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At a White House ceremony in the Rose Garden on Tuesday on what would have been her husband’s 32nd birthday, Erika Kirk accepted the Presidential Medal of Freedom on behalf of Charlie Kirk and delivered a powerful, deeply personal tribute to his life and legacy.
“Thank you, Mr. President, for honoring my husband in such a profound way,” she began. “Charlie always admired your commitment to freedom.”
She offered thanks to the first lady, the vice president, and friends and family “watching from all around the world,” along with Turning Point USA staff and chapters nationwide. “You are the heartbeat of this future and of this movement,” she said. “Everything Charlie built lives through you.”
Erika added that the Presidential Medal of Freedom itself is rooted in America’s Founding. “The very existence of the Presidential Medal of Freedom reminds us that the national interest of the United States has always been freedom,” she said.
CHARLIE KIRK POSTHUMOUSLY AWARDED MEDAL OF FREEDOM ON WHAT WOULD HAVE BEEN HIS 32ND BIRTHDAY
Erika Kirk, Charlie Kirk’s widow, participates in a Medal of Freedom Ceremony for late US right-wing activist Charlie Kirk in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, DC, on Oct. 14, 2025. Kirk was shot dead on a Utah college campus on Sept. 10, 2025, sparking a wave of grief among conservatives, and threats of a clampdown on the “radical left” from President Donald Trump. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images)
“Our founders etched it into the preamble of our Constitution, and those words are not relics on parchment. They are a living covenant. The blessings of liberty are not man’s invention. They are God’s endowment.”
She recalled how Charlie wrote about freedom often. “He believed that liberty was both a right and a responsibility. And he used to say that freedom is the ability to do what is right without fear. And that’s how he lived,” Erika said.
“His name, Charles,…
