Trump ally Laura Loomer ridiculed for swinging from Charlie Kirk attacks to leading backlash against detractors

As she pushed Donald Trump to “shut down” leftist organizations in the US over Charlie Kirk’s assassination, the far-right influencer Laura Loomer was confronted with a social media post that less than two months earlier lambasted the Turning Point USA (TPUSA) executive director as a “charlatan” who had betrayed the president.

“It’s time for the Trump administration to shut down, defund & prosecute every single leftist organization,” Loomer wrote on X after Kirk was fatally shot while speaking at Utah Valley University on Wednesday. “We must shut these lunatic leftists down. Once and for all. The left is a national security threat.”

The staunch Trump supporter on Thursday also described having stayed up all night and pledged to expose anyone online whom she perceived to mock Kirk or “celebrate” the rightwing activist’s murder, saying: “I’m going to make you wish you never opened your mouth.”

Yet replies to her plea for the president to pursue US liberals in Kirk’s name were inundated with screenshots of a lengthy post from 13 July in which she criticized the slain 31-year-old as a “charlatan” and “political opportunist” who engaged in “mental gymnastics” and “stabs Trump in the back”.

At the time, Kirk had spoken against military strikes targeting Iran that were ordered by Trump, for whom TPUSA had rallied young voters’ support. Kirk had also been vocal about wanting a full release of materials pertaining to the prosecution of Jeffrey Epstein, the former Trump friend who in 2008 had pleaded guilty to soliciting prostitution from a minor and in 2019 died in jail while awaiting trial on federal sex-trafficking charges.

Loomer in those days said she was also upset that, just one year removed from Trump’s having survived an assassination attempt in Pennsylvania, Kirk had hosted the comedian Dave Smith at a conference after the latter called on the Republican president to be impeached and for his supporters to “abandon” him.

“I don’t ever want to hear [Kirk] claim he is pro-Trump ever again,” Loomer’s post said, adding that TPUSA had only thrived “thanks to the generosity” of the president. “The honorable thing to do is to have a position and actually defend it to the death instead of flip flopping.

“It really is shameful. And I am honestly just disgusted by the nonstop flip flopping on the right.”

Among the replies prompted by Loomer’s reactions to Kirk’s slaying were “I think you need to shut up”, “Maybe sit this out” and “You’re nothing but a sociopathic hypocrite”, each with screenshots of an excerpt from the July post. Others were supportive of Loomer.

Further, Loomer’s responses to the violence aimed at Kirk – widely condemned by Democratic political leaders – contrasted sharply with her initial reaction to news that a man with a hammer had bludgeoned the husband of the former US House speaker Nancy Pelosi in the couple’s home in 2022.

Loomer at the time boosted a baseless conspiracy theory that Paul Pelosi had perhaps been victimized by a man whom he met on a dating app. The attacker was subsequently revealed to be a rightwing conspiracy theorist, David DePape, who was searching for Nancy Pelosi when he encountered her husband. DePape was subsequently sentenced to life in prison.

Authorities on Friday announced that they had arrested a suspect in Kirk’s killing, identifying him as Tyler Robinson, 22, of Utah. At a news briefing, Utah’s governor, Spencer Cox, said investigators had spoken with a relative of Robinson who reported that the suspect – while at a prior family dinner – described disliking Kirk “and the viewpoints he had”.