ACTION ALERT: Snopes Thinks Kirk Was Kidding About Killing Gays Being 'God's Perfect Law'

Julie Hollar

Counterpoint: Yes, he did (Snopes, 9/16/25).

When readers asked Snopes, the popular urban legend–dispelling website, to look at a claim about Charlie Kirk's take on stoning gays, the site's headline (9/16/25) was definitive: "Charlie Kirk Didn't Say Gay People Should Be Stoned to Death."

The claim originated when a clip from Kirk's podcast was circulated in which the right-wing organizer criticized children's musical performer Ms. Rachel for supporting Pride month. Ms. Rachel had explained her support by quoting Matthew 22 from the Bible—which, Ms. Rachel correctly summarized, says that when questioned about the "greatest commandment," Jesus replied that it is "to love God and to love your neighbor as yourself."

The clip showed Kirk, opening in mid-sentence, saying:

…is in Leviticus 18, is that thou shall lay with another man shall be stoned to death, just saying. So, Ms. Rachel, you quote Leviticus 19, love your neighbor as yourself. The chapter before affirms God's perfect law when it comes to sexual matters.

Snopes's Nur Ibrahim reprints this quote and writes:

The above clip does not show the full context of Kirk's comments. Kirk did not directly advocate for stoning gay people to death. We searched through footage and clips of him discussing LGBTQ+ issues and did not find evidence of him stating outright that gay people should be stoned to death; rather, he quoted the Bible as part of an argument about how others selectively choose quotations. As such, we rate this claim as false.

It then offers that "full context" from the show, quoting Kirk at length:

She's not totally wrong…. The first part is Deuteronomy 6:3–5. The second part is Leviticus 19. So you love God, so you must love his law. How do you love somebody? You love them by telling them the truth, not by confirming or affirming their sin. And it says, by the way, Ms. Rachel, might want to crack open that Bible of yours, in a lesser reference—part of the same part of scripture is in Leviticus 18, is that thou shall lay with another man shall be stoned to death. Just saying. So, Ms. Rachel, you quote Leviticus 19, love your neighbor as yourself. The chapter before affirms God's perfect law when it comes to sexual matters. Now, so how do you best love somebody? You love them by telling them the truth. Don't be cruel…. I would love for Ms. Rachel to respond to this: Is pride a Christian value? She thinks it is. Happy Pride Month everybody!... In fact the Scriptures tell us the opposite. "Pride goeth before the fall."

Snopes concludes its analysis:

Kirk was not saying that gay people should be stoned to death; rather, he was quoting the Bible in an effort to show how Ms. Rachel was being selective in her interpretation of the Scripture. However, we should note that in the same comment, Kirk called the section about stoning, "The chapter before affirms God's perfect law when it comes to sexual matters."

Reuters (9/13/25) noted that some of the people on a website doxxing "Charlie's Murderers" were "critical of the far-right figure while explicitly denouncing violence."

Well, gee, why should you note that, Snopes? Ibrahim doesn't explain.

Set aside Kirk's own straw man argument that pretends Ms. Rachel quotes Leviticus rather than Matthew. It is true, as Ibrahim writes, that Kirk did not "directly advocate for stoning gay people to death." And yet the straightforward way to read a self-professed Christian--and biblical literalist--characterizing a chapter of the Bible as "affirm[ing] God's perfect law" is as an endorsement of the laws in that chapter—in this case, condoning the stoning to death of non-celibate gay people.

Snopes offers no reason for us to doubt Kirk's sincerity about his belief in the scripture he quoted—whether or not he was trying (speciously) to paint Ms. Rachel as cherry picking—and therefore no justification for its definitive "false" rating. At a time when intense state and right-wing cultural pressure (Al Jazeera, 9/13/25; CBS, 9/16/25; Reuters, 9/13/25, 9/16/25) seeks to sanitize and censor accurate recountings of Kirk's beliefs, it is all the more important for those claiming to set the record straight not to bend over backwards to accommodate that pressure.

ACTION ALERT: Please ask Snopes to reevaluate its finding that Charlie Kirk was not endorsing the stoning of gays when he called the practice "God's perfect law when it comes to sexual matters."

CONTACT: You can contact Snopes here. 

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