Erika Kirk Breaks Silence Following White House Correspondents’ Dinner Shooting
on Apr 29, 2026
Erika Kirk issued a statement on Wednesday following the shooting at the annual White House Correspondents’ Dinner on Saturday night.
Erika Kirk, the widow of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk, was in attendance at Saturday’s White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner, where a gunman opened fire in an alleged attempt to assassinate President Donald Trump.
Video of the shooting shows an estimated 2500 guests seeking cover after gunshots were heard in the lobby of the Washington Hilton Hotel. Among those guests was Erika Kirk, who was seen seated next to Fox News correspondent Lawrence Jones in the moments prior to the shooting.
Footage was captured of Erika rushing out of the venue after the gunman, 31-year-old Cole Thomas Allen, was detained by Secret Service Agents. Kirk was visibly upset as she was escorted out of the venue and could be heard saying, “I just want to go home.”
Erika Kirk’s Statement
Four days after the shooting, Kirk released a 9-minute-long video addressing the situation. She started the video with scathing criticism of “the evil of this world,” whom she blames for “perverting the truth to the point that they motivated the murder” of her husband, Charlie, and “continuously tried to assassinate the president.”
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She then explained why she attended the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner.
“Everyone is asking why I even went to the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. It was because many of the journalists in that room have attempted to dehumanize me, and I wanted to meet some of them face to face, quite frankly,” she explained. “Why have a conversation about me when you can have a conversation with me?”
Erika detailed the moment “gunshots rang out, and chaos ensued.” She called out journalists who were more concerned with getting a video than with their own safety, a claim she says violates “the first rule of journalism.”
“These people have been so desensitized that fight or flight became secondary to the opportunity to put themselves into the story, which ironically, breaks the number one rule of journalism,” Erika claimed.
Erika Kirk Calls Out Jimmy Kimmel and Candace Owens
Two days before the alleged assassination attempt, late-night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel joked that Melania Trump had “the glow of an expected widow.” The comment drew ire from conservatives who saw it as a call for the death of President Trump.
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Kimmel told his audience on Monday (April 27), following Saturday’s shooting, that the comment was a joke about Donald and Melania Trump’s age difference. Erika Kirk hit back at Kimmel, saying, “In this culture we’re living in [sic] absorbs disagreement as a form of personal betrayal. It turns having an opposing viewpoint into a moral crime worthy of punishment.”
Kirk then turned her attention to the criticism she has personally faced as she’s lived through “literal hell these last seven months.”
“Every morning I wake up to a new headline lying about me. I have comedians dressing up in white face. I have people saying I’m not fit to be CEO. And I have Candace Owens claiming I murdered my husband,” she said. “And the list goes on and on and on.”
Erika Kirk concluded her statement by criticizing the media for finding a way to “conveniently explain away violence.” She challenged viewers not to allow “evil forces to divide us,” and to choose to handle disagreement through civil discourse, just as Charlie Kirk was known for doing.
See Erika Kirk’s full statement in the video below.
