JD Vance fills empty seat on Charlie Kirk podcast
US Vice President JD Vance has filled slain influencer Charlie Kirk’s empty seat on his podcast and railed against the “lunatic fringe on the far left”.
Hosting Kirk’s show on Monday (US time), Vance vowed that the Trump administration would go after organisations that promoted “violence and terrorism”.
He claimed the “incredibly destructive movement of left-wing extremism” had helped lead to Kirk’s killing.
“We’re going to go after the NGO (non-governmental organisations) that foments, facilitates, and engages – that’s not OK,” he said.
“Violence is not OK in our system, and we want to make it less likely that that happens.”
No organisations have yet been linked to shooting suspect Tyler Robinson, as the FBI continues to determine a motive.
Some Republicans, including President Donald Trump, have blamed liberal groups for Kirk’s murder despite a lack of evidence. Democrats have noted that left-wing figures have also been the targets of political violence in recent years.
Vance said that “something has gone very wrong with a growing and powerful lunatic fringe on the far left”.
He claimed people on the left were “much likelier” to celebrate political violence, citing a YouGov poll. The poll – released after Kirk’s death – found most Americans believed violence to achieve political goals was never justified (72 per cent).
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Younger and more liberal Americans were “more likely than older or more conservative Americans to say political violence can sometimes be justified”.
But that view remained a minority opinion among those groups, according to the poll.
White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller was also on the show. He said the administration was going to “go after left-wing organisations that are promoting violence”.
“With God as my witness, we’re going to use every resource we have … to identify, disrupt, dismantle, and destroy these networks and make America safe again for the American people,” Miller said.
DNA match to crime scene
Elsewhere, FBI director Kash Patel revealed on Tuesday (AEST) that a breakthrough find in the case linked Robinson to the crime scene.
Patel told Fox News that DNA matching that of 22-year-old Robinson was found on a towel that was wrapped around the rifle that is believed to be the murder weapon and on a screwdriver found on the rooftop from where authorities say the shooter fired.
Kash also revealed that Robinson texted another person before the shooting of his plan to kill Kirk.
Patel said investigators believed Robinson also wrote a physical note saying he had the “opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk” and would do so.
The note was destroyed, Patel said, but investigators have collected forensic evidence that it had existed and confirmed its contents through interviews.
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Patel offered no more details about who received the text message or whether anyone saw the written note before the attack.
Law enforcement authorities have said they believe Robinson acted alone in shooting Kirk but are investigating whether anyone else was involved in the plot.
Separately, the Washington Post reported on Monday that Robinson had sent a message via the online platform Discord to friends apparently confessing to the crime.
Kirk, an influential ally of Trump who co-founded leading conservative student group Turning Point USA, was killed by a single rifle shot last Wednesday during an event at Utah Valley University in Orem, about 65 kilometres south of Salt Lake City.
Robinson is expected to be formally charged on Tuesday, when he is scheduled to make an initial court appearance. He remains in custody in Utah.
Utah Governor Spencer Cox said on Sunday that Robinson was not co-operating with the investigation. Authorities have been interviewing his friends and family to try to work out a motive for the shooting.
The killing has shaken a country that has experienced a spike in political violence, stoked by deepening polarisation between the right and the left.
While Robinson was raised by religious parents in a deeply conservative region of the state, “his ideology was very different than his family”, Cox said on Sunday on NBC’s Meet the Press program, without going into specifics.
State records show Robinson had registered as a voter without choosing a political party affiliation and did not vote in the 2024 presidential election. But a relative told police that Robinson had grown more political and had expressed dislike for Kirk in a recent conversation.
Kirk’s killing was the latest in a series of high-profile episodes of US political violence. Last year, Trump was the subject of two assassination attempts, including one in which his ear was struck by a bullet.
In April, a man started a fire at the home of Democratic Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, though Shapiro and his family escaped harm. In June, a senior Democrat in Minnesota and her husband were assassinated in their home, and a man threw petrol bombs at a pro-Israel march in Colorado, killing one.
In August, a gunman obsessed with Covid conspiracies fired at the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention headquarters in Atlanta, killing a police officer.
-with AAP
