After Charlie Kirk’s Assassination, Vance Paves the Way for Repression

A few days ago, after the unjustifiable assassination of Charlie Kirk — because no matter his neo-fascist positions, nothing could legitimize that he be shot in this way — I spoke on RFI, then in Le Figaro and other international media. In doing so, I expressed my fears about what might follow. That stance immediately drew a flood of attacks and abusive emails from far-right sympathizers.

Today, events seem to bear me out. On Monday, September 15, during a special commemorative broadcast of the Charlie Kirk Show, Vice President J.D. Vance openly called to “dismantle” progressive organizations and certain liberal think tanks, accusing them of fostering a climate favorable to political violence. He even named institutions like the Open Society Foundations and the Ford Foundation, as well as media such as The Nation, directed by my friend Don Guttenplan, who visited IRIS earlier this year. Although to date no evidence links the crime’s perpetrator to these civil society actors, Vance suggested that the Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security might be mobilized to investigate and punish them.

Such rhetoric, devoid of tangible proof, looks less like a genuine investigation and more like a conscious attempt to criminalize counter-powers and silence opposition. For more than six months, the Trump-Vance administration has been methodically working to weaken democratic safeguards and establish a semi-authoritarian regime. It now has its first “martyr”: Charlie Kirk, whom Donald Trump honored by ordering the flags to fly at half-mast — an unprecedented gesture for someone who was neither elected nor a former state dignitary. This strong signal suggests that the figure of Kirk will become the foundation of a victimhood narrative used to justify an unprecedented tightening of control.

In the coming days, we can fear an increased deployment of the National Guard and strengthened measures against freedom of expression, particularly targeting universities, critical media, and social media. IRIS The explicit threats from the Proud Boys and other paramilitary groups, promising to “avenge” Kirk’s death, pose a crucial question: how far will the government allow them to go? If the White House were to turn a blind eye — or even implicitly “encourage” such violence — they could use it as the perfect pretext to institute a permanent state of emergency.

Let us recall once again: Charlie Kirk embodied a figure of the American far right — an ultra-right like none existing in France, except in some fringe groups. He was male-supremacist, anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant, anti-abortion, pro-gun, and one of the organizers of the January 6, 2021 assault on the Capitol. But nothing, absolutely nothing, justified his assassination. And yet, this murder could well become the spark that ignites America — turning a radical activist into a foundational myth for an authoritarian crusade.