Donald Trump has accused former president Joe Biden of “trying to put Charlie Kirk out of business” after it emerged the right wing influencer’s organization Turning Point USA was investigated by the FBI.
In a post on Truth Social, the incumbent president asked: “Why was the wonderful Turning Point under INVESTIGATION by “Deranged” Jack Smith and the Corrupt & Incompetent Biden Administration”?
Trump referred to the FBI’s election-related investigation into him, launched in 2022, which looked at dozens of Republican entities. That included Kirk’s Turning Point movement, as revealed by Republican Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IOWA) on Tuesday.
Kirk was fatally shot in the neck while on stage at Utah Valley University for a TPUSA event, The American Comeback Tour, last Wednesday.
In his Truth Social post Wednesday, Trump accused Biden and Smith of trying to “force Charlie, and many other people and movements, out of business” and weaponising the justice department against Democratic opponents, including himself.
“They allowed the daughter of a Judge, on one of the corrupt trials against me, to become the biggest fund raiser for Biden and Kamala, making many Millions of Dollars for herself and her family, but with her father, the Judge, not only refusing to RECUSE himself, but putting a gag order on me, not allowing ANY talk about their family corruption and unprecedented conflict of interest.
“Every leading legal analyst and pundit said this trial was wrong and should not have been allowed to go forward. But it did because of a Corrupt Judge who will hopefully pay a very big price for his illegal actions, someday!”
Along with senator Ron Johnson (R-WISCONSIN), Grassley has been publishing records relating to an FBI investigation, known to the bureau as “Arctic Frost” since January.
Grassley said at the Judiciary Committee’s annual FBI oversight hearing that Arctic Frost wasn’t just a case to politically investigate Trump, but “a vehicle by which partisan FBI agents and Department of Justice prosecutors could achieve their partisan ends and improperly investigate the entire Republican political apparatus."
He said that a total of 92 Republican targets, including Republican groups and Republican-linked individuals, were placed under the investigative scope of Arctic Frost, including Kirk’s Turning Point USA, a right-wing pressure group advocating for conservative politics in high schools and colleges across the country.
Kirk founded the movement in 2012 when he was just 18 alongside mentor Bill Montgomery - a retiree more than 50 years his senior, who encouraged the then-teenager to commit to political activism full-time. The organization’s influence extended overseas with a Turning Point chapter in the UK.
Tyler Robinson, 22 from Utah, has been formally charged with aggravated murder and six other charges, including obstruction of justice and witness tampering, after he was arrested on suspicion of shooting Kirk. He faces the death penalty if convicted, Utah County Attorney Jeff Gray announced at a press conference.
