The days following Charlie Kirk’s assassination have highlighted the stark differences between the U.S. and Europe, especially between the U.S. and Germany. Trump called Kirk a “martyr for truth and freedom,” and he was honored as such during his five-hour memorial service on September 21. In contrast, the president of the European Parliament rejected several motions to observe a minute of silence for Kirk on September 11, leading to an open dispute in the plenary session. The Parliament’s German vice president Katarina Barley said: “It is a prerogative of the president whether or not there is a minute of silence. There were number of points of order made on this particular issue and all of them have been informed that there will be no minute of silence, and I will stick to the president’s decision.” In 2020, the Parliament observed a minute of silence for George Floyd.
In Germany, the chancellor and the president remained silent. Charlie Kirk was certainly no statesman, but the reticence of the country’s leaders speaks volumes. Caroline Bosbach of the Christian Democrats deleted her Instagram post commemorating Kirk after receiving pushback, and soccer player and devout Christian Felix Nmecha is being investigated by his club for expressing support for Kirk.
The Austrian political scientist and “right-wing extremism expert” Natascha Strobl compared Kirk to Reinhard Heydrich on Bluesky. Heydrich, SS-Obergruppenführer and head of the Gestapo, was celebrated as a Blutzeuge (“blood witness”) of National Socialism after his assassination in 1942. She warned that “it is clear what comes next.”
The two major German television stations financed by all households, ARD and ZDF, distorted or suppressed facts, and even told lies. On September 12, ARD’s news program Tagesschau reported: “The coffin containing Kirk’s body was flown to Arizona on a U.S. government plane.” It was not just any plane; it was Air Force Two with Kirk’s widow, JD Vance, and Usha Vance on board.
Feminist journalist Dunja Hayali said on ZDF: “The fact that there are now groups celebrating [Kirk’s] death cannot be justified by anything, not even by his often abhorrent, racist, sexist, and misanthropic statements.” Slander, veiled as defense. Hayali’s colleague Elmar Theveßen, ZDF’s Washington correspondent, accused Kirk on of having said “that homosexuals should be stoned. He said that women must submit to men. He said that blacks are taking the positions of whites, he said that if you’re sitting in an airplane with a black pilot, you have to be afraid,” and so on.
The host Markus Lanz asked him: “Have I understood correctly that [Kirk said] homosexuals should be stoned?” Theveßen said: “Yes, he is referring to the Bible, of course, so he says that Christianity should be taken literally. He didn’t apply that to modern times, which is actually, um, largely, of course, and you could say that those are racist statements, those are, um, um, statements hostile to minorities.” Shortly after, ZDF issued a statement saying it regretted that Theveßen had not explained the context in more detail. But the issue isn’t that he said too little. The issue is that he lied. And his stammering gives away that he had no idea what he was talking about.
In June 2024, Kirk had cited the passages in question from the Book of Leviticus to demonstrate that the Bible cannot always be taken literally. He had said the opposite of what Theveßen accused him of. The writer Stephen King spread the same lie and apologized for it soon after. Despite complaints, the ZDF television council defended Hayali and Theveßen against “any form of incitement and political pressure.” In many major media outlets, advocates of falsehood and defamation presented themselves as guardians of freedom of speech.
Richard Grenell, special presidential envoy for special missions, is calling for Theveßen’s U.S. visa to be revoked. Don Alphonso from Die Welt later accurately summarized the slander as “a second murder of Charlie Kirk” and a Manichaean “culture war without mercy.” Even in death, no one is safe from the left.
Some more recent news completes the picture. On September 10, in the French city of Lyon, Chaldean Christian Ashur Sarnaya from Iraq was murdered while doing a livestream on TikTok. He was talking about his faith. Sarnaya, who fled Islamist persecution in his homeland, was wheelchair-bound and had been threatened several times for his criticism of Islam. The murder was barely reported on in German-speaking countries. So, one Christian martyr is defamed while another is silenced.
On September 13, a large demonstration against lawless immigration took place in London with over 100,000 participants. On stage, Elon Musk was interviewed by organizer Tommy Robinson. “You either fight back, or you die,” he told the cheering crowd—harsh words, perhaps, but they accurately convey the mood and anxiety that has been gripping the U.K. in recent months. Many who attended feel as though they have been forgotten and left behind—sacrificed on the altar of leftist policies and virtue signaling.
Such concerns were not mentioned in ARD and ZDF’s coverage of the rally. Instead, it was emphasized that the “right-wing extremist” Robinson has multiple prior convictions. This was not a lie. But why should one listen to these media outlets any longer? Their arrogance and selective reporting will soon be forgotten. But the world will remember Charlie Kirk for a long time to come: He fought and died for his beliefs.
Image by Gage Skidmore, licensed via Creative Commons. Image cropped.
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