The controversial political activist was gunned down by an unknown assailant during the first stop of his “American Comeback Tour.”
Charlie Kirk Quietly Petitioned for Ross Ulbricht’s Pardon
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The Kirk-Ulbricht Connection: A Quiet Push for a Presidential Pardon
Few know this, but Charlie Kirk was a Bitcoiner. An even smaller cohort knows about Kirk’s behind-the-scenes campaign to convince U.S. President Donald Trump to pardon Silk Road creator Ross Ulbricht, who was serving two life sentences and an additional forty years for multiple drug-related offenses.
Ulbricht was unusually lucky to have Kirk in his corner. The 31-year-old Republican activist had a direct line to the President after helping Trump garner a significant share of the youth vote in last year’s presidential election. So when Kirk whispered, Trump listened; and it seems that connection helped Ulbricht walk out of prison a free man in January, after serving less than twelve years on his double life sentence.
“He never took credit for it, but he played a BIG role in my freedom in many ways,” Ulbricht explained in a post on X, referring to Kirk. “When President Trump won the election, he asked Charlie what was the #1 thing he could do for him and Charlie replied: ‘Free Ross.’”
Kirk was shot and killed Wednesday in broad daylight by an as-yet unknown gunman on the campus of Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah. The location was the first stop of his “American Comeback Tour,” where he planned to debate college students on controversial topics such as race, religion, politics, and sexuality. Kirk was infamous for his provocative statements, earning him a slew of negative labels. But outside of the crypto community, few knew him as a hardcore bitcoin proponent, despite how bullish he was on the cryptocurrency.
“ Bitcoin, in some ways, has more integrity than the U.S. dollar,” Kirk said on The Charlie Kirk Show in 2022. “The idea that you can have a currency not controlled by the federal government is a direct competition to the U.S. Treasury, and it should be. That’s why I am a crypto enthusiast,” he added, during a different episode of the show in 2024.
It was that enthusiasm for bitcoin that ultimately led him to secretly lobby the president for Ulbricht’s release in 2025. “In the days leading to my release, Charlie advocated for a full pardon,” Ulbricht said. “He did this and more without expectations of me.”
