Four days after her husband, Charlie Kirk, was shot and killed at a speaking engagement at Utah Valley University, Erika had to explain to their 3-year-old daughter why her father wasn’t coming home. “What do you tell a 3-year-old?” Erika Kirk said in her first public address after the assassination. “I said, ‘Baby, daddy loves you so much. Don’t you worry. He’s on a work trip with Jesus so he can afford your blueberry budget.'”
Eight days after Kirk’s death, the board of Turning Point USA unanimously elected Erika, 36, to be its next CEO and chair, to help lead the organization her late husband co-founded in 2012 when he was just 18 years old.
The appointment wasn’t unexpected. Board members revealed that Charlie Kirk had previously expressed to multiple executives that this succession plan was what he wanted in the event of his death. “Charlie prepared all of us for a moment like this one,” the board said in its announcement. “He worked tirelessly to ensure that Turning Point USA was built to survive even the greatest tests”.
From political science to Bible studies
Erika Lane Frantzve was born on November 20, 1988. She was raised by her mother, a divorcee, in Scottsdale, Arizona, and later attended Regis University in Denver, where she played NCAA Division I basketball for two years.
Kirk completed her undergraduate studies at Arizona State University, earning dual degrees in political science and international relations. She later obtained a Juris Master degree in American Legal Studies from Liberty University in 2017. According to her website, she’s currently pursuing a doctorate in Biblical Studies from the same institution.
Kirk also immersed herself in the world of beauty pageants from a young age—to give back to the community, she told Arizona Foothills Magazine in 2012. “My mom used to take us to soup kitchens and constantly said we needed to share our blessings with others,” she said. “When I learned that by competing I could touch more people, further my causes, I knew it was a chance to make a greater impact.”
Kirk was crowned Miss Arizona USA in November 2012, on her 23rd birthday. She went on to represent Arizona in the Miss USA pageant that year, but failed to place.
Bridging faith and fashion
Kirk’s academic degrees and beauty pageant experiences shaped a similar approach to business, which is centered on her Christian faith. Like her husband Charlie, Erika founded her own organization when she was 18: the nonprofit Everyday Heroes Like You, which is designed to promote and support under-recognized charities.
In 2018, Kirk launched Proclaim Streetwear, a faith-based clothing company that emphasizes American manufacturing. “At PROCLAIM, we believe that honoring God means honoring the work of honest hands,” the company’s website states. The clothing line operates in conjunction with BIBLEin365, a ministry program Erika Kirk created in 2016 that challenges participants to read the Bible in one year.
Kirk also hosts the “Midweek Rise Up” podcast, which she describes as a series focused on Biblical leadership. She also reportedly works as a real-estate agent with the Corcoran Group in New York City; the Corcoran Group did not immediately respond to Fortune‘s request for comment.
Meeting Charlie
In an Instagram post, Erika said she met Charlie Kirk in 2018 during what initially was supposed to be a job interview. They sat in Bill’s, an NYC burger joint, and had a “deep” conversation about “theology, philosophy, and politics and at the end, you paused, looked at me and said, ‘I’m going to date you.'”
In a separate Instagram post, made after Charlie’s death, Erika attached a video of Charlie talking to their daughter about how they met. “It started as a job interview … and then I realized momma was beautiful and smart and elegant and Christ-like, and so I said, ‘Forget this job interview. I want to date you.'”
Erika and Charlie got married on May 8, 2021, in an intimate ceremony in Scottsdale. They have two young children: a daughter born in August 2022 and a son born in May 2024. The family has carefully protected their children’s privacy, never sharing their names publicly or showing their faces on social media.
Taking the helm at Turning Point
Since Charlie Kirk’s assassination, Turning Point USA says it’s received tens of thousands of requests from students across the country to start chapters or join existing ones. “If you thought my husband’s mission was powerful before, you have no idea what you just have unleashed across this entire country, and this world,” Kirk said in her speech two days after the shooting. “The cries of this widow will echo around the world like a battle cry.”
At her husband’s memorial service on Sunday in Arizona—attended by President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance—Erika Kirk publicly forgave her husband’s alleged killer, the 22-year-old suspect Tyler Robinson. “That young man, I forgive him,” she said, prompting a standing ovation from the crowd. “The answer to hate is not hate.”
Erika Kirk’s appointment comes at a critical time for Turning Point USA, which has 450 staff members, millions in funding, and a presence on 3,500 campuses across the U.S., according to its website. After playing a significant role in the most recent election cycle in mobilizing young voters, Kirk is now tasked with maintaining the organization’s momentum while balancing her other business ventures, including her clothing brand and podcast, as well as her two children.
You can watch Erika Kirk’s speech from the Charlie Kirk memorial below:
For this story, Fortune used generative AI to help with an initial draft. An editor verified the accuracy of the information before publishing.