A former United States President, Barack Obama, has condemned the fatal shooting of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
In a post via his official X handle on Wednesday, Obama described the act “as a despicable violence” that has no place in a democratic society.
The former U.S. leader also commiserated with the victim’s wife and their two young children.
He wrote, “We don’t yet know what motivated the person who shot and killed Charlie Kirk, but this kind of despicable violence has no place in our democracy. Michelle and I will be praying for Charlie’s family tonight, especially his wife Erika and their two young children.”
Kirk, a right-wing activist and close ally of President Donald Trump, was fatally shot during an event in the western US state of Utah on Wednesday.
Kirk, the head of the largest conservative youth movement in the United States, which he co-founded in 2012 at the age of 18, was speaking around noon on the campus of Utah Valley University.
Dressed in a white t-shirt with the word “Freedom” across the front, Kirk sat in a chair under a tent as he answered questions from the large audience gathered around him.
The event was the first of about 15 scheduled across the country through the end of October.
The 31-year-old collapsed and blood spurted from his neck, according to a video clip shot from a nearby location. Kirk was then rushed away on a stretcher by his security detail.
Authorities have yet to arrest any suspect in Kirk’s shooting, described as a “targeted attack” in a statement from Utah’s Department of Public Safety.
“The shooter is believed to have fired from the roof of a building down to the location of the public event in the student courtyard,” it said.
Two men were briefly detained and released after being questioned by law enforcement officials as the manhunt continued.
One man, George Zinn, was charged with obstruction.
Neither man has “current ties to the shooting,” authorities said.
Trump announced Kirk’s death, writing on his Truth Social platform, “The Great, and even Legendary, Charlie Kirk, is dead.”
Although a suspect has not yet been identified, Trump linked rhetoric from the “radical left” to Kirk’s killing and vowed to carry out a crackdown.
“This kind of rhetoric is directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in our country today,” he said in a sombre four-minute video, seated at the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office.
“My administration will find each and every one of those who contributed to this atrocity and to other political violence, including the organisations that fund it and support it,” the US president said.
