Officials provided an update on Charlie Kirk’s killer and the murder weapon that was used on Thursday.
The FBI has recovered a “bolt-action, high-powered rifle” in a wooded area near an area where the assassin of conservative commentator Charlie Kirk fled, the bureau’s local field office director said on Thursday morning.
The FBI also has “good video footage of this individual,” and the bureau has “tracked his movements,” FBI Special Agent in Charge Robert Bohls said in a news conference, where he also described Kirk’s slaying as a “targeted event.”
Kirk was killed with a gunshot from a rooftop at the Utah Valley University campus, where he was speaking on Wednesday, officials said.
As the search stretched into a second day, they provided little information about the shooter’s identity, motive, location, or evidence, and were reviewing grainy security videos of a mysterious person in dark clothing.
The shooter is still on the run, and it isn’t clear how far the suspect may have gotten, but the nearby woods have been secured, authorities said.
Investigators also have obtained a footwear impression, forearm imprints, and a palm print, Bohls also said.
In the news conference, Utah Public Safety Commissioner Beau Mason said that the suspect “blended in” with the college crowd, adding that the individual appears to be of “college age.”
Authorities have “good” surveillance footage of the suspect but won’t release it to the public “at this time,” Mason added.
The state official told reporters that he spoke with Kirk’s wife on Wednesday evening, saying that “the family is devastated.”
“I can only imagine what that family is going through,” Mason said. “The heinous event that happened yesterday is not Utah. This is not what we’re known for.”
Mason stated, “We will not stand for what happened yesterday.”
Kirk’s assassination drew widespread condemnation across the political aisle. President Donald Trump on Wednesday evening called Kirk a “martyr for truth and freedom” and said that progressive rhetoric was “directly responsible” for his death.
“For years, those on the radical Left have compared wonderful Americans like Charlie to Nazis and the world’s worst mass murderers and criminals,” the president said. “This kind of rhetoric is directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in our country today, and it must stop right now.”
Trump added that his administration “will 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.”
Several former presidents—including Joe Biden, Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and Bill Clinton—also condemned the shooting.
Kirk was speaking at a debate hosted by his nonprofit political youth organization, Arizona-based Turning Point USA, at the Sorensen Center courtyard on campus. Immediately before the shooting, he was taking questions from an audience member about the Second Amendment.
“Do you know how many transgender Americans have been mass shooters over the last 10 years?” the person asked. Kirk responded, “Too many,” according to video footage of the event, captured right before the shooting occurred.
The person then questioned Kirk about mass shootings in the United States before Kirk replied, “Counting or not counting gang violence?” before the shot rang out.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
