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Dec. 16, 2025 - Rubin Report - Dave Rubin
14:54
Being with Charlie Kirk in His Final Moments & Debunking Candace Owens | Frank Turek
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frank turek
We later learned from the doctor, he was killed instantly.
He didn't feel a thing because it essentially went into his neck and hit his, probably his brainstem.
And so he was gone already.
But we did whatever we could to try and stop the bleeding.
And I tried CPR on him, you know, just to you had to try, right?
I mean, and then we all know what happened.
I mean, they did get a pulse when we got to the hospital, but that's just because his body was strong.
You know, you can do that even where the guy's already gone.
So the only saving grace is he was killed instantly.
And at this point, there's really good evidence that Tyler Robinson did this.
And I think just about, I can't say everything, but most of what you're hearing online is just categorically false.
Candace Owens' conspiracy theories, false.
Maybe she has one or two things right.
But Dave, so far from her, we've heard the Egyptians are involved.
The Israelis are involved.
Trump did it.
Turning point did it.
Mikey McCoy, Rob McCoy, the French did it.
I thought all the French did was surrender, Dave.
In any event, everybody has been implicated in this.
They can't all be implicated in this.
It's strange credulity to think all those people work together, which means just by pure logic, most of what she's saying, if not all, has to be false.
why don't people see this?
dave rubin
All right, I'm Dave Rubin, and joining me is a prominent Christian apologist, author, and president of crossexamine.org.
My friend Frank Turek, welcome back to the Rubin Report.
frank turek
Dave, always great being with you, and it was especially good seeing you at Charlie's Memorial.
You came all the way from Miami to Phoenix.
I know everybody appreciates that.
Thank you for being there.
dave rubin
Well, it was an incredibly, well, thank you for speaking that day, and it was an incredibly moving day.
And actually, why don't I give the audience a little insider info at the moment, which is that we are taping this right now on December 10th, 2025.
And it didn't hit me until this morning when I was doing my live show that it's three months to the day since Charlie was assassinated.
Now, I want to spend most of our time together today talking about Christmas and talking about Jesus and the reason for the season.
However, I think we should probably get into a little bit about what happened that day and some of the subsequent events because you were not only with Charlie that day, you were quite literally with him in his last moments in the car.
So I know you've talked a whole bunch about this, but maybe you could just kind of recap a slightly shorter version of that, and then we can talk a little bit about some of what's transpired over the three months.
And then I really do want to focus on Christmas and love and decency and all of those things.
frank turek
Yeah, thank you, Dave.
You know, Charlie considered me somewhat of a mentor because I've been going to college campuses for many years, providing evidence that Christianity is true and then answering questions of students.
So he contacted me about five and a half years ago to help him out.
Now, as you know, Dave, it can be difficult to mentor somebody smarter than you, but not with Charlie because the only thing that exceeded his intellect was his humility.
So the few things that I knew that he didn't know he wanted to know.
And the reason I was with him that day is because this summer we spent four, I took four trips to Phoenix to help him get ready for this upcoming college tour.
And we were together for a couple of days before this event.
He said, hey, Frank, why don't you just come with me to the event and just see how it goes?
And then he and I were supposed to be together at Berkeley on November 10th.
And of course, he remains with Jesus.
And it was Rob Schneider and I that went to Berkeley.
I think you probably saw some of the craziness that went on there.
In any event, I'm standing 25 feet from him when the shot rang out.
And Dave, I feared this was going to happen at some point.
I really did.
I feared that somebody was going to take a shot at Charlie.
In fact, when we were heading into the event, we had some footage from above.
Originally, I thought it was drone footage, but it may not have been drone footage because there was a building above us that you could, and a walkway, you could have easily put your cell phone over and taken drone footage or footage from above.
And there was such a crowd there an hour before, I said to Charlie, Charlie, I don't like this place.
There are too many buildings.
And he just kind of shrugged it off because he was brave.
He knew he had to put himself in harm's way to reach people.
You just can't be completely secure.
He loved people and he wanted them to know the truth.
So he put himself out there.
And when that shot rang out, I said to myself, if it ever happens, do whatever you can.
Just try and do whatever you can to help him.
So I went with the security team and just got in the car and tried to revive him.
But Dave, he wasn't looking at me.
He was looking right past me into eternity.
His eyes were fixed.
We later learned from the doctor, he was killed instantly.
He didn't feel a thing because it essentially went into his neck and hit his, probably his brainstem.
And so he was gone already.
But we did whatever we could to try and stop the bleeding.
And I tried CPR on him, you know, just to you had to try, right?
I mean, and then we all know what happened.
I mean, they did get a pulse when we got to the hospital, but that's just because his body was strong.
You know, you can do that even when the guy's already gone.
So the only saving grace is he was killed instantly.
And at this point, there's really good evidence that Tyler Robinson did this.
And I think just about, I can't say everything, but most of what you're hearing online is just categorically false.
Candace Owens' conspiracy theories, false.
Maybe she has one or two things right.
But Dave, so far from her, we've heard the Egyptians are involved.
The Israelis are involved.
Trump did it.
Turning point did it.
Mikey McCoy, Rob McCoy, the French did it.
I thought all the French did was surrender, Dave.
In any event, everybody has been implicated in this.
They can't all be implicated in this.
It's strange credulity to think all those people work together, which means just by pure logic, most of what she's saying, if not all, has to be false.
Why don't people see this?
dave rubin
Frank, what do you think Charlie would think about the fallout three months later?
The fact that the right has become so frayed, the fact that somebody like Tucker Carlson, who I think he considered a friend, ushered in Nick Fuentes, who was the only person that Charlie did not want to be part of this movement, who was actively trying to destroy everything that Charlie created.
I mean, those are basically his words.
I don't even want to repeat his words when he said that because it was so vile how he talked about impregnating Charlie's baby turning point, et cetera, et cetera.
What do you think he would think about all this?
I've desperately tried to honor his legacy and I don't know if it's working.
frank turek
I know what he would think because the day before he was murdered, I was in a meeting with him and Josh Hammer can verify this.
He was part of it via Zoom and a couple of folks in Israel were on the call as well.
And the whole premise of the call, Dave, was how can I answer questions better on campus when people bring up the Israeli-Hamas conflict?
He just wanted to know their insights because Charlie was a sponge.
You know this, Dave.
I mean, he had humility and he knew that people knew things he didn't know.
And he wanted to know what those things were.
That's why he, I wasn't his only mentor.
He had mentors all over the place.
So, I mean, you were a friend of his.
I'm sure he learned so much from you too.
dave rubin
You learn more from him.
frank turek
Yeah, so me too.
But the point here is, is that what's going on now, trying to slander people, trying to say that Charlie was on their side or this side or that side when they didn't have access to Charlie is false and it's very, very disuniting.
The proverb says, one thing the Lord hates is when you stir up dissension among the brothers, especially when you don't have evidence.
And that's what's going on, Dave.
dave rubin
So where do you think this is coming from?
I mean, this is going to sound corny or maybe not to you.
Maybe it'll sound like the loftiest thing I could say.
But I've actually, as it relates to this, Charlie's life and legacy, I personally have tried to act more Christ-like.
I'm sure I'm failing constantly, but I've tried to have my better angels with me and not be part of the fight.
I'm not saying I've never been part of it and it's just the nature of this business.
But to watch so many people release his text messages for political purposes, to make up things, to use that man's life and to do it overnight in essence.
I just, I honestly, and maybe it's also part of the season, I cannot fathom it right now.
frank turek
Yeah, well, the problem is, is that this is coming from the pit of hell because Satan is a liar and a murderer, and both those things have been done in Charlie's life.
First of all, he was murdered.
Second of all, there's been a lot of lies told about him, a lot of lies told about TPUSA, a lot of lies told about the people involved who love Charlie.
I mean, one of the very first conspiracy theories was about me, the guy in the white hat.
And the FBI actually checked that out, Dave.
They called me and they said, we're sorry we have to ask you this, but were you signaling the shooter?
I said, yeah.
I was telling him to steal second base.
unidentified
I mean, it's the stupidest thing in the world, right?
frank turek
Like somebody needs to be signaled as to who Charlie Kirk is.
Everyone knows he's the only guy sitting under the tent with the microphone, but yet people will believe the dumbest things.
And unfortunately, it's causing a lot of dissension.
And Erica, to her credit, is moving forward.
I was with them recently in Mar-a-Lago at their donor event.
She, despite the fact that she's grieving, is focused on the future, focused on what Charlie would want us to be focused on.
That's the Lord and the country.
And that's what she's doing.
And that's what we're all going to do.
dave rubin
There is a big turning point event that Tucker and many others will be at.
Do you think Turning Point itself should have done anything differently over these last three months?
You know, they finally released a video sort of debunking some of Candace's nonsense.
Do you think there was some other way to do this?
Or is it that turning point itself that Charlie's fingerprints were so all over everything there that they, for as incredible as Erica is, and I mean, she's a grieving mother on top of all this, that she has to run this organization, that there was no way to prop, there was no one to properly message this or what do you do in the face of eyes?
Do you think there's anything else they could have done?
And again, an awful lot could change between us taping this and when it airs.
frank turek
I don't know.
I don't know if there was any really good solution to this because as Blake said in his statement last week or now that people watch this a few weeks ago, the statement was essentially, well, we considered Candace the friend and we thought she wouldn't continue to do this.
And we've reached out to her, but she just continued to go on and on and on.
So, you know, on one hand, you say, hey, this is going to die down because Candace is just asking some questions and eventually this is going to die down.
She'll get to the point where she knows that what she's saying is false, but that hasn't happened.
So at some point, they just decided, well, we're going to have to, we're going to have to at least address it.
And then they invited her to come on the show and she, she declined after saying, name the time, name the place.
You know, so what are they to do?
What are they to do?
I don't know what else to do other than, okay, let's talk about it.
And then she doesn't want to talk about it.
unidentified
So do you judge her motives?
frank turek
Look, Dave, I can't judge her motives and I don't speak for Turning Point.
I'm not an employee of Turning Point.
I'm just friends with them.
I love them.
I love Erica.
I'd love Charlie as I know you did.
I love the people involved.
And one of the things I'm upset with, I don't care when people attack me.
I'm upset when they attack Erica.
I'm upset when they attack Mikey McCoy.
Mikey McCoy would not step on an ant.
He's such a Gentile-loving soul.
And yet they're implicating him somehow in the murder.
It's crazy, Dave.
Imagine if we sat here and said, you know what?
I think Candace Owens is the real murderer.
I think she was upset that Charlie cut her out of the big events.
I think that Candace Owens really decided to have Charlie killed and she was jealous of Erica and she's bringing all this up to cover her tracks.
Is that possible, Dave?
Oh, that's possible.
Do I have any evidence for it?
No.
And it would be ridiculous for me to suggest that without evidence, but that's what she's doing.
dave rubin
You know, it's funny, Frank.
I don't know if you know a bit of my history with Candace, but, you know, I was basically the first one to put her on a real primetime show and when she was kind of nobody had a little channel.
And I joke with people now because everyone always asks me about this.
And it's like, and it's a kind of a joke, but it's kind of not.
I really think when I meet my maker one day, I'm going to have to answer for that.
Like I didn't see something that maybe I should have saw.
I don't know what to do with that.
frank turek
Well, hey, hey, Charlie, the first person I asked Charlie about when he, when he called me, when he reached out to me first, five and a half years ago, I said, tell me about your organization.
Tell me what you do.
Who do you produce?
First person he said was Candace Owens.
dave rubin
Because she's a talented person.
You know that I introduced them?
frank turek
I did not know that.
unidentified
No.
dave rubin
I introduced them at a David Horowitz, another person she's turned on.
He's no longer with us, unfortunately.
One of his Freedom Center events at the Breakers in West Palm.
I was with Candace.
We saw Charlie down the hall.
She said, I'd love to meet him.
I introduced them.
They stood about 20 feet away from me for about 10 minutes.
She walks back up to me and says, I just got a job with Turning Point.
I swear I'm allowed.
frank turek
I pray for Candace because I think she's an enormous talent directed properly, but she's gone off the deep end.
I mean, not all these people can be involved in this, Dave.
And yet she keeps going on and on about all these different conspiracy theories.
And yet people are getting death threats over it.
Mikey McCoy, even I get emails.
You never know what can happen to you.
You ought to repent.
I'm going, dude, I was there trying to save him.
He's my friend.
You know, it's just, it's crazy.
dave rubin
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