ISTANBUL

Conservative American political commentator Charlie Kirk was shot dead during a university event in the Western state of Utah on Wednesday, an incident that has once again brought the alarming trend of political violence in the United States into sharp focus.

Kirk, the 31-year-old activist, founded his organization, Turning Point USA, in 2012, building a national profile by targeting younger people and organizing events on liberal-leaning college campuses.

The shooting is the latest in a series of violent acts that reflect the nation's deep political divisions and a history marked by politically motivated attacks.

The US has a long and bloody history of political assassination. Four of its presidents have been murdered. The first was US President Abraham Lincoln, shot dead on April 14, 1865, by Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth at Ford's Theatre in Washington.

President James A. Garfield was shot twice in the back on July 2, 1881, at a Washington railroad station by a disgruntled office-seeker. On Sept. 6, 1901, President William McKinley was shot at point-blank range by an anarchist factory worker during a public reception in Buffalo, New York.

The most recent presidential assassination occurred on Nov. 22, 1963, when US President John F. Kennedy was shot by a sniper, Lee Harvey Oswald, in Dallas, Texas.

The 1960s also saw the assassinations of key leaders like civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr. in Memphis in 1968 and activist Malcolm X in New York City in 1965.

New era of political violence

While decades passed without such high-level successful assassinations, recent years have seen a dramatic number of deadly instances of political violence targeting officials at all levels of government.

The recent deadliest attack on elected officials occurred in June 2025 in Minnesota. A 57-year-old man, Vance Boelter, went on a politically motivated shooting spree, killing Democratic State Representative Melissa Hortman and her husband, and wounding State Senator John Hoffman and his wife. After a multi-day manhunt, Boelter was arrested and found to possess a "hit list" containing the names of 45 Democratic officials.

In April, Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro’s residence was set on fire. The suspect admitted to planning to beat Shapiro with a hammer.

In 2022, Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg was nearly killed in an assassination attempt during his mayoral campaign when a suspect fired 6 shots in the campaign office.

A similarly targeted attack struck the family of US District Judge Esther Salas in New Jersey on July 19, 2020. A self-proclaimed "anti-feminist" lawyer, Roy Den Hollander, disguised himself as a delivery driver and went to the judge's home, where he shot and killed her 20-year-old son, Daniel, and critically injured her husband, Mark.

One of the most significant events was the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol. A group of Donald Trump's supporters stormed the building to prevent the certification of the 2020 election. Five people died on the day of the attack, and four police officers died by suicide in the following days.

Assassination attempts on national leaders

The highest levels of American politics have also been targeted recently. In 2024, Trump faced two assassination attempts during his presidential campaign. On July 13, at a rally in Pennsylvania, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks fired an AR-15-style rifle from a rooftop 400 feet (122 meters) away. The shots grazed Trump's ear, killed a spectator, and wounded two others before Secret Service snipers killed Crooks.

The second attempt occurred on Sept. 15, when 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh hid in bushes with an SKS rifle 300-500 yards (274-457 meters) from Trump at a Florida golf course. A Secret Service agent spotted the rifle and opened fire, causing Routh to flee without firing a shot.

Other top officials have faced grave threats. In October 2022, the husband of then-US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Paul Pelosi, was bludgeoned with a hammer by an intruder in their San Francisco home. The attacker said he intended to hold the speaker hostage and break her kneecaps.

In June 2022, an armed man was arrested outside the home of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, later admitting he intended to kill the justice.

Members of Congress have also been directly targeted. On June 14, 2017, a gunman motivated by left-wing extremism opened fire on Republican lawmakers practicing for a charity baseball game in Alexandria, Virginia. House Majority Whip Steve Scalise was critically wounded, and three others were injured before Capitol Police killed the attacker in a 10-minute gunfight.

Targeting infrastructure and officials

The violence has also extended to the infrastructure of politics. Political party offices for both Democrats and Republicans have been repeatedly attacked. In the fall of 2024, a man shot at a Democratic office in Tempe, Arizona, on three separate occasions and was later found with over 120 guns.

In March 2025, the New Mexico GOP (Grand Old Party) headquarters in Albuquerque was targeted by suspected arson. Other incidents have included a 2016 firebombing of a North Carolina GOP office and repeated acts of vandalism against Democratic offices nationwide.

The period has also seen a wave of attacks related to Tesla and its CEO, Elon Musk, following his increased involvement in politics. In early 2025, dealerships and charging stations were targeted with Molotov cocktails, arson, and vandalism in multiple US states.

Finally, the democratic process itself has come under assault. Election workers have faced a wave of death threats and intimidation since 2020, leading to mass resignations. In 2024, suspicious packages containing white powder were sent to election officials in eight states, and ballot drop boxes were set on fire.