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Jan. 8, 2026

2025 was a big year for the Christofascists at Turning Point USA (TPUSA), and it was a big year for Unicorn Riot’s coverage of the right-wing political group. UR contributor L. Cam Anderson followed the organization from their first campus appearance after the assassination of TPUSA founder, Charlie Kirk, to their annual shindig in Phoenix, Arizona. Catch up on our coverage below.


** Turning Point USA
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** 2025 Coverage Retrospective
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Charlie Kirk, who founded TPUSA in 2012, served as the organization’s executive director until his assassination on Sept. 10, 2025, at Utah Valley University. His death set off a scramble to fill the power vacuum he left behind. ()


** Turning Point’s Christian Revival ([link removed])
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The beginning of Turning Point USA’s nation-wide “The Turning Point Tour” was a stop at the University of Minnesota that was originally slated as the third stop in the “American Comeback Tour.” The tour rebranded following the assassination of the group’s founder, Charlie Kirk, only 12 days prior to the stop in Minnesota.

The on-campus event saw heightened security and a religious revival-like fervor that permeated all of the speeches that night. As Hennepin County Sheriff’s deputies rested their long guns on the roof of the neighboring buildings, inside Northrup Auditorium Pastor Dale Witherington led the rally in prayer: “Would you please join me in praying to our father of the USA.”

The Daily Wire’s Michael Knowles was the night’s key speaker, and his hour-long segment was no less ecclesiastic. It dripped of Biblical justifications and underhanded calls for retribution against “the left,” who supposedly took Kirk from them.

The speech even echoed the latest conspiracies at the time emanating from the former Turning Point associate Candace Owens, who was telling viewers of her independent talk show that Kirk had been playing footsie with the idea of becoming Catholic.
READ: Turning Point’s Christian Revival ([link removed])
The Turning Point tour stopped at 10 other universities, ending at UC Berkeley on Nov. 10. There would be no more TPUSA events until Dec. 18, when the organization’s annual AmericaFest began. ()


** ‘AmericaFest’ Kicks Off in Phoenix as Fallout Over Founder’s Death Continues ([link removed])
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This was the first AmFest since Kirk’s assassination. The vacuum left behind after his death has opened the movement up to change, which was seen at the conference.
READ: Turning Point USA’s ‘AmericaFest’ Kicks Off in Phoenix as Fallout Over Founder’s Death Continues ([link removed])


** AmericaFest is Decadent and Depraved ([link removed])
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On the first night of AmFest, Erika Kirk signaled her control of the organization and its battling fractions in her opening address. “You may not agree with everyone on this stage this weekend, and that’s OK,” Kirk told a packed audience. “Welcome to America.”
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The event coincided with the movement cannibalizing: Candace Owens’ conspiracy theories have come to implicate multiple countries and even Turning Point itself in the assassination of Charlie Kirk. On top of that, Nick Fuentes has become a persistent problem for the organization’s unity, evidenced by Ben Shapiro’s scathing remarks on the first night.

“If you host a Hitler apologist, Nazi loving, anti-American piece of refuse like Nick Fuentes … you ought to own it,” Shapiro said, making a jab at Tucker Carlson for his October interview with Fuentes.
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“The event was a depraved spectacle filled with the image and voice of Kirk and countless grifters looking to make easy money off of the event.

“I flew out to Phoenix from my home in Minneapolis, Minnesota, earlier in the day looking to see if I could glean anything on the future of TPUSA and the American conservative movement writ large. It was billed to be a large event, but tickets quickly disappeared after Kirk’s assassination. I bought my ticket shortly after, and as a student at the University of Minnesota I qualified for a student ticket. I chose to pay an extra $50 for TPUSA to put me up in a hotel room for three nights with three conservative students, an opportunity I hoped would illuminate the inner workings of the growing movement of far-right youth.”

Over 30,000 people attended the event, making it both TPUSA’s largest event to date and possibly one of the largest conservative events in the history of the country.

Continue reading at unicornriot.ninja ([link removed]) to find out what Anderson saw, including his experience staying in a hotel room with other student attendees.
READ: AmericaFest is Decadent and Depraved ([link removed])

As we celebrate 10 years of independent, community-centered reporting, we need your support more than ever. The fight for the truth doesn’t stop — and neither can we. Donate today. ([link removed])
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