Question:
I never imagined I’d sit at my HR desk debating whether to fire two employees for cheering an assassination. Yet here I am.
I work in HR at a left-leaning non-profit where most staff identify as progressive. That’s fine with me—I value a mix of voices—but it’s not a safe place to share right-of-center views. Personally, I admired Charlie Kirk, not because I agreed with every position, but because he leaned into debate. He forced people out of their bubbles.
When news of Charlie’s assassination broke, two employees raised their fists and celebrated. They talked excitedly about it all day. Their cruelty and glee made me physically ill.
My HR role required I investigate. I asked them what, exactly, they despised about Charlie. Their answers fell apart quickly. Neither had ever listened to his original speeches or podcasts . Every “fact” they lobbed at me came from headlines passed through others.
They weren’t cheering because they had grappled with his words and found them harmful. They were cheering because they’d absorbed distortions and decided a human life didn’t matter. To me, that crosses into hate speech.
When, legally and ethically, can an employer fire employees for rhetoric like this? What real-world precedents exist? And if I move forward, how can I convince my left-leaning Board it’s the right call?
Answer:
Why This Matters
We live in an age where political violence slips too easily into casual conversation. A recent survey found 38% of respondents and 48% of self-described liberals viewed assassinating Donald Trump as “somewhat acceptable,” https://networkcontagion.us/wp-content/uploads/NCRI-Assassination-Culture-Brief.pdf.
That’s the climate your employees reflect. Cheering an assassination isn’t harmless venting. It glorifies violence, violates dignity, and undermines your nonprofit’s credibility.
Why Charlie Kirk’s Death Struck a Nerve
You hit on the key point: your staff condemned him without ever listening to him. They cheered based on caricature, not content. That is the polarization Kirk tried to puncture.
Agree with him or not, Charlie pushed people to debate across divides. If employees in your workplace can celebrate his assassination while admitting they’ve never engaged with his actual words, they’re not just expressing an opinion. They’re modeling intellectual laziness and moral callousness dressed up as righteousness—and they’re doing it under your non-profit’s roof.
Can You Fire for Hate Speech?
Yes—if you are a private employer and you document carefully. Free speech protects people from government action, not from workplace consequences. Employers have wide discretion when speech:
- Violates policy (anti-harassment, anti-violence, codes of conduct).
- Damages reputation with donors, clients, or the public.
- Undermines trust or creates a hostile environment.
Recent precedents:
- Nasdaq fired an employee who cheered Kirk’s shooting online, https://www.businessinsider.com/charlie-kirk-microsoft-nasdaq-delta-office-depot-employees-public-comments-2025-9.
- Clemson University dismissed staff for “inappropriate” posts about the assassination, https://www.greenvilleonline.com/story/news/politics/2025/09/15/clemson-investigation-charlie-kirk-posts-professors-employees-fired/86168808007/.
- United Airlines and Delta Air Lines have pulled employees from duties over Kirk-related posts, https://www.cnn.com/2025/09/14/us/airlines-suspend-workers#:~:text=Late%20Sunday%2C%20the%20airline%20confirmed,any%20attempt%20to%20justify%20it.%E2%80%9D
In multiple other cases workers have lost jobs for glorifying violence, even outside work hours. Courts generally uphold these actions when employers can show reputational harm, policy violation, or disruption, Workers Are Getting Fired Over Posts Mocking Charlie Kirk’s Death – WSJ
How to Frame This for Your Board
- Your Board may lean left politically, but this isn’t about politics—it’s about principle. Frame it as:
- Mission alignment: Celebrating violence contradicts the values your non-profit stands for.
- Reputation risk: Imagine headlines: “Non-profit tolerated staff cheering assassination.” Donor trust crumbles.
- Culture & morale: If this goes unchecked, employees who disagree politically, reject violence or want professionalism, will lose faith in leadership.
- Consistency: You can’t preach dignity while allowing staff to exalt in someone’s death.
- Precedent: Other organizations have already acted decisively.
The Bottom Line
Termination isn’t about politics. It’s about humanity. It’s about saying: in this workplace, we don’t cheer when people are killed. Period.
Document what was said, cite the policies violated, and present the risks clearly to your board. Your Board doesn’t need to approve a firing, but to endorse a principle: we are better than this.
We don’t cheer death.
© 2025 Lynne Curry, PhD, SPHR, SHRM-SCP
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As always Lynne, I agree with your response, BUT I think there could be another, perhaps more producative way to go. Given the current combative climate that we all now live in, I think the HR department could suggest that the company take advantage of this situation to create a learning moment. I wouldn’t fire anyone. I would ,however, make it clear that the employee’s behavior troubled me and the company greatly because what it reveals about their character. To enable them to overcome this bad mark against their character, I would ask them to help me put together a program about how to deal with extreme views on both sides of the divide. (I’m assuming these are people the company would like to keep.)
I was one of those people who didn’t cheer Kirk’s assissination, but definitely didn’t admire what I knew of him. However, one of my friends did. And she made me realize there was more to him than I thought. It made me examine my own views and the basis of them and question how justified they might be. I’m still the “lefty” I’ve always been but, I hope, a bit more open-minded then I’ve been in the past.
Anyway, opening up discussions about assumptions based on modern media might not help – then again – it might. Right now we have to find ways to come together rather then solidify the opinions that divide us.
Inappropriate responses to Charlie Kirk’s assassination have definitely become an issue and hit a nerve, across the country. Cheering a killing–except maybe for a tyrant who ruined many people’s lives [Hitler comes to mind here]–is never appropriate, no matter how much a person may revile them. But firing people over it is extreme. I agree with Wendy Lalli, creating a learning moment and talking about extreme views and how they harm individuals and the organizations they work for would be a good call. If the cheering veers into exhorting others to violence, then, we have a different issue, and firing could be called for as well as contacting law enforcement.
A practical, helpful article. And the comments point to the next question—how do we learn to do better?
Agreed!
Thanks for addressing this one, Lynn. I have to admit that I’ve chosen to move away from some former friends over this issue. I never saw one actually cheering, but I did see people defending the cheering, which was close enough for me. It is sad that there is even a portion of this country (the news said 20%!) that don’t see a human life any longer, just an enemy. I hope we can do better.
A clear and strong post Lynne.
Thanks.
Aileen, thank you so much.