By Lou Lesinski
Charlie Kirk is a conservative political activist, Trump ally, youth evangelist, devoted husband, committed father and – paramount in all of his life’s quest – a saved Christian! He was convinced he could help people by sharing God’s Word, by demonstrating how scripture supports his conservative views and enlightening young people by speaking the truth. Utah Valley University (UVU) in Orem, Utah was the first stop on “The American Comeback” campus tour set. Charlie was in a booth for his “Prove Me Wrong” session, exercising his free speech rights, using students’ questions to expose and counter the progressive propaganda students receive in campus courses and lectures. He knew the youth were hungry for real answers from someone closer to their age. Charlie’s answers took what they heard from their professors and flipped the narrative (as seen here). He empowered young people with the truth they were craving, while calling them to embrace the challenge of rejecting passive, emasculating culture.
On September 1, 2025 at UVU, Charlie Kirk’s voice was silenced by an assassin’s bullet. Yet the voices of Charlie’s supporters grew louder and the commitment of his supporters has increased at an exponential rate since his death. Within hours of his death, reports began flowing into TPUSA requesting new student registrations and chapters in every state in the United States. Early reports went from 18,000 to 40,000 to 80,000 to 120,000 and counting. The last numbers publicized on October 20, 2025 from Fox News were 130,000+ requests for college/high school chapters and 350,000 new student registrations.
The day Charlie was murdered, TPUSA had a little more than 2,000 college and high school chapters. Commitments to continue TPUSA and Charlie’s vision were made by his wife Erika and backed up by nearly every high-profile Republican political figure. The establishing of chapters began in earnest and continues at a staggering pace, but don’t be fooled that establishing high school and college chapters has been without controversy and pushback.
Let’s take a look at recent efforts to start a chapter close to home: Eureka High School. Within a week of Charlie’s murder, Eureka High School had their first organizational meeting to start their chapter. Sixty people attended but sadly not all were there to support TPUSA. A 15-year old female student, Aislynn, was confronted online by a man who was against having a TPUSA chapter. Fortunately for Aislynn, her father later interacted with the man and defended her. The man backed down. Now Aislynn is the Chapter Vice President! A few other parents protested by making social media comments suggesting that students joining the TPUSA chapter were racists. Chapter meetings started and after two meetings at the school, the chapter was told they had to move off campus because they wanted a Missouri State Representative to speak at their chapter meeting. Despite this relentless resistance, the kids have persisted and been supported by a school coach, Ralph Gianino. There are several other Eureka teachers supporting the chapter and attending their meetings. Chapter President Tyler along with Aislynn are continuing their hard work and expect over 100 people to attend their next meeting. Many of the students want to do more and are hoping to attend the TPUSA Americafest 2025 in December in Phoenix, Arizona.
Another district with interested students is Francis Howell School District. The School Board involved themselves when they heard of the interest in starting a chapter: four of the seven board members publicly opposed the development of a TPUSA chapter. Despite this resistance, all three of the high schools in Francis Howell district are forming TPUSA chapters with the financial donations of US Congressman Bob Onder and MO State Senators Adam Schnelting and Nick Schroer, who are gifting at least $1,000 to each Turning Point chapter established at Francis Howell high schools. In addition, TPUSA training has been set up to help the students establish their new chapter. The TPUSA Club America (high school chapter) map also shows existing chapters at Ladue High School, Lafayette High School, Lindbergh High School and Pacific High School. So, in our region, you could say we have doubled our Club America chapters.
At the university level, Logan (Chiropractic) University was approached by a student who is also the son-in-law of a Grace Church member. He wanted to organize a memorial service for Charlie, but the idea was quickly shut down. TPUSA encouraged him to move forward with organizing a new chapter and assured him if this was met with resistance, TPUSA would send a letter to Logan University informing the school that conversative students’ right to assemble is equal to that of other student groups. Another local college working to start a chapter is St. Charles Community College. Their story is a bit different. Organizers of a new chapter were able to find a faculty member to assist them in the development of a TPUSA chapter. There were logistics to work out, but this chapter has strong support from a Christian teacher.
Looking beyond our region, we go to Mizzou and find another variation of opposition to the development of a TPUSA chapter. Mizzou had a dormant chapter that Paige Schulte wanted to restart. This attempt started before Charlie’s assassination. Initially she was told she couldn’t restart the chapter because she failed to attend a specific meeting to organize the chapter. Then she was told she hadn’t filled out a form to start the chapter. Paige reports never having been told of these requirements. She continued moving forward, and at the first meeting over 150 people attended. The original dormant chapter membership was only 25 members! Following Charlie’s murder, the chapter membership quickly grew to 300. Paige reports at each new meeting they have, they are exceeding the maximum allowable occupancy for fire safety standards for the venue. Paige also reports her Catholic Church has seen a tremendous increase in attendance since Charlie’s death, especially among young people.
Moving outside of Missouri, Loyola University, A Catholic university in Chicago Illinois denied a TPUSA chapter request. Loyola University does allow for gay and lesbian groups and groups for Muslims, but they have denied this Christian group the opportunity to start a TPUSA chapter. Overshadowing that news, Texas’ Lt. Governor Dan Patrick pledged $1 million from his campaign funds specifically to launch chapters at every Texas high school and college campus. Oklahoma’s former State Superintendent Ryan Walters announced a statewide partnership to establish chapters in every high school (public, private, and homeschool), Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis partnered with TPUSA and directed the Attorney General’s Office to pursue legal action against any schools blocking chapters, aiming for universal access. And Gov. Glenn Youngkin donated $100,000 personally to TPUSA to support new chapter formations across Virginia. On September 24th Andrew Kolvet, Executive Producer of the Charle Kirk radio show, announced that “Charlie’s vision to have a Club America chapter (our high school brand) in every high school in America (around 23,000) will come true much faster than Charlie could have ever possibly imagined.”
In closing, please keep these fledgling chapters in your prayers. Pray for protection, strengthening resolve, and wisdom on how to keep their chapters fresh and increasing. For our part, Grace Church continues our involvement by being a TPUSA Faith Hub church. The goal is to help churches all across America to become beacons for truth in the public arena and to help schools create chapters all across the nation and even internationally. Charlie has joined the great cloud of witnesses surrounding us, cheering us on. He has passed the baton to us to “run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking only at Jesus.” (Hebrews 12:1-2). Now, will we run with it?
