Reflecting on the life and legacy of Charlie Kirk

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• Amna Nawaz:

  For more on Kirk's life and legacy, I'm joined now by Benji Backer. He's the CEO and founder of Nature Is Nonpartisan, and he worked with Kirk when he launched Turning Point USA.

  Benji, welcome to the show. Thanks for joining us.

  Benji Backer, Founder and CEO, Nature Is Nonpartisan: Thanks for having me.

• Amna Nawaz:

  First of all, let me just say on behalf of all of us how sorry we are for your loss, for everyone else who lost a friend and a family member in Charlie Kirk.

  But you have known him from the very earliest days of Turning Point USA. You shared a photo online of the two of you all those years ago. Just tell us why you joined that effort, what it was about Charlie and the message that spoke to you.

• Benji Backer:

  Well, how you just explained Charlie, a friend and a family member, is how he will be remembered by those who cared about him the most.

  And when I was in high school, he was drawn to me and I was drawn to him because we were two high school activists, conservatives pushing back against some of the stuff that we were seeing in the classroom, bias in the classroom that we were seeing. And I grew up in Wisconsin. He grew up in Chicago.

  So we'd drive up to see each other or drive down to see each other pretty often when he was starting to think about launching Turning Point USA. And a really pivotal moment of my life was in high school. I was getting death threats from my own high school colleagues because of my political activism, getting phone calls and tweets and all sorts of different things.

  And he was really supportive. He was really the only person that stood up for me at the time, and just reminded me always to stay resilient, to stay strong, and that these threats were baseless, and that nothing had ever happened because of it.

  And so it just — it's painful to see being on the receiving end of that, those threats, and not having that happen to me and having someone like him push me through that time at a pivotal time in my life, seeing him get killed this way, the same way that it was threatened of me, just is really painful.

  And he was one of the strongest people. And I didn't agree with him on a lot of things. And we drifted apart in recent years, but I always had so much respect for the strength that he had, the courage that he had to stand up for what he believed in, even if I didn't always agree.

  And it was always genuine. It was always what he wanted. And he was trying to do the best thing. And so I saw how he supported me and how he supported so many others. And so seeing him go out this way is hard.

• Amna Nawaz:

  Benji, I'm so sorry for your loss. I know how hard this must be for you. And I hear you saying you didn't always agree with him. You drifted apart recently.

  But, in your view, did he ever worry that something like this might happen?

• Benji Backer:

  I think he knew that standing up for what he believed in was worth it. You know, that's something that I think we can all carry with ourselves.

  Violence is not OK. You know, the way that this country's headed is not OK. You know, we're more disconnected than ever before. And this sound bite politics that we're seeing is pitting us against each other in a way that's really damaging, this social media-fying of politics.

  And so I think he knew that there was always a risk in doing what he was doing. But throughout history, the boldest people have died standing up for what they believed in. And you can hate the guy or love the guy politically, but you have got to respect the way that he stood up, knowing that this was always a risk. He put himself in harm's way all the time.

  I speak at college campuses multiple times a month. Thinking about being put in harm's way has been really hard for me as well to just think about. And he knew that. And he had a target on his back. He got threats all the time. You know, what I went through in high school was just a small percentage of what he has to go — what he had to go through on a day-to-day basis.

  And he knew that that was always a chance, but he still went and showed up and had those conversations with people who disagreed with him. And I think that's really, really admirable.

• Amna Nawaz:

  At the same time, Benji, I have to ask you. You mentioned you grew apart. You have criticized some of the things that he had to say recently online. You went so far as to call some of his remarks vile and anti-human.

  You clearly didn't agree with him always. Even on this issue that's close to you on climate, he dismissed a lot of climate concerns. And yet he amassed such a following. He had so many people listening to what he had to say. Why do you think that was? Was it in spite of the things that you disagree with or because of them?

• Benji Backer:

  Well, I don't remember saying those things, but I do know that I had my very strong disagreements with him.

  And the reality is, I can think something is vile or what someone says is vile, but not think that they deserve to be killed over it. You know, he was a good person deep down. And we had very, very adamant disagreements on a lot of things, including climate change and the environment.

  But at the end of the day, I mean, it's like if Greta — who's the biggest climate activist in the world, if someone on the right thinks that she's radical and is telling everyone that fossil fuels need to be shut down and she's protesting things in a very bold way, similar to how Charlie engaged, that does not mean that, if you disagree with her, she deserves to be hurt.

  And I think that that's the problem that we're at in society right now. We disagree with somebody, and we almost wish that they had something bad happen to them, and that we have become so inhumane in our disagreements with one another. I have disagreed with Charlie many times in the past, but I have also agreed with him a lot.

  And no matter what, it doesn't really matter. He's a human that deserves to live. And as a society, we're manifesting this evil. We're telling each other that this person's a Nazi, this person's an extremist, this person's a communist, this person's a socialist. Therefore, they are evil and they must go.

  And the more that we do that, the more people are going to get killed. The more that we pit other people as the villain, to the point where we think that we need to end their life, that is when we are losing control of society. And our country is not going down a good path.

  I might have had my disagreements with Charlie. I have my disagreements with lots of people. But in a country with free speech and where we actually have the ability to talk with each other about these things, we're losing all of that by shutting down people we disagree with, by threatening them and by telling them that their opinion is not just vile and inhumane, but we actually think it should kill them.

  I mean, that is an absolutely absurd trend that we're headed on. And I might have disagreed with him, but that does not justify anything even close to what's happened here.

• Amna Nawaz:

  Benji Backer, the CEO and founder of Nature Is Nonpartisan, thank you for joining us in what I know has to be a difficult week.

• Benji Backer:

  Thanks for having me.

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