Clark County Today Editor Ken Vance reacts to the Clark County Council’s reluctance to pass a resolution to unequivocally condemn the political assassination of Charlie Kirk
Ken Vance, editor
Clark County Today
Earlier this week, I provided each of the five members of the Clark County Council an opportunity to unequivocally condemn the political assassination of Charlie Kirk. Initially, only one of the five, Councilor Michelle Belkot, accepted my opportunity to do so.
“I absolutely condemn the political assassination of Charlie Kirk,’’ Belkot said. “As public servants we should hold ourselves to the highest standard, not the lowest bar. Assassinating another human being is always wrong, regardless of differing political opinions.’’
County Chair Sue Marshall responded to my email, but didn’t address the opportunity I provided for her to offer any condemnation, so I replied to her and provided her a second opportunity. Later, County Communications Manager Joni McAnally provided a statement she instructed me to attribute to Marshall.
“Violence has no place in our society. Whether it is politically or personally motivated or a random act — violence is never the answer. Clark County supports and encourages civil public discourse in our community, state and nation.” – Clark County Chair Sue Marshall
On Wednesday, Belkot provided her fellow councilors the opportunity to make the condemnation formal, in the form of a resolution. Here’s the wording of the summary of that resolution:
NOW, THEREFORE,
BE IT ORDERED AND RESOLVED BY THE CLARK COUNTY COUNCIL, STATE OF WASHINGTON, AS FOLLOWS:
The Clark County Council unequivocally condemns political violence in all its forms, including the assassination of Charlie Kirk, and declares that acts of violence shall never be tolerated as legitimate tools of political expression. This Council urges all citizens to reaffirm their commitment to the principles of the Constitution and Bill of Rights, to resolve differences peacefully, and to protect the freedoms that secure our Republic.
I can’t imagine an elected official in Clark County, or the United States for that matter, who could say no to an opportunity to make that statement. But, four of the five councilors were unwilling to sign off on that language. Instead, they played the “what about this, what about that’’ game. It’s the first play in the playbook of Liberal Democrats on how to avoid an unequivocal condemnation of Kirk’s assassination.
Councilor Matt Little wondered if the victims of the recent school shooting in Minnesota could be added.
Councilor Wil Fuentes wondered if the Minnesota State Speaker of the House Melissa Hortman and her husband, who were assassinated in June, could be added.
“I don’t see this as being about Charlie Kirk,” Glen Yung said. “To me, this is about one American willing to murder another over political views. That’s the tragedy that happened.’’
Yung also proposed that the council adds that it would be willing to promote conflict resolution.
Marshall said, “It’s regrettable that it seems to be some sort of scorekeeping of who mentions which person has been shot. That’s not the way to look at this.’’
So, a county staff member will go back to his office and try to write a new resolution that reflects the myriad of qualifiers that Yung, Little and Fuentes offered to make Belkot’s proposed resolution much more benign and confusing.
Let’s just be honest with each other. These four councilors will obviously do whatever they can to keep from condemning the assassination of a Conservative Christian whose beliefs didn’t match their own. And, the bigger picture is, Liberal Democrats are doing everything they can to distance themselves from the reality that they have spent years inciting this type of violence by calling President Trump a “Nazi’’ and a “fascist.” They’ve told their followers that they have to rise up and save our nation from this dictator and the “deplorables’’ who follow him.
Charlie Kirk was one of Trump’s most passionate supporters. Many credit him and his organization, Turning Point USA, for getting Trump elected a second time. Kirk and Turning Point USA were responsible for getting hundreds of thousands of young voters to the polls, presumably to vote Trump in as the 47th president of our country. Liberal Democrats blame Kirk for initiating “hate speech.’’ That simply isn’t true. They hated his speech, and they hated that it he was having so much success with it, but it wasn’t “hate speech.’’
In sharp contrast to the way Liberal Democrats have responded to the Kirk assassination, I offer this. In September 2020, President Trump was confronted by a reporter who informed him that Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bade Ginsburg had just died. It was the first Trump had heard of the death of the woman who was a longtime nemesis and political opponent.
“She was an amazing woman who led an amazing life,’’ said Trump, after gathering himself from the surprise of the news. “I’m saddened to hear that.’’
That’s how a compassionate person reacts in a situation like that.
Murder, quite simply, is wrong, especially murdering someone because they expressed beliefs that you don’t agree with. If we can’t agree on that, there’s nothing left to debate. And, every voter in Clark County needs to know this is the way those four councilors feel about such an impactful event. They’re not willing to unequivocally say the murder of a Conservative Christian is wrong without balancing it against other qualifiers.
They are complicit through their silence and that is morally abhorrent.
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Great take Ken! Thank you
Thanks for the column Ken. I wonder who exactly the county council represents – it certainly is not Clark County residents.
Anyone of the 5 can have a resolution. I did many times. The others have opportunities to do that. What a lame excuse.,
What would Jesus do? “Blessed are the peacemakers, including Billy Bob Boudreaux”? Why try to sneak in a glorification of a radical right-wing talk show host under the disguise of a condemnation of violence? Just come out and say it. Own it. Pending, of course, board approval.
None of the councilors were silent, they all commented and rejected violent assaults, including murder, against political opponents.
In a recent article about responses to the murder of Charlie Kirk:
” Republican Senate Leader John Braun of Centralia issued a statement that said, in part: “The killing today of young father, husband, and political leader Charlie Kirk is a reprehensible act of pure evil. In America, we cannot shoot or physically attack people we politically disagree with. Not Charlie Kirk. Not Minnesota Speaker Emerita Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark. Not Minnesota Senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette. Not Paul Pelosi.
“Not Rep. Steve Scalise. Not Gov. Josh Shapiro. Not President Trump. We are Americans before we are Democrats, Republicans, or Independents.”
Bringing up other politially motivated murders and acts of violence in a discussion is not condoning violence.
GREAT ARTICLE KEN !!! The proposed PROCLAMATION was worded well but not for Marshall, Yung, Little or Fuentes – so they simply asked Jordan Boege (unElected so does not Serve The People) to rewrite the Original Proclamation to fit their sanctuary-marxist agendas – of course leaving out main components that are highlighted in the Original such as ‘Conservative’ and ‘Republic’ – let alone mentioning Charlie Kirk’s name !!! HOLD this sanctuary Council ACCOUNTABLE NOW – on Tuesday September 23, ‘25 there is a 10 am CCCouncil meeting and the ‘revised’ Proclamation is on the agenda !!! I Hope You’re as disturbed about the changes as I am !!! There also is OPEN PUBLIC COMMENT to voice Your opinions !!! They highlight numerous organizations but miss the True meaning of the wording in the Original Proclamation !!! I wrote Jordan today telling him to ask the four other Council members to write their own Proclamation and DO NOT rewrite the Original !!! This Council did the same to Me when, last year I wrote a Proclamation for JULY as INDEPENDENCE MONTH – they gave it to Jordan, plagiarized from the Original – taking out The Lords name, the Republic and that We The People have a Right to ASSEMBLE when government becomes dangerous. Retired Chair Mr. Medvigy took great Joy stating what a Good idea and presented it to their representative !!! From Independence Month to Independence Day !!! Thankfully God Is Always Good and I do intend on presenting another Proclamation for INDEPENDENCE MONTH for Our Nation’s 250 year ‘birthday’ !!!
+++++ There will be a “Community Candlelight Memorial” on September 25, ‘25 next Thursday at Esther Shirt Park 6-7:30 pm for the National Day of Remembrance – LET’S GO CHARLIE and see You there !!!
The councilors weren’t silent. And what about the other assassinations, where’s they’re resolution?
I think this following article from Heather Cox Richardson sums it up for me.
September 12, 2025 (Friday)
Since a gunman murdered right-wing activist Charlie Kirk at an outdoor event at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah, both social media circles and the political sphere have been alight with accusations that “the Left” was responsible for the shooting. Prominent right-wing social media accounts called the Democratic Party “a domestic terror organization” and declared “WAR.” Billionaire Elon Musk posted: “The Left is the party of murder.”
From the Oval Office, President Donald J. Trump blamed the shooting on “the radical left” and vowed to “find each and every one of those who contributed to this atrocity, and to other political violence, including the organizations that fund it and support it, as well as those who go after our judges, law enforcement officials, and everyone else who brings order to our country.”
Without any information about the shooter, the media got in on the game, with the Wall Street Journal reporting yesterday that “[a]mmunition engraved with transgender and antifascist ideology was found inside the rifle authorities believe was used in Kirk’s shooting.” Bomb threats targeted Democratic politicians—primarily Black politicians—and historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs).
Condemnation of the shooting was widespread. Perhaps eager to distance themselves from accusations that anyone who does not support MAGA endorses political violence, commenters portrayed Kirk as someone embracing the reasoned debate central to democracy, although he became famous by establishing a database designed to dox professors who expressed opinions he disliked so they would be silenced (I am included on this list).
Meanwhile, it was not clear the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was up to the task of finding the killer. FBI director Kash Patel and deputy director Dan Bongino were both MAGA influencers with relatively little law-enforcement experience when Trump put them in charge of the agency. Once there, they focused on purging the agency of those they considered insufficiently loyal to Trump or “DEI hires.” In early August, they forced out the leader of the Salt Lake City, Utah, field office, Mehtab Syed, a decorated female Pakistani American counterterrorism agent.
Meanwhile, David J. Bier of the Cato Institute reported that one in five FBI agents have been diverted from their jobs to conduct immigration raids with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and just hours before the shooting, three former top officials at the FBI filed a lawsuit against Patel, the FBI, Attorney General Pam Bondi, the Department of Justice, and the president accusing them of unlawfully politicizing the FBI, purging it of anyone who had ever worked on a criminal investigation of Trump. The lawsuit suggests Bongino had an “intense focus on [using] his social media profiles to change his followers’ perceptions of the FBI.”
As Quinta Jurecic reported today in The Atlantic, hours after the shooting, Patel’s personal social media account posted a picture of himself and Kirk; minutes later, Patel’s official FBI account posted that the shooter was already in custody and then, an hour and a half later, said the suspect had been released. Both Patel and Bongino appeared to be focused more on posting than on doing the work to find the shooter.
This morning, Trump announced on the Fox News Channel’s Fox & Friends that he had just heard “they have the person that they wanted.” That person turned out to be 22-year-old Utah native Tyler Robinson, who turned himself in to authorities after his father urged him to. Robinson’s parents are registered Republicans; he was not affiliated with a political party and was an inactive voter. Over the past years, Robinson’s mother posted a number of pictures of him and his brothers posing with guns.
Robinson had recently had a conversation with a family member about why they didn’t like Kirk’s viewpoints. Robinson appears to have admired the “Groypers,” led by Nick Fuentes, who complain that more mainstream organizations like Kirk’s Turning Point USA are not “pro-white” enough and have publicly harassed Kirk in the past.
Allison Gill of The Breakdown explained that the rumors the shooter had engraved anti-fascist rhetoric on some of the bullet casings found at the scene turned out to be a misunderstanding of terms from the video game Helldivers2. The claim that he had used “transgender ideology” was apparently a misreading of the headstamp “TRN” that marks ammunition as the product of Turkish manufacturer Turan.
Almost as soon as Robinson was identified, the tone of MAGA leader’s conversation about the shooting changed. Representative Nancy Mace (R-SC), who had used a slur to refer to the shooter as pro-transgender, posted on social media: “We know Charlie Kirk would want us to pray for such an evil, and lost individual like Tyler Robinson to find Jesus Christ. We will try to do the same.”
For his part, Trump seemed to have lost interest in Kirk even earlier. Yesterday evening, a reporter offered the president his condolences on the loss of his friend Kirk and asked Trump how he was holding up. The president answered, in full: “I think very good. And by the way, right there, you see all the trucks, they just started construction of the new ballroom for the White House, which is something they’ve been trying to get, as you know, for about 150 years, and it’s going to be a beauty. It’ll be an absolutely magnificent structure. And I just see all the trucks. We just started so it’ll get done very nicely and it’ll be one of the best anywhere in the world, actually. Thank you very much.”
Sent via the Samsung Galaxy S20 FE 5G, an AT&T 5G smartphone