Meghan McCain issued a powerful defense over the allegedly “evil” criticism of Charlie Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk (née Frantzve).
“I don’t understand why Erika Kirk, who saw her husband get brutally assassinated on live television, is a goal of such evil and cruelty,” McCain, 41, wrote via X on Friday, March 27. “Why are you all doing this to her? Have she and her children not suffered enough?”
Charlie, a conservative political commentator, was shot and killed during a Utah speaking engagement in September 2025. He was 31 and is survived by Erika and their two young children.
“A few of you were literally birthed in hell,” McCain added on Friday.
Weeks after Charlie’s death, Erika assumed the role of CEO of Charlie’s Turning Point USA organization and went on a press tour promoting his posthumous book, Stop within the Name of God.
“My daughter and I [have] talked about this at night. She would ask, ‘What do you’re thinking that Daddy did today in heaven?’” Erika told Sean Hannity on Fox News in December 2025. “I’ll have her relay that back to me. We’ve come to the understanding — and I’ve tried to elucidate this to her — that Daddy’s still with us, he’s just in a distinct location, and he’s constructing us a house in heaven.”
Erika has drawn criticism for diving into work so quickly after her husband’s death.
“I didn’t ask for this,” she stated during a CBS town hall held later in December 2025. “I view it as a blessing [and] an obligation to my husband, but I used to be very glad being a stay-at-home mom. There’s nothing unsuitable with being a mother.”
Erika continued, “Getting into this role is just not a lot a job title. It’s not a 9-to-5 for me, [and] that is something that I’m very obsessed with. [Turning Point USA] remains to be a living, respiratory version of my husband. This organization is just not just an organization to me, and the staff and employees should not just staff and employees, they’re family.”
Social media commenters also criticized Erika over her now-infamous hug with Vice President JD Vance at a Turning Point event earlier in fall 2025. (JD, 41, is married to Usha Vance, who’s pregnant with the couple’s fourth baby.)
“My love language is touch, if you happen to will,” Erika said of the seemingly cozy moment on Megyn Kelly Live in November 2025. “I will provide you with a play-by-play: They only played the emotional video. I’m walking over, [JD] is walking over. I’m beginning to cry. He says, ‘I’m so pleased with you.’ And I say, ‘God bless you,’ and I touch the back of his head. Anyone whom I even have hugged, that I even have touched the back of your head once I hug you, I at all times say, ‘God bless you.’”