MURFREESBORO, Tenn. (WKRN) — Less than a week after the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, more than a thousand people filled a plaza in Murfreesboro on Monday night for a candlelight vigil in his honor.

"I can't believe it actually happened," Rick Smith said. "It's kind of weird you'd grieve someone you never met, but I feel like he's part of us."

Kirk, a Chicago suburb native, founded Turning Point USA at just 18 years old. The organization now claims it has received over 40,000 more inquiries to start new campus chapters.

"I feel like this is the turning point," Trey Miles said. "With all the chapter applications, and with what Charlie had built, it's just going to explode. It already has."

Some local students recently started a Turning Point USA chapter at Oakland High School.

"I think it's really important for our generation to be informed about the kind of stuff he was speaking about," Sarah Buache said.

For others, the grief felt deeply personal.

“He was going to come on my birthday to visit her, and since he got shot, he couldn’t come," an 11-year-old boy in attendance said. "I was kind of sad at that moment. I wish he could come.”

Kirk was scheduled to speak this week at World Outreach Church in Murfreesboro as part of his "American Comeback Tour." Instead, his funeral will be held Sunday at State Farm Stadium, home of the Arizona Cardinals, in Glendale, Arizona.

The man accused of killing Kirk is 22-year-old Tyler Robinson, and he is expected to make his first court appearance on Friday. Law enforcement officials said he has not been cooperating with the investigation.

News Source : https://www.wkrn.com/news/local-news/murfreesboro/over-1000-gather-in-murfreesboro-to-honor-charlie-kirk-at-candlelight-vigil/