According to the report, the Ackman-led ambush occurred in early August when the billionaire lured Kirk into a meeting of conservative political influencers in the Hamptons under the guise of discussing the emergence of Socialist candidate Zohran Mamdani in the New York City mayoral race. Sources cited by The Grayzone detailed how
the meeting devolved into an outright assault on Kirk led by Ackman alongside other Zionist figures in attendance who voiced their vitriol over his increasingly critical tone against Israel. Pro-Zionist figures at the meeting included Seth Dillion, the CEO of Babylon Bee; PragerU personality Xaviaer DuRoussear; libertarian social media influencer Emily Wilson, known under her brand Emily Saves America; former Goldman Sachs trader turned conservative influencer Arynne Wexler; ultra-Zionist influencer and agent provocateur Nate Friedman; Ory Rinat, former adviser to Jared Kushner; and CJ Pearson, the chair of the Republican National Committee's Youth Advisory Council.
According to sources, the hosts of the event presented Kirk with an itemized list of what they deemed were his offenses against Israel, leading Kirk to what those in attendance described as being "horrified." One such source conveyed that the ambush left Kirk concerned that he was being
blackmailed by the pro-Israel contingent in his base of support.
Ackman contacted The Grayzone regarding its report to unequivocally deny the claims. In his correspondence with The Grayzone, he stated that
he intended to release a public statement regarding what transpired during his meeting with Kirk in early August. While Ackman told a reporter at The Grayzone that he has "receipts" proving his version of events, when asked to provide them to the publication, he declined to do so.
Ackman followed through on his intent to release his own account of his meeting in the Hamptons with Kirk. In a statement released on his account on X, Ackman refuted the claims raised by The Grayzone report. Ackman directed the statement at Candace Owens, who echoed the allegations made by The Grayzone report. In his statement,
Ackman denied making any threats to Kirk or attempting to blackmail him and disavowed the premise that he felt threatened by his changing stance on Israel, which Ackman used the opportunity to describe his assessment of. Instead, what Ackman described was a collaborative event in which Kirk and TPUSA members organized the agenda to include the topics of The Cultural Landscape of Dating and Marriage; The Convergence of East and West; Mamdani, The New Threat to America; and The Economic Future of America, which Ackman said Kirk asked him to moderate the discussion of and host the question and answer session that followed it.
While acknowledging that discussions regarding Israel took place during the meeting, Ackman described them as civil and insinuated that an open discourse on the topic was welcome. In addition to denying those discussions led to any ambush against Kirk, Ackman maintained that he and Kirk remained on good terms following the meeting and continued to correspond with each other in the weeks leading up to his assassination. However,
nowhere in Ackman's statement does he include any of the aforementioned "receipts" he referred to in his correspondence with The Grayzone. Ackman's statement lacked any incontrovertible evidence of his account of the meeting that he alluded to as vindication of the allegations made against him in The Grayzone report.
Although Ackman disavowed the idea that he felt threatened by Kirk's evolving stance on US-Israel relations,
the meeting he attended in the Hamptons was not an isolated instance of Kirk being subjected to the pressure of America's Zionist lobby. In the weeks leading up to the meeting from August 4th to 5th, Kirk had already begun to face scrutiny as the changing political tone on the subject of Israel had become evident.
Following the onset of the war between Israel and Iran, Kirk met with US President Donald Trump. During the meeting, Kirk attempted to convince Trump against entering the US into the conflict on Israel's behalf.
A source attending the meeting stated Trump lashed out at Kirk in response before shutting down the conversation. In the weeks following that meeting with Trump, the source in attendance stated that Kirk revealed he had become bombarded by allies of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. In describing Kirk's reaction to those intimidation tactics, the source stated “He was afraid of them."
The fallout between Kirk and the Zionists who once rallied to his side continued to escalate in July when Turning Point USA held its Student Action Summit in Tampa, Florida. Criticism of Israel's influence over the Trump administration was a central point of the discussion during the summit,
a position Tucker Carlson amplified during his speech at the event when he raised questions about Israel's involvement in Jeffrey Epstein's child sex trafficking operation. Carlson addressed the long-held position that Epstein was working as an intelligence asset for Israel and it was met with raucous applause from the crowd, a scene that may have marked the point of no return for Kirk.
According to a source close to Kirk, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went as far as reaching out to the late political activist to offer a massive transfusion of funding into TPUSA —
an offer that Kirk firmly rejected. That refusal was not enough to entirely dissuade Netanyahu from continuing to court Kirk, as he offered to fly him out to Jerusalem to attend a meeting between them 2 weeks before his death. Kirk also refused the invitation from Netanyahu to meet with him in Israel.
In the weeks following the backlash against the TPUSA Student Action Summit in July, Kirk began to voice his frustration with the pro-Israel contingent of his supporters publicly. On August 6th, just one day after meeting with Ackman, Kirk joined the Megyn Big Kells Show to air his frustration over Israel with its eponymous host. Kirk succinctly summarized the avalanche of criticism that befell him by stating,
“I have less ability… to criticize the Israeli government than actual Israelis do. And that’s really, really weird," during his interview with Big Kells. A cursory examination of Kirk's history on X also shows that the last post he made mentioning Israel was around that same timeframe on August 14th.
Despite the crucible of political pressure Kirk was put under by the Zionist axis, he remained undeterred with his increasing criticism of Israel. This was apparent during what turned out to be the last interview he ever held on the Charlie Kirk Show when he asked guest Ben Shapiro pointed questions about the ongoing conflict led by Israel in the Gaza Strip. During the interview,
Kirk dared to question Shapiro on whether or not the media was providing Americans with the truth about Israel before going on to address criticism that Israel was committing an ethnic cleansing in Gaza. While only being framed as playing devil's advocate, Kirk's decision to ask the question left Shapiro visibly unsettled.
Following Kirk's assassination, Shapiro assumed an entirely different stance. Following the murder, Shapiro wasted no time in promising to "pick up that blood-stained microphone where Charlie left it" in a commitment to carrying on Kirk's legacy. Those remarks were joined by an outpouring of support from pro-Israel figures and Israeli government officials like Minister of National Security and self-admitted Jewish supremacist Itamar Ben-Gvir. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu immediately offered a eulogy for Kirk before joining Newsmax TV's Greta Van Susteren in an interview in which, for some reason, he chose to announce to the world that Israel was not a part of Kirk's assassination in a decision that embodied the Shakespearean line from Hamlet,
"The lady doth protest too much, methinks." The public reaction to Kirk's assassination, meant to paint him as an unwavering ally of Israel, was even amplified by US President Donald Trump, who posted an image of himself hugging Kirk in front of an American and Israeli flag.
It was not until the days following the outpouring of mourning over Kirk's murder that a focus could be brought to the growth of his political consciousness,
which led him away from unconditional support for Israel. While that renewed focus was initially one of pure speculation, if not apophenia, the patterns brought to light by those examining the final months of Kirk's life in politics have coalesced into something far more concrete in the wake of The Grayzone's report about Bill Ackman's alleged ambush.
The events leading up to and following Charlie Kirk's meeting with Bill Ackman in early August demonstrate how little the billionaire and his cohorts were able to reverse the course of the late conservative activist's departure from the pro-Israel position that he built his career on until the months preceding his assassination. In the days following his murder, this dimension of the political chaos that enveloped Kirk's life has been entirely overlooked by major media outlets continuing to cover the investigation into the assassination. Instead,
their focus has been on shaping a narrative that stokes the flames of a culture war that threatens to turn the once-great nation of the United States into smoldering ashes. That narrative and the chaos it unfurls provide a perfect facade to keep Americans from examining how much of a factor Kirk's changing position on Israel may have played into his untimely demise.
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