Welsh council didn't mark Charlie Kirk's death, fumes Reform

Consternation at Torfaen Council in South Wales, where the Reform group is up in arms that not enough was done to commemorate the death of a US podcaster no one in Wales had heard of until last week.

David Thomas, who leads the Reform group on the Labour-run local authority, says he is “in absolute disbelief” that the council had done nothing to mark the death of Charlie Kirk, who was killed in a shooting in Utah.

After walking out of a council meeting in disgust at the lack of so much as a minute’s silence for the right wing campaigner, who had no connection to Torfaen, Thomas posted on X: “I’ve just walked out of @torfaencouncil’s full council meeting in absolute disbelief.

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“Not a single mention… not even a moment’s acknowledgment… of the horrific event involving Charlie Kirk. For a council that claims to stand for community, compassion and respect – their silence today was nothing short of shameful. Absolutely disgusting.”

He later told the South Wales Argus: “I simply couldn’t get my head around the fact that, given the horrific circumstances of Charlie Kirk’s death and what his family must now be going through, the council didn’t feel it appropriate to even acknowledge it.

“For me this is not about politics, it is about compassion. It just felt wrong to continue with ordinary business while something so tragic was at the front of my mind. That is simply my personal opinion.”

Council leader Anthony Hunt said, not unreasonably, he “wasn’t sure there was a relevant place” to raise Kirk’s death in the meeting. And putting aside that the council also didn’t mark the death of Democrat Melissa Hortman, a member of the Minnesota House of Representatives who was shot dead alongside her husband in June – something there is no record of Thomas getting worked up about – he doesn’t appear to have asked for a tribute to Kirk to be included on the agenda, nor stuck around for the ‘any other business’ section, when he could have raised it. Still, priorities.