DETROIT – When Donald Trump takes the stage in Detroit on Saturday, it will be the second time in two weeks that he will headline an event hosted by Turning Point Action – a group known for its growing political influence and for its boxing founder, Charlie Kirk.
It’s a long-standing partnership that links Trump to a lightning commentator who made headlines this year for saying women in their 30s are “not at their best” for dating, and who now thinks twice about flying with black pilots for diversity, equity and inclusion goals.
But it has also armed Trump’s presidential campaign, which has lagged in fundraising and organizing in the battleground states, with a powerful operational ally.
Once dismissed by top officials of the Republican National Committee, Turning Point’s status has quickly grown from a controversial student movement to one of the most active organizations in conservative politics.
Now Turning Point is investing tens of millions of dollars in an ambitious voting operation in three battleground states, making the 2024 election a major test for the organization’s operations — with consequences not only for Kirk and his organization, but also for Trump and the GOP in in general.
“They are very influential,” said Vermont RNC committee member Jay Shepard. “Effective? That depends on what your measurement is. They are certainly a huge messenger and fundraising juggernaut.”
While praising the organization’s large number of boots on the ground, he said, “The real test is always the day after the election, and who wins and who loses.”
Turning Point has been a controversial presence in Republican politics for years, with millions of Kirk’s listeners tuning in for his rebukes of feminism, diversity initiatives and progressivism on college campuses. But the group is no longer just loud. Now, after filling several dozen seats in the RNC with allies and spending tens of millions of dollars this year on an aggressive get-out-the-vote program, it has become a central player in the party apparatus — especially as some older, more Traditional action groups have seen their influence in the party diminish.
The group’s field program is a “force multiplier” of the Trump team’s resources in key battleground states, said Brian Hughes, a senior adviser to Trump’s campaign. It’s part of recent collaborations between the campaign, RNC and outside groups following a recent FEC advisory that allows for coordination.
“We always knew that eventually there would be a fundraising gap between Biden and the DNC and Trump and the RNC,” Hughes said.
While he insists that Trump’s team is building out its infrastructure in every battleground state, he said partnerships like the one with Turning Point allow them to “deploy campaign and RNC resources more efficiently.”
It’s a stark contrast to the RNC’s stance toward the organization at the beginning of the year, when then-chairman Ronna McDaniel had long viewed Turning Point as a nuisance to be ignored, and Kirk openly called for its removal. The Trump campaign welcomed Turning Point when it took over the RNC, with Trump calling on McDaniel to leave her post just days after the organization held a rally to bash its leadership in January. Some RNC members were among those in attendance at the weekend conference in Detroit and attended an exclusive Turning Point Action dinner held for them on Friday evening.
Through a spokesperson, Kirk declined to be interviewed.
A Trump campaign official with knowledge of Kirk’s relationship with the former president and granted anonymity to describe it said the pair has a “warm” relationship, speaks occasionally and “shares a kindred spirit for the conservative common sense case’.
McDaniel wasn’t the only Republican who viewed Turning Point with skepticism. Oscar Brock, an RNC committee member from Tennessee who has been an outspoken Trump critic but who found himself on the same side as Turning Point in opposing McDaniel’s 2023 re-election as RNC chairman, said he has collaborated with members affiliated with the group, including Arizona. board member Tyler Bowyer, a top Turning Point executive. Bowyer, who did not run for re-election to the RNC this year, was one of 18 charged in Arizona in April in connection with an alleged alternative voting scheme after the 2020 election. He has pleaded not guilty.
But Brock said the Turning Point brand itself comes across as “all about making money.”
“They raised a ton of money, and then they turn around and shit-talk and insult the Republican Party left and right until they get a seat at the table,” Brock said. “I don’t think this is just the way you operate.”
Turning Point’s dominance of Republican activism comes as the most powerful conservative groups of recent decades have lost their appeal, drained money and put up dividers in sparsely filled congressional ballrooms.
Once-powerful groups like CPAC and the NRA have suffered leadership scandals in recent years. Longstanding economic policy influencers such as the Koch Network and the Club for Growth have clashed with Trump, and leading anti-abortion groups are now fighting for relevance as Trump has distanced his platform from their initiatives.
Turning Point has swooped in to fill the void. It puts allies on the RNC. The country has spent tens of millions of dollars hiring hundreds of field workers in Arizona, Wisconsin and Michigan so far this election, according to a spokesperson.
And Turning Point’s approach to social issues and home life: the online store offers women’s shirts such as ‘Do you have raw milk?’ and “Buy me chickens and tell me I’m beautiful” – seems to have resonated with a young generation of conservatives, thousands of whom travel from across the country to the organization’s high-volume events.
“I don’t think there’s any doubt that Turning Point really stole a march, so to speak, from a large part of the conservative movement,” said Gregg Keller, who was executive director of the American Conservative Union a decade ago and CPAC. .
Just last week, Turning Point hosted Trump at a Phoenix megachurch for a live “Chase the Vote” town hall, where the line of people hoping to get in exceeded the venue’s capacity. They held a Young Women’s Leadership Conference in San Antonio, with prominent speakers including Megyn Kelly, Candace Owens and Lara Trump. That same weekend, Turning Point Action field representatives were spread across the country, holding an Ohio Faith Coalition kickoff event outside Dayton, while staff in Georgia registered voters at a rodeo.
It’s all in addition to Turning Point Action’s larger mission this year, which is to act as “America’s ballot-chasing army,” a plan that will see the group deploy hundreds of employees per state in Arizona, Wisconsin and Michigan, in addition to the existing staff they already have. had in other states across the country.
The vote-chasing plan was originally announced as a $108 million goal to get on the ballot, and fundraising is underway. The new hires will be assigned to small, tailored areas where Turning Point Action has identified there are several hundred low-propensity conservative voters who need to be urged to go to the polls this fall.
Andrew Kolvet, a spokesman for Turning Point, said the group’s internal data shows that committed swing voters may need as many as 20 interactions to convince them to show up and vote Republican, but voters with a low propensity to five.
“It used to be that the consultant class would go to swing districts to try to win. We say ‘No.’ The philosophy is fundamentally different,” says Kolvet. “We want to increase the score where people already appreciate our ideas and values.”
For example, in Arizona, where Kirk and the organization are based, Kolvet said their research showed that a significant number of registered Republican voters did not vote in the 2016 and 2020 elections. In Republican Party Paul Gosar’s district, more than 121,000 Republicans did not vote in one of the last two presidential elections, and more than 58,000 did not vote in either.
Keller, who previously worked with CPAC, said Kirk “took a really calculated gamble on the MAGA populist angle,” which paid off.
“I think Charlie was the right person in the right place at the right time and made the right projections,” he said. “And when you put all those things together at once, it’s like catching lightning in a bottle.”
