ISTANBUL

US President Donald Trump condemned the fatal shooting of conservative commentator and activist Charlie Kirk on Wednesday, calling it “a dark moment” for the country.

“To my great fellow Americans, I am filled with grief and anger at the heinous assassination of Charlie Kirk on a college campus in Utah,” Trump said on the US social media company Truth Social’s platform, which he owns.

He vowed 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.”

“This is a dark moment for America,” he said, sending his prayers to Kirk’s wife Erika and their two children. “We ask God to watch over them in this terrible hour of heartache and pain.”

He labeled Kirk as “a martyr for truth and freedom” who inspired millions, devoting “his life to the cause of open debate and the country that he loved so much, the United States of America.”

Trump said that “for years, those on the radical left have compared wonderful Americans like Charlie to Nazis and the world's worst mass murderers and criminals, adding that “this kind of rhetoric is directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in the country today.”

“Charlie was the best of America, and the monster who attacked him was attacking our whole country. An assassin tried to silence him with a bullet, but he failed, because together we will ensure that his voice, his message, and his legacy will live on for countless generations to come,” he said in praise of the 31-year-old.

Kirk was fatally shot during a university event in the western state of Utah on Wednesday.

Footage posted on social media appears to depict Kirk sitting under a canopy addressing hundreds of assembled students at Utah Valley University when a sound like a gunshot rings out, Kirk recoils, and students began fleeing en masse.

A separate video taken from close to where Kirk was speaking appears to show a bullet striking Kirk's neck, followed by sudden, massive blood loss.