Christian activist Charlie Kirk, who just last week was in the South Valley speaking at an event at Visalia First Church, was killed in a cowardly act by an assassin who shot him with a high caliber rifle from a nearby rooftop on the campus of Utah Valley University. Kirk’s murder has been characterized as a “political assassination.”
More than 2,000 people attended the Visalia event, including about 30 protestors. Kirk, who was 31, often drew large crowds of younger, college-aged voters, some who agreed with him and, others who didn’t. Derrick Ruiz, a student at College of the Sequoias, attended the Visalia program to report on the event for his journalism class.
Ruiz recalled “Everyone had a really strong opinion but they weren’t really against each other, per say. I noticed they were very focused on the preservation of human life and the fact that both sides felt that the sanctity of life, or rather the value of life was diminishing.”