In this post, Professor Emerita of Social and Cultural Geography, Melissa Butcher, draws on writings from her book, The Trouble with Freedom: Love, Hate and America’s Future, to examine how current conservative politics is attempting to reach and engage Gen Z audiences.
It’s been just over a year since the murder of Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA (TPUSA), an activist network primarily organising conservative youth. In 2024, Kirk was lauded in MAGA circles for persuading a significant number of young people, especially young men, to vote for Trump. Today, as with other segments in Trump’s coalition, that Gen Z support is dissipating and there is no clear successor who can bring them back to bolster Trump’s flagging administration in the upcoming November mid-term elections.
Kirk was undoubtedly smart, charismatic and driven. He was able to communicate the real challenges facing young people (affordability, housing, student debt, the threat of AI to future job prospects), even if his solutions (more free market, conversion to Christianity and expulsion of migrants) were untenable.
His loss leaves a vacuum in the conservative universe, and a question of whether Kirk’s replacement will tilt towards even more violent rhetoric as a thin solution to intergenerational injustice. With the uptick in subscribers to commentators such as Nick Fuentes, the answer is possibly yes, but the one thing Kirk was able to do that others have not is build a movement.
The TPUSA ecosystem now supports over 1500 college chapters and 1200 high school Club Americas.1 They have created several organising platforms that train activists, mobilise young people to vote, and extend outreach to community networks. There is a stream of media content to support their work, including the eponymous podcast, the Charlie Kirk Show, now hosted by his former producers and some-time co-presenters, Andrew Kolvet and Blake Neff. It has almost 2 million subscribers.
The messaging is much the same as when Kirk was alive: their version of American culture, ‘patriotism, [Christian] faith, family and freedom’, must be restored and defended from those regarded as attacking those values. The latter includes immigrants, Islam, the ‘radical left’, and ‘western, liberal feminists’.
However, with the mid-terms likely to see the loss of the House of Representatives and possibly the Senate, this messaging has become sharper, with dire predictions for the future if the Democrats win back control. Railing against a ‘mass demoralising campaign’ on a recent podcast, Kolvet warns young conservatives that if they don’t vote they will ‘hand power over to the people that want you dead, that mocked Charlie’s death, that want to take wealth from white people to give it to not-white people’. They criticise ‘Republicans In Name Only’ (RINOs) who stand in the way of freedom. But their condemnation of the establishment is followed by a plea to young people not to burn it all down by allowing Democrats to get back into power.
There is good reason for young people to feel dissatisfied at the state of politics and the corrosion of democracy more broadly. Even those who organise for TPUSA at times express discontent. At a Chapter Leaders panel in July, broadcast on the Charlie Kirk Show, students’ frustration focused on the Iran war and questions of trust in the administration. Trump’s inability to tackle affordability, particularly housing and the cost of petrol, was a key driver of disappointment. Promises to fix things have yet again been broken. Some spoke of giving Trump his two more years, but then figuring out who they will support after that.
In a swirl of conspiracy theories following Kirk’s death, including that TPUSA may have been involved, the organisation has also had to respond to questions of trust. Even more mortally wounding to his legacy, Kirk has become a little cringe according to some reports, and once that happens his influence with all but the most devoted will slip further away.
Despite the disillusionment, no black-pilling is allowed on the Charlie Kirk Show. There can only be optimism and action. Negative polling is rigged, like elections, and part of a ‘mass psy-op’. Kolvet and Neff embrace their underdog status and hope to defy the odds, calling on listeners to show up and play their part; chase ballots, get people registered, vote.
But it sounds hollow without the force of Kirk’s personality, and the contradictions have become all too evident. For example, just how do you address the precarity young people face without critiquing the economic system that got us here in the first place. There is heresy from a student on the Chapter Leaders panel when she makes a suggestion that the administration could raise the minimum wage (it’s presently just $7.25 per hour in her state) to help manage the cost of living. The idea is quickly shut down. It is a core mission of TPUSA to promote free market capitalism.
Yet for all the disagreement I have with many of Kirk’s views, he was able to see a void in young people’s lives and create something that would fill it. Rather than nihilism or apathy, he offered a sense of belonging and structures of support. He created an organisation that offered meaning, purpose and validation for conservative life choices.
For a politics that builds an alternative to our current tilt towards authoritarianism, there is a need to also address that void, creating support for young people that rebalances the scales of intergenerational justice without blaming immigrants and minorities. Maybe all it would take to start is just for political leaders to do what they say they will do and in so doing rebuild trust between younger generations and the decision making that will impact their future.
For more on why people may vote for authoritarianism, see Melissa’s new book, The Trouble with Freedom: Love, Hate and America’s Future, Manchester University Press, 2026.
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