedy: a culture so ferociously wedded to unfettered gun rights that it enables anyone, anywhere, to obtain virtually any weapon at any time. For example, conservative activist, Isabella Maria DeLuca wrote on X, “They couldn’t beat him in a debate, so they assassinated him,”. With the shooter only taken into custody Friday afternoon, the ‘They’ DeLuca is referring to remains deliberately ambiguous, the death of Charlie Kirk feeding the MAGA conspiracy machine. Earlier today, the President confirmed that the FBI’s person of interest had been arrested in southern Utah, just days after the fatal shooting of the conservative influencer. Authorities have since identified the suspect as 22-year-old Tyler Robinson and released his mugshot. Bullet casings found inside the rifle used to shoot Kirk had written on them -“catch fascists"- the first indication of Robinson’s motive. The FBI has said they believe Robinson acted alone, making it difficult to tie him to a wider conspiracy. No matter one’s opinion of Kirk or the often inflammatory things he said, a gun death remains a gun death, every victim a human loss. Yet it is difficult to imagine that the killing of this young father of two will spur any meaningful reckoning with America’s gun crisis. The irony is stark: Kirk, a fierce champion of gun rights, spent his final moments speaking about gun violence beneath a banner reading “Prove me wrong.” It is a chilling tableau that underscores just how distant the United States remains from confronting its epidemic of gun violence.