Last week, Red Alert Politics contributor Jordan Lancaster published an op-ed in these pages that was critical of Turning Point USA and its founder Charlie Kirk, warning young conservatives to stay away from the group. While I’m sure Lancaster had good intentions, such criticisms of Kirk and TPUSA are unfair and unhelpful to the greater youth conservative movement.
One of Lancaster’s core criticisms of Kirk and his organization focuses on their relationship with the Trump administration and the Trump family. Critics like Lancaster argue that since the 2016 election, Kirk and TPUSA have abandoned previously-held beliefs to remain in lockstep with Trump.
There are several problems with this critique. First, it incorrectly implies that the ideas behind conservative politics cannot change, as they clearly have with the rise of President Trump. To claim that having a sensible change in opinion on trade or foreign policy somehow makes a person less conservative is an elitist, out-of-touch view.
Additionally, Lancaster suggests Kirk maliciously orchestrated TPUSA’s rejection of free trade and support for President Trump’s trade war. But he didn’t.
Kirk, like millions of other free-market conservatives, is willing to defend tariffs against bad actors such as Mexico and China, even though ideally, he does support free trade. It’s also in the United States’ national security interests to stop emboldening adversaries with free trade when these gracious policies aren’t reciprocated.
And this criticism suggests that Kirk and TPUSA must publicly emphasize their policy disagreements with Trump. According to critics, failing to do so somehow makes TPUSA “deceptive” and “dishonest.”
But if people are looking for commentary that’s critical of the president, they should go read the Washington Post or the New York Times. Or, they could watch CNN, MSNBC, ABC, NBC, or any of the seemingly infinite news outlets that have publicly demonstrated their anti-Trump bias.
This isn’t to say that conservatives can’t or shouldn’t disagree with Trump, Kirk included. I’m sure Kirk disagrees on several policy matters with the Trump administration. But there’s nothing to be gained by publicly accentuating a few differences when Kirk, TPUSA, and Trump clearly have much more in common.
It’s not Kirk’s job to do the work of the liberal media.
Moreover, those who criticize Kirk for developing a relationship with Trump would likely do the same if they could. Such a relationship would be invaluable to any organization.
Lancaster also discussed the allegations of racism by TPUSA staffers. This is of course a serious issue, and Kirk dealt with it appropriately by firing the employees who made the racist statements in question.
However, insinuating that the offensive texts and tweets of a few bad apples are emblematic of the views of an entire organization is extremely unfair. Such a standard would mean that any large company, government agency, or organization is defined by the worst actions of a few of its employees. One employee’s racism, sexism, or bigotry does not define an organization, especially when corrective action was taken.
At worst, one could argue that TPUSA should improve its hiring process and strengthen its HR department to ensure employees who have previously made bigoted statements are not hired. But TPUSA should also get credit for its work in empowering minority conservatives through their black and Hispanic leadership events. A racist organization wouldn’t spend resources doing this.
And while I don’t know Kirk very well personally, I have interacted with him professionally on several occasions. I was also a member of TPUSA in my last semester of college.
When I started working as a freelance journalist in 2017, Kirk not only granted me a press pass to TPUSA’s Student Action Summit, but he graciously allowed me to use TPUSA’s professional film equipment to interview the conference speakers. As any young journalist would attest, this access and equipment were extremely helpful to building my portfolio. Regardless of one’s personal feelings for Kirk, acts like that warrant respect.
I can’t help but wonder if some of the criticisms come because of Kirk’s success. Of all the conservative youth groups, TPUSA has been the most criticized in recent years while also arguably being the most successful.
Kirk is clearly a talented individual who has created a very successful organization. People are welcome to disagree with him and TPUSA’s mission. But if these individuals, staffers or outside observers disagree with the political direction of the group they should either quit or simply say so without issuing hyperbolic attacks on Kirk’s character and TPUSA’s integrity.
Eduardo Neret is a contributor to Red Alert Politics and a former member of Turning Point USA.
