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Charlie Kirk is the Founder and President of Turning Point USA, the largest and fastest growing conservative youth activist organization in the country with over 250,000 student members, over 150 full-time staff, and a presence on over 2,000 high school and college campuses nationwide. Charlie is also the Chairman of Students for Trump, which aims to activate one million new college voters on campuses in battleground states in the lead up to the 2020 presidential election. His social media reaches over 100 million people per month and according to Axios, he is one of the "top 10 most engaged" Twitter handles in the world. He is also the host of “The Charlie Kirk Show,” which regularly ranks among the top news shows on Apple podcast charts.
Rylie Barnes and Riley Beasley Face Death Threats After Exposing Student Who Celebrated Charlie Kirk's Death
Rylie Barnes and Riley Beasley, leaders of the University of Utah College Republicans, faced death threats and potential expulsion after posting a photo of a student's cake mocking Charlie Kirk's assassination. The student posed proudly with a cake reading 'Happy Kirk Anniversary' while the College Republicans tabled to promote a memorial event. Instead of disciplining the student who celebrated murder, the university threatened Barnes and Beasley with expulsion for 'doxing', despite never naming the student. They received messages like 'It would be a shame if someone shoots you up like Kirkie' and discovered protesters tracking their class schedules. With support from Erika Kirk, TPUSA, and national figures like Harmeet Dhillon and Senator Mike Lee, the students continue fighting back against the university's moral inversion while campus police investigate the threats against them.
Rylie Barnes, vice president of College Republicans at the University of Utah, and Riley Beasley, chair of the Utah College Republicans, were tabling on campus to promote a memorial event for Charlie Kirk at Utah Valley University (UVU), located 45 minutes away from the University of Utah. Their table featured a whiteboard asking students: 'Did you think that Charlie Kirk deserved to get murdered?' The board showed 12 tallies saying yes and many more saying no.
A female student approached their table carrying a cake. She laughed at their board and told them, 'I think my cake is pretty funny.' When Barnes and Beasley asked her to remove the lid, they discovered the cake read 'Happy Kirk Anniversary'—a celebration of Charlie Kirk's assassination.
'We then tell her that we're going to take a photo of it and then she stood there for 10 minutes and started posing,' Barnes explained. The student was clearly proud of her creation, mocking Charlie Kirk's death openly and willingly posing for photographs.
Going Viral and Facing Backlash
Barnes posted the photo on X (formerly Twitter) without naming the student. The post went viral, reaching over 6 million engagements. 'We found it very vile and disgusting and we knew that we needed to show fellow Utahns, alumni, and honestly just everyone who knows this campus what is happening with conservative students,' Barnes said.
Rather than facing consequences for celebrating murder, the student who made the cake remained protected by the university. Instead, Barnes and Beasley became the targets of university discipline. The University of Utah alleged that the College Republicans had committed 'doxing' by posting the photo—despite never naming the student and simply documenting what happened at their own table.
A disciplinary hearing was scheduled for Wednesday morning but was canceled due to 'unforeseen circumstances'—likely the massive social media backlash from Americans outraged that students exposing someone celebrating murder were being punished rather than the person who made the cake.
Death Threats and Surveillance
Following the viral post, Barnes and Beasley received numerous death threats and disturbing messages, including:
'Hello Riley, we have seen your Twitter posts harassing college students. It would be a shame if someone shoots you up like Kirkie. Tread carefully white trash.'
'LOL, you going to get it. FAFO just like Charlie did.'
'Protect your necks. If you know, you know.' (with a laughing emoji)
'I think we should start treating you like said Nazi.'
Beyond the threats, Barnes and Beasley discovered that students were actively surveilling them on campus. A student posted their class schedules in a leaked protest group chat, stating 'Don't ask me how I know' when questioned about how he obtained their private information.
When Barnes confronted this student in the library, he claimed vaguely that 'people know' when he has class, but couldn't explain why he wrote 'Don't ask me how I know' about Barnes and Beasley's schedules. The student is reportedly part of ASUU (Associated Students of the University of Utah), raising serious questions about how he accessed their private class information.
'We're still having the police investigate into it because we have no idea how he did this, and this is definitely a violation of privacy,' Barnes said. 'And we're going to make sure that this comes out to the Dean of Students as well to get this handled.'
A Pattern of Threats Against Conservatives
This isn't the first time conservative students at the University of Utah have been threatened. Beasley revealed that earlier in January, another student was arrested after threatening to 'Kirk us' while motioning with his arm like shooting a rifle during campus debates. Police witnessed the incident and immediately apprehended the individual.
'This is something that you're seeing at the University of Utah where they're allowing these ideologies to fester with students. And they do nothing to call it out or stop it,' Beasley said. 'And in my opinion, this has got to end. It's getting too far when people are making threats like this.'
The pattern is clear: the left on campus has normalized threatening and silencing opposing political views while avoiding accountability. 'Those on the left find it comical to make threats,' Beasley observed. 'They've normalized on campus silencing the opposing political view.'
University Response and Moral Inversion
Despite the numerous documented threats against Barnes and Beasley, the university moved to discipline them rather than the student who celebrated Charlie Kirk's assassination or those making death threats. The same clause the university attempted to use against Barnes and Beasley—prohibiting intimidation, doxing, and threatening—should apply to those actually threatening the College Republican leaders.
'These students on University of Utah just they really don't support freedom of speech unless it's their speech, and that's the biggest issue here,' Barnes said.
Barnes has been working with campus police to report the threats, but 'unfortunately nothing has happened quite yet.' She expressed trust in their investigation while noting the frustrating lack of action against those making threats, including verified students at the university.
National Support and Legal Help
The moral inversion of the situation—punishing those who exposed someone celebrating murder rather than the person who celebrated it—drew national attention and support. Erika Kirk, Charlie Kirk's widow, stepped in to provide legal support. Harmeet Dhillon, civil rights attorney, publicly questioned what was happening in Utah. Senator Mike Lee also voiced support for the students.
'Without that, going into these meetings, had they not been canceled alone, we probably would have been crushed by the University of Utah,' Beasley said. 'What they're alleging is criminal and without the proper support that you guys have been very willing to give us and which we're very grateful for, I don't know what would be happening to us right now.'
Barnes expressed similar gratitude: 'There's no words to even express how grateful I am for the amount of support that me and Riley Beasley have received on every single level from TPUSA to the attorneys that Erika has been so kindly to pay for and for all of these news outlets.'
What's Happening in Utah?
The incident raises broader questions about the state of Utah, which many Americans view as a conservative stronghold. However, those familiar with Utah politics note inconsistencies in the state's conservative credentials.
'I feel like that's something that's caused us exasperation for years at this point,' one commentator noted. 'It's what we see when the governor waffles on transgender policy, when they waffle on immigration and guest workers. It's a waffly state, unfortunately.'
The situation at the University of Utah mirrors issues discovered at Utah Valley University (UVU) in the aftermath of Charlie Kirk's assassination. Tom Fitton exposed emails from UVU professors and staff fighting against a memorial on campus for Charlie, revealing deep anti-conservative bias at supposedly conservative institutions in a red state.
Interestingly, Charlie Kirk himself had tweeted before his UVU event about controversial headlines surrounding his campus visit, asking: 'What's going on in Utah, folks?'
The Fight Continues
As of the interview, the disciplinary case against Barnes and Beasley remained ongoing. 'We're hopefully have updates here. We want this to be done, right?' Beasley said. 'The University of Utah, I hope, has some common sense in them and isn't in the business of expelling students for their freedom of speech or holding consequences for us doing nothing more than highlighting the fact that students at their university are celebrating murder.'
Despite the stress and danger of their situation, both Rylie Barnes and Riley Beasley maintained remarkably positive attitudes—what they call being 'happy warriors.' Their courage in the face of death threats, surveillance, and potential expulsion represents exactly what Charlie Kirk stood for: refusing to be intimidated, standing up for truth, and fighting for conservative principles on hostile college campuses.
Barnes and Beasley embody the front lines in the fight for freedom on America's college campuses, standing firm against those who celebrate violence and demand conformity to left-wing ideology.
