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CLERMONT, Fla. – On Sunday evening, hundreds of people gathered at Clermont’s Waterfront Park to remember Charlie Kirk.
Kirk was killed during a political rally in Utah on Sept. 10.
“He reminded me of what it means to stand firm in the truth, to love this country, and most importantly, to love Jesus Christ,” Connor Hayes told News 6.
Hayes, the event organizer, said the idea for the remembrance blossomed after a social media post he made for an earlier event honoring Kirk garnered over 60,000 views.
“Charlie Kirk was – he wasn’t just somebody who got involved in politics, he was someone who was big in his faith,” added Hayes. “And he was one of the best debaters out there. And unfortunately, there’s people out there, who, if they don’t agree with you, they’ll shut you down, or unfortunately, they’ll kill you.”
Aliya Erhardt, 16, also spoke at tonight’s memorial.
“I think even though it’s tragic what happened, it shouldn’t take something like this to get to this point where people start to care,” she said before the memorial began.
Aliya Erhardt, who announced at the memorial that she was organizing a launch of a Turning Point USA chapter in Clermont told the crowd “The enemy did not silence Charlie Kirk because he spoke, he silenced him because we listened.”
Turning Point USA was created as a nonprofit aimed at promoting conservative valuers at college campus across the U.S.
Aliya and her dad, Sean Erhardt, wanted to focus on Charlie Kirk’s life, a life cut short by violence. But at the same time, they also wanted to put divisiveness and rhetoric aside.
“It doesn’t matter what side you’re on, what color you are, where you come from,” Sean Erhardt told News 6. “I could care less about any of that. It’s the simple fact of just being, you know, just being humane to be to one another.”
Tonight’s memorial stayed true to heart – more as a faith-based church service, and less like a political rally.
And although there was a heavy law enforcement presence at the park by the Clermont Police Department, everything went off without a hitch.
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