’The day before he was horrifically murdered, Charlie Kirk sent me a direct message on X. He and I had been sparring publicly over the killing of a Ukrainian refugee and its relationship to race.

He said the gruesome killing of a White woman by a Black man was motivated solely by anti-White hatred. I denounced those comments on CNN as unfounded. He went on TV and denounced MY denunciation. Then he unleashed a firehose of tweets, challenging my argument.

Kirk’s pushback sparked an online torrent of racist death threats against me, the likes of which I have rarely seen. Things were seriously heading off the rails. Then — in the middle of all this — Charlie Kirk reached out.

Condemning murder is not hard So it was not hard for me to condemn his murder — immediately, without qualification and in unconditional terms. That afternoon I tweeted:

“Today’s attack on Charlie Kirk is absolutely horrifying and heartbreaking. He fought with words not weapons. There is no place for political violence in our society and those responsible must be swiftly brought to justice. My prayers are with Charlie’s loved ones, the traumatized students at Utah Valley University and all who have been impacted by this senseless act.” Political murder is wrong, period. I was born in 1968 — into a country being torn apart by riots and assassinations. I don’t want to go back to that. None of us should.

In fact: Kirk’s murder gives us all reason to come back to the table for dialogue. There is a rising tide of political violence that has already swept away his life and many others’ lives, from both the Left and the Right.

Violence like this should compel people in both parties to turn down the heat, seek common ground and look for off-ramps from the vitriol — as Kirk was doing with me, the day before he died.

Charlie Kirk opposed censorship and ‘civil war’ But instead, the opposite is happening. People are using his horrific assassination to call for MORE violence — justifying murder or even calling for a civil war! Government officials are using his killing as an excuse to censor and silence dissent. Hold up! Wait a minute!

That’s NOT the way Charlie Kirk handled disagreement. Not at all. When our public dispute started going sideways, what was Kirk’s response? He pushed for more conversation, not more silencing or censorship. He pushed for more civility, not more stridency or venom.

Whatever you think of Kirk’s legacy, that simple fact is commendable — and it’s something that everyone should uphold and seek to replicate. If you are on the Right, please don’t give up on open debate and dialogue. Charlie didn’t. I won’t. And I make the same plea to folks on the Left.