Rainn Wilson recounts liberal friends’ 'good riddance' reaction to Charlie Kirk’s killing

On his Soul Boom podcast, Rainn Wilson recounted liberal friends’ reaction to the assassination of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk last week, describing some attendees at a recent event who told him they wouldn’t shed a tear. Wilson avoided endorsing Kirk’s ideas but said harming someone for having different views is fundamentally wrong. He cited exchanges with Mark Ruffalo, noting that the clip in circulation comes from a portion of a future episode that has not yet aired.

Wilson said, “You won’t find me shedding any tears,” and another person added, “Oh well.” He pressed back against the mood, arguing that celebrating violence toward political opponents is not acceptable and that violence should never be framed as a path to progress. The two actors discussed the incident in the context of a broader national dialogue about political division and the limits of rhetoric when people are injured or killed.

Ruffalo joined the conversation, saying the event hit especially close to home because his own brother was shot and killed. He stressed that there is no victory in celebration of violence and cautioned that cheering on harm to political opponents corrodes society. “There’s no winning. We’ll never win this way,” Ruffalo said, adding that there is no noble outcome in endorsing harm to others, even if they are political adversaries. Wilson pushed back on using the term “opponent,” arguing that such language contributes to division and that the focus should be on engaging with people with whom one strongly disagrees, rather than labeling them as enemies. He asked, “How can we reframe it from opponent to, you know, just someone we disagree with?”

Ruffalo then steered the conversation toward gun-control policy, describing firearms as “weapons of war” and acknowledging uncertainty about the exact weapon used in Kirk’s death. He said the gun’s classification matters because it shapes the public conversation about what kinds of firearms should be allowed. Wilson agreed that the weapon’s nature influences the debate and questioned how the country should respond to violence, even when it involves political figures with polarizing views. “It’s not about scoring points,” Wilson emphasized, “it’s about ensuring safety and preserving communal values in a democracy.”

It was later clarified in the discussion that the firearm recovered in the Kirk case was a bolt-action rifle, a reliable hunting weapon that typically requires manual operation between shots. The bolt-action design is simple and durable, and in many models it is capable of a single shot before reloading. The discussion highlighted how debates over gun policy are intertwined with national conversations about political violence, safety, and the responsibilities of public figures and their supporters to model restraint in the face of outrage.

As the dialogue moved between condemnations of violence, questions about rhetoric, and the gun-control questions that dominate U.S. politics, the participants underscored a central point: in a polarized era, ethics and empathy must guide discourse even when the subject of disagreement is deeply controversial. The episode’s excerpts have circulated widely, underscoring how entertainment figures weigh in on real-world consequences of political vitriol and the enduring debate over what kinds of speech and action are acceptable in a functioning democracy.