Students revive Turning Point USA chapters in Virginia
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A Turning Point USA event on Sept. 24 at Virginia Tech. Photo: Alex Wroblewski/AFP
Turning Point USA — the conservative group co-founded by the late Charlie Kirk — is seeing a resurgence on Virginia college campuses.
Why it matters: The group has been credited for helping secure the youth vote that delivered President Trump his victory in 2024, Axios' Josephine Walker reports.
- And now White House officials want to ensure it remains well-funded and on solid footing ahead of the 2026 midterms, Axios' Alex Isenstadt scooped this week.
State of play: At the time of Kirk's death last month, Turning Point — which describes itself as the "largest and fastest growing conservative youth activist organization in the country" — had roughly 900 official college chapters and 1,200 high school chapters nationwide, USA Today reported.
- Now, several public colleges in Virginia are reviving or starting a chapter, just some of the more than 32,000 inquiries Turning Point received for new chapters in the immediate days after Kirk's death, according to spokesperson Andrew Kolvet.
- Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) helped up the ante while filling in for Kirk at a Turning Point event at Virginia Tech last month. There, the governor announced a $100,000 donation to the group to help support new chapters in the state, per Politico.
Zoom in: VCU's Turning Point USA chapter, last active in 2023, is being revived, per the editor of VCU 's student paper.
- More than 80 students turned out for an interest meeting last month for a JMU chapter, its student paper, The Breeze, reported. That group hadn't been active since 2021, per its Instagram.
- A Virginia Tech chapter restarted this semester and saw dozens of new members after Kirk's death, WDBJ reported.
- And similar resurgences seem to he happening at other Virginia colleges, including ODU, which held its first meeting of the year in mid-September. Inaugural meetings quickly followed at George Mason and UVA, per their social accounts.
Zoom out: Kirk co-founded Turning Point in 2012. The organization says it educates students about the "importance of freedom, free markets, and limited government."
- While Kirk and Turning Point were widely praised by conservatives, liberal critics said his provocative style and rhetoric at times were anti-Muslim, sexist, homophobic and transphobic.