What happened
Tens of thousands of people gathered at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, yesterday for a memorial service for slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk. The speakers included President Donald Trump and many of his administration’s top officials, plus Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk (pictured above), who has assumed leadership of his Turning Point USA organization.

Who said what
The five-hour service “had the feel of a religious revival mixed with a ’Make America Great Again’ rally,” Reuters said. Many of the speakers “invoked religious warfare” and “extolled” Kirk as a “religious leader of almost biblical stature,” The Washington Post said, and “the crowd rose to its feet in applause” when his widow said she forgave his killer. “I forgive him because it is what Christ did,” Erika Kirk said. “The answer to hate is not hate.” 

Trump, whose 45-minute speech closed the event, called the murder suspect a “radicalized, cold-blooded monster” and said that unlike Charlie Kirk, “I hate my opponent and I don’t want the best for them.” He honored Kirk as a “martyr for American freedom” but “pivoted swiftly to blunt politics,” The New York Times said. As his “speech veered increasingly” into political point-scoring, “hundreds of people started leaving the arena.”

What next?
Trump was “just one of several speakers to use the word ‘revival’” at Kirk’s memorial, The Wall Street Journal said. The who’s who of GOP leaders “appeared hopeful it might unify and fortify a conservative movement that had shown signs of cracking” before Kirk was assassinated.

What happened
The Justice Department suspended and then closed a bribery investigation into President Donald Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan (pictured above), that was launched after undercover FBI agents recorded him accepting a $50,000 bag of cash while promising future immigration-related contracts, The Washington Post, Reuters and MSNBC reported over the weekend. Trump, meanwhile, “all but ordered” Attorney General Pam Bondi to “prosecute his political foes in a series of weekend posts,” The Wall Street Journal said.

Who said what
The FBI set up the September 2024 sting after the target of an unrelated investigation “repeatedly brought up Homan, saying he was collecting bribes in exchange for future government contracts,” Reuters said. With video of Homan taking the cash, “several FBI and Justice officials” believed they had a “strong criminal case” for “conspiracy to commit bribery,” which only requires proving intent, MSNBC said, citing four sources.

FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche yesterday said the investigation was shuttered after a “full review by FBI agents” and prosecutors “found no credible evidence of any criminal wrongdoing.” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson called the case a “blatantly political investigation” by the Biden administration against “Trump’s allies.” 

What next?
Trump said Saturday on social media he was appointing White House adviser Lindsey Halligan, a former personal lawyer, to be U.S. attorney in Virginia, after forcing out his previous appointee, Erik Siebert, on Friday. Trump criticized “woke RINO” Siebert for declining to file charges against New York Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI Director James Comey. James, Comey and Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) are “all guilty as hell,” and “we can’t delay any longer, it’s killing our reputation and credibility,” Trump wrote in a post Saturday directed to “Pam.” “JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!”