The Manhunt for Charlie Kirk’s Killer, and Putin’s Defiant Message

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0:37Today's Thursday, September 11th. Here's what we're covering.

0:45In Utah, a manhunt is underway as authorities search for the person who shot and killed Charlie Kirk, a close ally of President Trump and the influential founder of the country's foremost right-wing youth activist group. That's a lot of people, Utah. Kirk was holding an event at Utah Valley University yesterday, about 45 minutes south of Salt Lake City. It was the first stop on what was supposed to be his nationwide tour of college campuses this fall, put on by Kirk's organization, Turning Point USA. All right, we're going to get started, everybody. You know how it works. Question and answer. He spoke for about 20 minutes in a crowd of approximately 3 ,000 people, taking questions from the audience, including some who'd come to openly debate him.

1:30Do you know how many mass shooters there have been in America over the last 10 years? One man asked him about mass shootings in America. And just seconds later, a single shot rang out, hitting Kirk. Get down, get down, get down. He was rushed to a hospital where he died a short time later.

1:51Authorities say they believe the shooter fired from a nearby rooftop down onto the quad. Videos recorded at the scene show a person on the roof of a building about 150 yards away, who then rushed off immediately after the shooting. Two people were questioned by police and released, and numerous false posts have circulated online claiming to ID the shooter. But as of now, no one is in custody, and the FBI has asked the public for their help in identifying the gunman. Kirk had his own security detail on site with him yesterday. Over the years, his events sparked backlash and controversy as he rose to become one of the most prominent stars on the right, denouncing woke culture, promoting Christian nationalism, and making inflammatory comments about Jewish, gay, and Black people.

2:40He made his first appearance on Fox News when he was in high school and had become, at just 31, a powerful and charismatic force in Trump's orbit. 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. In a video posted to social media last night, President Trump mourned Kirk's death as a dark moment for America and called out those he felt were to blame. For years, those on the radical left have compared wonderful Americans like Charlie to Nazis and the world's worst mass murderers and criminals. This kind of rhetoric is directly responsible for the terrorism that we're seeing in our country today.

3:29And it must stop right now. Trump's comments were echoed across the right, where the initial shock of Kirk's death almost instantly shifted into open calls for a political reckoning and even vengeance, including from Fox host Jesse Waters. They are at war with us, whether we want to accept it or not. They are at war with us. What are we going to do about it? How much political violence are we going to tolerate? And that's the question we're just going to have to ask ourselves. Kirk's killing coming just months after the assassination of a Democratic lawmaker in Minnesota, along with multiple attempts on Trump's life and growing threats to judges, congresspeople and other public officials, has raised fears of more potential violence.

4:16One professor who conducts polls about the public's attitude toward political violence told The Times that the U.S. is seeing more radicalized politics and more support for violence than at any point in recent years, adding, we're basically a tinderbox of a country.

4:41This week, Russia has dramatically escalated its attacks in Ukraine and ratcheted up tensions with the West. On Sunday, it launched its largest missile and drone barrage of the entire war. And on Tuesday, a Russian bomb exploded in a crowd of older Ukrainians who were picking up their pension payments, killing at least 23 people. Then yesterday, Poland's prime minister said his country had faced a serious and, quote, large-scale provocation after more than a dozen Russian drones entered the country's airspace, causing NATO to scramble fighter jets to shoot them down. We're still trying to understand what exactly happened in Poland on Wednesday, how intentional was this incursion by Russian drones.

5:26But it really does make clear that Putin is prepared to keep taking risks here, to keep pushing the envelope, even if it means bringing NATO more directly into the conflict. Anton Trojanovsky is the Moscow bureau chief for the Times. He's been talking to analysts and people close to the Kremlin about what appears to be a new level of aggression from Russian President Vladimir Putin. You know, we see Putin continuing to escalate in various ways. And I think that really underscores how confident Putin is right now of having the upper hand on the battlefield and being able to face down a West that has been pretty scattered in figuring out how to respond.

6:12And an American president, President Trump, who has been repeatedly setting deadlines and warning of sanctions against Russia and then not following through. So we're in a moment right now where Putin very clearly believes that he's in a position to dictate the terms to the end to this war. And so his message comes down to, I won't back down.

6:43The Times has learned new details about the U.S. military strike on a boat that President Trump claimed was carrying illegal drugs. When Trump announced the strike last week, he said there were 11 Venezuelan gang members on board and that the boat, which was in international waters, was heading to the United States. He justified it as an act of self-defense, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio said drug smugglers pose a, quote, immediate threat to the country. But multiple officials now tell The Times that the boat appeared to have altered its course and turned away from the U.S. before the American strike killed everyone on board.

7:21They said the crew seemed to have been spooked by a military aircraft that had been following the boat. Some legal specialists, including top retired military lawyers, say that revelation undercuts any claim of self-defense. Several had already questioned whether even that rationale was valid, saying that killing low-level smugglers as if they're enemy combatants is a crime. One retired military lawyer told the Times he's concerned that what seemed to him to be in a legal order was able to be passed through the military chain of command and carried out. I think it's a terrible precedent, he said.

7:58We've crossed a line here.

8:09Our jobs as firefighters are dangerous even when everything's going right. We now face a danger created by others, others who are driven not by public safety but by profits and nothing else. Firefighters are raising urgent concerns about soaring costs and major production delays for fire engines in the U.S., which have forced some departments to wait years for new ones while struggling to keep the old rigs running. These delays have absolutely had dangerous impacts on the safety of our neighbors and the prices are crippling municipal budgets. Their warnings came yesterday in testimony to a bipartisan group of lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

8:50Senators were demanding more information about the fire engine supply chain after a recent Times investigation found that Wall Street executives had upended the industry in an effort to boost profits. Fire engines used to be built by small local companies. But starting in the mid-2000s, private equity swooped in and started buying those companies up. Now, the industry's three largest firms control almost 80 percent of the market. I mean, you've got enormous profits. You have a huge backlog. These guys can't get any of their equipment. Where's the money going? You're making a cob of money. At Wednesday's hearing, senators pressed manufacturers, including about whether they were colluding to keep prices high.

9:33In response to the questions, a senior executive at one of the main companies denied those allegations and said they are working to address the backlog of fire engine orders.

9:49And finally, small businesses across the U.S. are finding themselves caught up in a very modern extortion scheme. It starts with a random message on WhatsApp. Like, hey, someone just paid me money to post negative reviews of your business, and I'm about to post a whole bunch of one-star write-ups unless you pay me not to. It's a big threat. These days, negative reviews can be the first thing that pops up when you search for a company, and a bad online reputation can drive away customers. One business owner, who runs a contracting company in California, told The Times she sent hundreds of dollars to scammers with phone numbers from Bangladesh and Pakistan to take down bad reviews that they posted.

10:31Even after that, 10 more bad reviews showed up. She eventually got Google to remove them, but that can be a difficult and time-consuming process. It took me eight years to get my reputation in the market, and one guy can damage it in one day, she told the Times. The scam is not brand new, but it's flared up recently, and some industries have been specifically targeted, including contractors, roofing companies, and movers. Underneath it all is a complicated web of players who are now taking advantage of AI to pump out even more realistic-sounding fake reviews at an enormous scale.

11:10Those are the headlines. Today on The Daily, more on Charlie Kirk's rise to power in the MAGA movement and what his legacy will be. You can listen to that in the New York Times app or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Tracy Mumford. We'll be back tomorrow.

11:31This podcast is supported by On Investing, an original podcast from Charles Schwab. Each week, hosts Liz Ann Saunders, Schwab's Chief Investment Strategist, and Colin Martin, Head of Fixed Income Research and Strategy for the Schwab Center for Financial Research, along with their guests, analyze economic developments and bring context to conversations around stocks, fixed income, the economy, and more. Download the latest episode and subscribe at schwab.com slash oninvesting or wherever you get your podcasts.