Charlie Kirk killing fuels free speech disputes in Wyoming as newspapers come under attack

Two days after an assassin shot and killed Charlie Kirk, the student newspaper at the University of Wyoming published two stories about the conservative activist who’d visited Laramie’s campus only a few months before. 

One was a reported news story, the other an opinion column. Both were written by Charles Vaughters, editor-in-chief of The Branding Iron. As is happening in communities across the U.S. in the days since Kirk’s killing, they would provoke outrage and debate over freedom of speech amid growing concerns about political violence. And that rancor, at least in Wyoming, wouldn’t stop with the Branding Iron.

In the editorial, Vaughters described his experience attending Kirk’s April UW visit. 

“During the entirety of the event, Kirk repeatedly stressed that he only wanted what was best for America, and I believed him,” Vaughters wrote.

The student journalist, who voted for Trump, said he and Kirk “may have had some disagreements on certain policy issues,” but he thought “the man was genuine in his belief that he was doing what was right for the country.” 

The same day Vaughters sat down to pen his editorial, he wrote, the paper asked students on campus what they thought of Kirk’s death. “Most were sympathetic, and you can read their quotes in this very paper,” Vaughters wrote. 

One student, however, was particularly baffling to the paper, Vaughters wrote. The student, “who repeatedly refused to identify themself, basically said that this was a good thing. That Charlie Kirk deserved to die for harboring fascist and racist beliefs.”

“We found that absolutely disgusting,” Vaughters wrote, adding that the paper does “not condone any acts of political violence” and prides itself “on including opinion pieces from writers on every side of the political aisle, should they want to get their voices out there.” 

Vaughters concluded by asking readers to pray for Kirk.

A few hours after the paper was printed and distributed across campus, the Wyoming Freedom Caucus took to social media. The group represents the further right flank of the Republican Party, and its lawmakers control the Wyoming House of Representatives. 

“Why is the UW student newspaper platforming students who support political assassinations? This level of indifference toward human life is dangerous and unacceptable,” the caucus posted on both Facebook and X.

The Facebook post, in particular, erupted into a sprawling, and at times strained, virtual debate. More than 500 comments piled on, many weighing in on the bounds of free speech. Some pointed to the perceived political leanings of the University of Wyoming, saying they would no longer support the school. Several commenters echoed the caucus’ criticism of the paper. 

Others focused on the unnamed student. Some called on the student to be identified, to be expelled, to be watched, to have their gun rights stripped. Others said the student should be free to voice their opinion. 

Quote sparks more controversy

The next day, another virtual cycle began.

After the Cowboy State Daily, the state’s largest news organization, published a story about the student paper and campus reactions to Kirk’s killing, the Freedom Caucus singled out a graduate student quoted in that story, posting her photograph on its social media feeds. 

“Charlie Kirk, in his heart, thought he was doing the right thing, but I think he also spread a lot of horrible rhetoric,” Cowboy State Daily quoted the grad student saying. “I’m not happy to see him murdered in front of his family at all, but I’m also aware that I think I was happy to have his voice out of the spotlight.” 

(Both the graduate student and the editor-in-chief declined WyoFile’s request for interviews.) 

Again, hundreds of comments poured in, split on freedom of speech and what, if any, repercussions the student should face. Some were outraged at the student, and questioned why the public would pay for the salary of someone with her opinions. But for others, even staunch Republicans, the matter came down to the need to protect speech, regardless of whether they found it callous. 

“I’m really struggling to understand why the Freedom Caucus wants to vilify speech. I mean really struggling!” one commenter wrote. “I am a staunch conservative. A constitutionalist to the core. The Republican party is typically too centrist for me, but this is insane! I mourn CK as well. But this is not the answer. It’s like we are doxing people for the rhetoric we don’t agree with in an effort to effectively ‘cancel’ them. Sound like any other party we know?!”

As a conservative activist, Kirk rose to prominence in part for taking on the country’s higher education system for what he saw as policing conservative speech and producing an out-of-control cancel culture. He was perhaps best known for visiting college campuses and inviting students and staff to publicly question and debate him. He also launched an online watchlist in 2016 that targeted university professors who were believed to “discriminate against conservative students, promote anti-American values and advance leftist propaganda in the classroom.” 

UW and the Freedom Caucus

The Facebook posts focusing on The Branding Iron and the grad student weren’t the first time the Wyoming Freedom Caucus has been critical of the  University of Wyoming. In fact, the group has a lengthy history challenging the state’s lone four-year public university.

In late 2022, the Wyoming Freedom Caucus caucus criticized the university for revoking a church leader’s tabling privileges after he targeted a transgender student by name in a sign in the Wyoming Union breezeway. 

“It is clear that the University of Wyoming has impermissibly silenced the protected speech of a Wyoming citizen,” the caucus said in a statement at the time. “The Wyoming Freedom Caucus will not allow Wyoming’s lone land-grant university to bow to the cancel mob. The recent actions of the University of Wyoming are out of step with the people of our State.”

The caucus also pointed ahead to the 2023 session in the statement as an opportunity for “our caucus together with other likeminded legislators to examine closely how the University of Wyoming is spending public dollars. The session will also allow for the legislature to pursue meaningful oversight of the University.”

Two years later, the Legislature voted to cut the school’s block grant and forbade it from spending that appropriation on its Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. More recently, Freedom Caucus members have expressed interest in having more of a say in the school’s spending as part of its plans to “DOGE” the state budget.

Asked to what extent the Freedom Caucus remains concerned about freedom of speech on UW’s campus, the group’s chair, Cody Republican Rep. Rachel Rodriguez-Williams, told WyoFile in a statement, “the right of these troubled students to celebrate Charlie Kirk’s murder does not limit the right of the Wyoming Freedom Caucus to call them out for it.”

“Students are free to say what they want — and we are free to call out any state employee who supports political assassinations,” she wrote. “It is completely within the realm of the First Amendment to point out that Wyoming taxpayers are paying someone who celebrated the assassination of Charlie Kirk. Doing so is an aspect of freedom itself.”

Comments and firings

What’s happening in Laramie is a reflection of a larger trend. Across the country, many Republicans are carrying out a campaign to expose and punish those whose comments on Kirk are deemed inappropriate. 

Numerous professionals, from government employees to teachers and college professors, have reportedly lost their jobs for posting comments critical of Kirk, according to PBS NewsHour. 

“When you see someone celebrating Charlie’s murder, call them out. And hell, call their employer,” Vice President JD Vance said while hosting The Charlie Kirk Show podcast on Monday. “We don’t believe in political violence, but we believe in civility. There is no civility in the celebration of political assassination.” 

Firings have been reported in various professions. One of the more high-profile dismissals involved Disney’s decision this week to remove late-night comedian Jimmy Kimmel from the air waves after he commented on Kirk’s accused assassin.

Cartoon provokes backlash

Closer to home, at least two local businesses in Lander have faced harassment for online comments posted by their owners. In Jackson, the local newspaper company temporarily closed its doors after a syndicated cartoon printed in its weekend edition of the Jackson Hole Daily sparked outrage. 

“Our front office door is locked,” read a sign earlier this week on the door of Teton Media Works, the umbrella company for both the Jackson Hole News&Guide and Jackson Hole Daily. 

“After receiving multiple threats of violence against our employees, we will be glad to assist you via phone or email.”

The publication removed the cartoon from its digital edition and one of its editors apologized to readers, explaining that they understood the cartoon “to suggest that Kirk’s assination might be a turning point in our nation’s divide,” and “as a statement that the United States is at a turning point as a nation, where political violence is escalating at an alarming rate.” 

The company’s owners also published a letter to readers Wednesday. 

“To move forward, we will use this fracture of trust to ensure everything we do reflects our publishing principles: Seek the truth and report it. Minimize harm. Act independently. Be accountable and transparent,” the letter reads. “We have changed internal content review, and we have re-engineered editing processes to uphold these values.”

Chip Bok, the right-leaning cartoonist who produced the cartoon, took a different tone following uproar in other states where his cartoon was published in local papers. 

“My agenda as a cartoonist is basically free speech. That made Charlie Kirk my kind of guy,” Bok wrote on his website. 

“Here’s my apology: I’m sorry Charlie Kirk isn’t around to give these guys a free speech lesson.” 

The Wyoming Democratic Party on Thursday warned of a crackdown on free speech.

“Free speech is a core American value — and one that Charlie Kirk himself championed,” the party said in a press release. “That’s why, even as we condemn the horrific shooting in the strongest possible terms, we cannot stand by while politicians in Washington and here in Wyoming use this tragedy to crack down on free speech.”

The party also accused the Freedom Caucus of turning “this tragedy into a McCarthy-style witch hunt” for its decision to target the student paper and a graduate student. 

“It will take all of us, across the political spectrum pushing back to protect our constitutional rights,” the party wrote. 

Some suggested a simple solution, and one often advocated by Kirk himself: more speech.

On Wide Right Turn, one of the state’s conservative podcasts, host Joey Correnti and Sheridan Republican Rep. Tom Kelly described their horror with “those celebrating and rationalizing the assassination” as well as their disappointment with “those on the right espousing a desire for revenge” in Tuesday’s episode. 

“Put the rage away,” Kelly said. “Do what Charlie would have wanted you to do, and keep talking.”