Tangle - SPECIAL EDITION: Interview with witness of Charlie Kirk shooting.

Episode Date: September 14, 2025

A couple of days ago, a Tangle reader reached out and shared that she was at the event yesterday where Charlie Kirk was killed. She bravely offered to recount her experience to share with the Tangle audience in an interview with Tangle senior editor Will Kaback. You can subscribe to Tangle by clicking here or drop something in our tip jar by clicking here. Our Executive Editor and Founder is Isaac Saul. Our Executive Producer is Jon Lall.This podcast was hosted by Will Kaback and edited and engineered by Dewey Thomas. Music for the podcast was produced by Diet 75 and Jon Lall. Our newsletter is edited by Managing Editor Ari Weitzman, Senior Editor Will Kaback, Lindsey Knuth, Kendall White, Bailey Saul, and Audrey Moorehead.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Not a billionaire, not a problem. You can still do something legendary by leaving a gift to charity in your will. Even 1% in your will can change the game for a cause you care about without taking away what you or your family need. It's a powerful way to make your mark. Anyone can leave a legacy. Willpower shows you how. Learn more at willpower.ca.

Hey, everybody, and welcome to a special edition of the Tangle podcast. This is Will Kayback, Tangle's senior editor. On Wednesday, we watched in horror as the news and the video of Charlie Kirk's shooting and death spread on social media and in news outlets. In Tangle, we covered the shooting on Thursday as our main name. addition, and I'm sure this will be a topic that continues to come up in our future coverage. On Thursday morning, I received an email from a Tangle reader who quickly identified herself as someone who had been at the event at Utah Valley University, where Charlie Kirk was shot. She said that she was interested in sharing her perspective on what happened and her reflections

on the event about 24 hours after the fact. I reached out to her, connected with her, and learned a little bit more about who she was. She asked to only be identified as Haley for this episode. She lives in Utah. She is a sophomore in high school, and she was attending the event out of curiosity because she was familiar with Kirk

and had followed some of his videos and was interested to see what the debate with students was going to look like and she was in the crowd when the shooting occurred and was forced to rapidly evacuate along with her friends and as she describes

tried to get out of the area completely on her own without really any direction from any officials or authority figures as you can imagine it's an incredibly visceral and in my opinion moving recollection of the events and

in the course of our conversation I thought that Haley made several profound observations about how witnessing something like this changes a person immediately and forever. And I really admired her willingness to come forward and share her story so soon after a traumatic event like that. And after the conversation, it was clear that this was something

that we felt would be valuable for the entire Tangle audience to hear and engage with. So that's what we'll be doing here. in this episode. We haven't edited this interview in any way except to remove a few identifying details that Haley and her family asked we remove after the fact. You'll also hear that for the first part of our conversation, she's in a car, she's not driving, but she's a passenger in a car. And so you will hear some environmental noise like turn signal, the sound of the car, hitting the brakes at a few points and the like. So we understand that this is not the greatest audio quality, but this was

one-time opportunity to have this conversation, and we felt it was important to publish, even though the audio quality wasn't as good as we would have liked. Towards the end of the conversation, Haley was in her home, and the audio is much cleaner. So without further ado, we'll get right into the conversation. We'd love to hear your thoughts on this and on our coverage. in general, but we felt like this is a pretty unique opportunity to hear from somebody who was at the event and witnessed what happened. Here's my conversation with Haley about the shooting of Charlie Kirk at Utah Valley University on Wednesday, September 10th. Can you just set the scene for me and let me know where you are as a student?

what your background is where you're from and what you're studying at Utah Valley. Yeah, so actually, I'm not actually a student at UVU. I'm 16. So I came to the campus, not as a student, but with a group of friends to see the debate. I've seen a lot of Charlie Kirk's videos. And I was really excited to kind of see him in person and see the debate that would happen because he's a very, he's a very, like, more modern talker who I think had a priority of discussion with others. And I found that it was very interesting. So that's what kind of drew me to the, the idea you do. And you mentioned that you have engaged with Kirk's content before.

You're familiar with him. Would you say, if you're comfortable sharing, that your personal political views tend to align with his, and the ideas that he has spouses, or would you say that you more often disagree with him? Yeah, so I think I agree with him on most topics. I think seeing some of his views, I've definitely, like, disagreed or have had a different opinion. But for the most part, I generally agree or, like,

lead to what he leads to and on opinions. So. say that, you know, in addition to attending to hear the debate and hear the question and answer, that you were also maybe attending because you were a fan of his and you were interested in seeing him in person? Yes, that was definitely a big part of it. Cool. So could you just talk me through the order of events as they transpired from where you were? And maybe could you start by just describing where you were in the crowd

and where you were when the shooting occurred and what happened afterwards. Yeah, of course. So me and a group of friends, one of our friends had texted me the day before and told me about this event that was happening the next day because we all kind of had an interest in Charlie Kirk. And so I got tickets the night before

and me and my friend were actually going to go to McDonald's and I get food and then go and see the event at UVU but we ended up leaving late so we just tried going straight to UVU and finding parking which was hard and so we went over to the McDonald's Walmart parking lot and that actually ended up being a really big part of how we were able to get out so quickly later on so we parked at McDonald's we were trying to find kind of our friends and we walked in and the first thing that I noticed was that there was a very tense feeling in the air. And this is my first political event that I've been to.

And naturally, right, something like this, like a discussion is very polarizing to groups, right? You have, like, people from all over, just different spectrums of beliefs there. And I actually turned to my friend before, one of them women went up with our summer friends, and I said, this looks almost like a mob. Not that. And there were, of course, people before. There was different groups of people saying different things. But before we arrived, apparently there was like a chant off.

And there was a group just screaming, fuck, fuck, fuck. And we're like, fuck Charlie Kerrigan, fuck your beliefs and whatever else. And so anyway, getting there, it was a lot of new experiences for me, right? So we could see a lot of different signs on either side, just people sharing their beliefs, a lot of chanting, a lot of just excitement in the air. And we tried to find, like, a better spot. So some of our friends are like a little, some of my friends are a little bit taller than I am. We had like about three or four guys and they were like six foot over six foot.

So they could see better than me and some of my other friends could. So us girls, we went a little further. down into the grass area on the first steps of the, um, just of the courtyard. So we were in front of Charlie Kirk a little bit further back. And, um, starting off, we, I could hear him speak and I was really excited to just seeing how he was handling different things of what people were saying. And he had started talking about, um, mass shootings, um, ironically, wow. while just kind of kicking off this whole thing.

And I was trying, actually, in the moment, I was trying to peek around someone's shoulder to get a better look at him just to see what his expression was while I'm trying to talk about this. And then we, and I got a little distracted, actually. I took a selfie. Sounds so ridiculous now, but we were taking a selfie.

and so my friends just seconds before the actual shooting happened and so I took a selfie I was putting my phone back into my pocket and turning around to say something to my friend and then to look to Charlie and they heard a gunshot and it was almost like the world froze

for a minute because no one said anything no one moved and I think really what was going through everyone's mind was that a gun I mean like what happened because I don't think anyone was expecting anything like anything like that really and talking about it after some people thought it was fireworks i i thought it was a gun i thought maybe it was a start off gun or a kickoff thing but

once i realized that there was silence the terror kind of settled in that oh we were under shooting um like someone just fired yeah someone just fired a bullet right and so someone screams get down and i the floor. I have to drag my friend down next to me because she's not moving. And I look to my left and there's someone's like kneeling kind of with her head covered over and I can see like their orange and green kind of sneaker outline and I look to my right. And I make eye contact with an older woman. She's probably my mom's age and which is like 40-ish, 40 years old. And she had I remember she had like pebbles on her face and a little like a little bit of wrinkles that said it and she was crying and I was like this is real I like I'm going to die here exposed and afraid and I think really I thought my life was over and we were going to get shot so someone screams run

I don't know if it was a policeman or a person and someone drags me up and we start running towards the end of the building my group and IRA and so I've got one person on my right one person on my left and I'm

driving there by their wrists and dragging them and I keep saying we have to go to the exit we have to go to the exit and leave and my friend next to me the one who's one of the ones who was taller actually saw Charlie gets shot and he kept saying Charlie's dead. Charlie's dead. He's dead. He's dead. Charlie's dead. And really, I didn't process it until we were actually in the building. I was like, what do you mean Charlie's dead? Like,

who, who's Charlie? And then I realized that he was saying that Charlie Kirk had been shot. And so there was, there was a moment in the building once we'd made it inside the building where we didn't know where the shooter was or if they were going, if it was a mass shooter, or if he was a mass shooter or if he had already killed Charlie he was going to kill other people and so we started and we lost one of our group members and so I was trying to figure out what to do everyone else was trying to figure out what to do and we split between staying inside the building where the shooter might be or going outside where they also might be because we didn't know where the shot had come from or what all had happened

yet. And so I think that's when I really started just to kind of realize that I needed to get myself out of here and that no one else was going to tell us what to do, right? There was no clear plan of how to escape the danger. And so, anyway, what we ended up deciding on was going through the tunnels and back over to the Walmart and McDonald's where we parked. And just running driving out of there so i remember calling my mom right after and she didn't understand what i was saying um but i was telling her like there's a shooter but i'm alive uh i'm alive we're okay i'm going to go to my friend's house and we're going to wait there we're going to stay there so um really it was kind of a blessing that we parked so far out because i had i knew some other people who their car there was obviously out of car crashes right when everyone was trying to get my friend got his car smashed by

a motorcyclist and then another car while trying to get out of the UV parking block so I was really blessed I think that the story ended there but yeah and oh

yeah go ahead oh and then what I was going to say is another thing is when I finally got home after kind of just sitting through the shock of the whole experience, I remember thinking, oh, maybe taking a shower and I feel better because it's, I don't know, when something like that happens, it was just so out of the body that I didn't realize what I could do to process

it. So I was like, oh, I'll do what generally makes me feel better. And I just remember thinking, and then I like got dressed and stuff and changed and I still felt the same. and I kind of realized I'm never going to be able to wash off or scrub off or sleep off that feeling of terror that overtook me and thousands of other people when realizing what had happened and what could have happened. We'll be right back after. this quick break. Not a billionaire, not a problem. You can still do something legendary by leaving a gift to charity in your will. Even 1% in your will can change the game for a cause you care about without taking away what you or your family need.

It's a powerful way to make your mark. Anyone can leave a legacy. Willpower shows you how. Learn more at willpower.ca. Well, that's a really powerful recounting, and I really appreciate you sharing it. I have a few follow-up questions, first of which is have you debriefed at all with your friends who were there with you. And if you have, what have you guys been talking about in the past day? Yes.

So all day yesterday, right after. the shooting happened we met up at one of my friends houses and we just talked about it and um three of my friends who were taller who had actually seen charlie got shot um one of them he kind of just kept saying like charlie's dead he's dead i can't believe he's dead and once he got out of his stupor a little bit he looked up the news and i um i remember we kind of we were all trying to like cope in our own ways but once someone pulled out with the phone to search the news everyone

had rushed over to just see what was happening because although we were there I mean no one was really in the know of what was going on with Charlie right so yeah we saw the news my friend showed me the video of what actually happened to Charlie

that I missed when I was distracting and so just kind of What else? Sorry, there's a lot of noises. I'm just going to wait for a second. Another thing that we kind of debriefed is you would think that this is the kind of thing

that happens to other people or in other countries, right? Because the whole idea of America and its protection is that our laws are made in such that people are protected. What they say, right? And the civilians shouldn't have to fear for their lives. ever really and I remember looking at just different texts that people had been sending and it made me so angry some people were cheering others were trying to demonize the people who were there who didn't have anything to do with the shooting but happened to be liberal

and it frustrated me and there were and there were sorry and there were other people trying to flex the fact or brag about the fact that they were almost there or that they went to the campus and I think seeing that really frustrated me because no one who was there and who experienced it relished the idea that they were in an event like that and that they had to experience it and really I thought it might have

been okay from there trying to just talk with people and seeing what was happening But I remember on my way home driving, I was taking other people in the car. And we took a wrong turn. There was a very risky, like, swerve that I did as a driver and people in the back

started screaming. And I was thrown back to just a couple hours earlier being in that mass. Really kind of just horde of people, right? because I don't know you're you feel like very dignified and human and evolved but in that moment after that gunshot everyone was looking after themselves and it kind of became just a mass panic right so yeah um yeah go ahead oh yeah and so what I was going to say is it threw me back to that panic and I really

in all honesty we almost crashed because I spun the car around trying to kind of regain my senses and my grip on what was happening and so we missed the cement barrier by a little bit and we drove in and I I don't normally swear by the way ever just because of I don't know who I like try to be

but I just started crying and I was like it's the screaming it's the fucking screaming like Like, I'm still there, right? Mentally, I'm still in that place of fear. Yeah. So it was very, and it wasn't anyone's fault, obviously, but it just kind of reminded me a little bit that I wasn't safe, and I wouldn't ever feel safe really for a long while.

Yeah. So. Have you talked with your parents about it? Yes. So, I, I, obviously like I called on going right now and she I don't think she understood the gravity of what happened

at first but once she kind of understood she she tried to help me as best she can because and right just because she didn't really know what was happening and so she came to support me

yeah and she actually brought bread for everyone there around my friend's house just so we could kind of calm down a little bit. And then I came home and I talked to my dad and he was a really good help and just kind of supporting me, just helping me think through, like, what I felt and why I just experienced. Yeah. I obviously have no way to imagine what it was like. to go through this. I am curious, though, how things have felt today. How did you sleep last night?

What was it like waking up this morning? And how has the day after been for you? Just trying to see. Yeah, well, the irony of all of this, a lot of people have been talking about it, but I keep saying that today is 9-11, right? And yesterday was kind of my 9-11 of realizing that I mean, obviously this has happened before in different scenarios with different people, but just the world is so broken that we're doing the same things again, right? So just the same acts of violence. So sleeping, I don't think I slept until about 4 a.m. I tried writing down the details of what had happened, but by the time I got to the beginning

of the shooting, I physically couldn't put the pen to the paper. because it was hard for me to think that I had been in that situation and I still felt the terror of that. And waking up today, I've been trying to go about life as normal, but it's a bit frustrating, honestly, to see, and it's not anyone's felt, but just to see so many people around acting so normal and doing things that are so normal

when everyone's, I mean, lives have been changed and someone just got murdered, right? So there's also people who just don't know what happened. And so, like, I just got out of a class. And, you know, like, I obviously wasn't like, oh, hey, guys. Like, I was in a shooting yesterday. And so it's been kind of interesting to try to act like everything is fine and normal when I thought I was going to die yesterday.

Yeah. And our, what's the chatterer? like at school today. I mean, I think you talked a little bit about it earlier, but are your peers, is this the main topic of discussion today? And, you know, what have you thought about the comments from people who weren't there? Yeah. So a lot of people have been posting things or just talking in different groups and also just talking in person about what they can't believe. I do think a lot there's a very

like defined line kind of between who thinks the death should be celebrated and who thinks the death should be avenged. And there's been a lot of people I was going to say

sharing, but almost kind of just fighting out their different ideas of what it should be and what should happen next. Obviously that as of now, I think the shooter's still at large. And just knowing that that person is still out there and can know who was at the event is also kind of a big topic of discussion right now. So just seeing if we're ever going to catch him or who he is.

We'll be right back after. this quick break. Not a billionaire, not a problem. You can still do something legendary by leaving a gift to charity in your will. Even 1% in your will can change the game for a cause you care about without taking away what you or your family need.

It's a powerful way to make your mark. Anyone can leave a legacy. Willpower shows you how. Learn more at willpower.ca. Are political topics often discussed with your peers? Like, is this something, just in general, like, would it be pretty typical for you guys to be talking about political issues? Yes, there's definitely, I'm actually in debate. I have a debate class, and so a lot of the time we have many discussions on different things.

And some of my friends kind of will just, yeah, tell me about random things that happen in politics and we'll discuss it. because we're all varying views, obviously. You mentioned that there were varying views about what people felt about the killing. Some people feeling that it was justified. Some people feeling like it needed to be avenged somehow. I'm curious to hear from your perspective what you think about political violence in general in the United States right now. And if you are concerned about it and how the event, of yesterday, maybe have altered your perspective?

Yeah, to see. I think definitely before, I thought political violence was a problem. I don't think I've ever thought an assassination was justified regardless of whose it was in America generally. I think after the event, though, really, I've kind of come to realize how much it affects people from all different areas to have to I mean first choose right to take the um the actions of violence against someone for their political beliefs so um a lot of people actually have kind of talked to me and been like oh it's a very um leftist thing and it's there doing all the violence

and I don't think really that's true I honestly think political violence is very on both sides of the spectrum and I think it's never really justified because regardless of what people believe or what they say or what they do in the end they have a right to life I mean that's one of the basic parts of the American dream right?

My last question but I'll open the floor up for you to give any other responses but just in reflecting about 24 hours hours since the shooting occurred, is there anything else that stands out to you in your mind in the way that you are reflecting back on it or in your memory of it that maybe has changed from the immediate aftermath? Yes, I think really what struck me was kind of how quickly humans can turn almost animal-like.

I mean, really, when everyone was told to scatter at the sound of the gun, people were running over each other and pushing each other and trying to um bend for themselves without really having a thought of what was happening around them so that really struck me another thing was I really don't believe that um whatever your belief is like on on what happened you should be able to negate the experiences of other people. So, like, and just how it's kind of struck me as interesting how in this society a little bit, like we tend to push a lot of things down, right? So there's a lot of things that aren't talked about openly, like suicide, for example,

which isn't necessarily related to politics, but I, yeah, we tend to look over it or to hide it when it happens to someone else. And I think it's very similar to people experiencing something that's out of the ordinary. And I think that's something that needs to change because as humans, we have things come up that are unexpected. And I think we should be able to learn how to experience it with others. My last question would just be, is there anything else that you would say as somebody who was at a very horrific event to the people who maybe don't understand? what that experience is like and that you think is important for them to know. I know you've talked through a little bit of that already,

so it's fine if the answer's no. No, you're good. No, I do. I'm just kind of trying to formulate my words a little bit. Yeah. I think, honestly, what I would say, someone who hasn't experienced something like that and who's kind of looking from the outside in,

we need to change as a world and part of that change is the people regardless of what their ideas are behind what the change needs to be I think it's important that we realize that how we're dealing with things right now isn't okay I mean it's not acceptable

to I think put the lives of thousands in danger and really to have have hundreds of people who last night didn't sleep at all or couldn't sleep because of what happened to them that they're not going to be able to live down or forget. Or like my, yeah, or the people who saw him die, the people who got into crashes as a result or the people who maybe thought they might have saw the shooter and didn't and now are regretting their decisions now. So I think we need to remember that we are.

capable of change and nothing's going to change in this world unless you make it. So I think regardless of whether you were in or out of the event necessarily, I think you need to take action and just speak on what your belief is regardless of what the belief is, just to speak on it. Again, really appreciate your willingness to share, especially so soon after the event, which again, I can't imagine, but I'm obviously, I'm happy you're safe, that you and your friends are safe. and I'm sorry that you went through this and had to go through this

but I thought just personally your reflections were really moving and I think it'll be amazing for us to be able to share it with others too who are still processing this so thank you and of course wish you all the best our executive editor and founder is me

Isaac Saul and our executive producer is John Lull today's episode was edited and engineered by Dewey Thomas our editorial staff is led by managing editor Ari Weitzman with senior editor Will Kayback and associate editors Hunter Casperson, Audrey Moorhead, Bailey Saw, Lindsay Canuth, and Kendall White.

Music for the podcast was produced by Diet 75. To learn more about Tangle and to sign up for a membership, please visit our website at reTangle.com. Not a billionaire, not a problem. You can still do something legendary. by leaving a gift to charity in your will. Even 1% in your will can change the game for a cause you care about

without taking away what you or your family need. It's a powerful way to make your mark. Anyone can leave a legacy. Willpower shows you how. Learn more at willpower.ca.