“He did not hate his opponents, he wanted the best for them,” Donald Trump said Sunday of the assassinated Charlie Kirk during a eulogy during Kirk’s memorial Sunday in Arizona. “That’s where I disagreed with Charlie: I hate my opponents and I don’t want the best for them,” he added, railing repeatedly against “nasty” political violence coming from “radical Left,” their “allies in the media” and “paid agitators.”

While never naming the now-benched Jimmy Kimmel by name, Trump made sure his audience watching the ceremony at State Farm Stadium in-person, on TV and online knew exactly who he was talking about.

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“Some of the very people who call you a hater for using the wrong pronoun were filled with glee at the killing of a father with two beautiful young children,” Trump insisted, as he has before the past week and more since Kirk was shot and killed while speaking during an event at Utah Valley University. “The same commentators who this week are crying fascism over a canceled late-night TV show, where the anchor had no talent and no ratings were implying Charlie deserved what happened to him,” Trump went on to say, offering no evidence for his accusations.

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“The gun was pointed at him, but the bullet was aimed at all of us,” Trump added, referring to Kirk and his notion of freedom of speech.

Following a “unique blend of speeches,” as CNN‘s Boris Sanchez so deftly put it earlier in the day, Trump took the stage at to a crowd of tens of thousands in Glendale, AZ — with thousands more in a local spillover venue and elsewhere. Receiving multiple standing ovations and stressing the power of faith and forgiveness, widow and now Turning Point USA CEO Erika Kirk emotionally eulogized her husband just before Trump took the stage.

After going hard on his enemies and critics and abandoning any attempt at a “consoler-in-chief” moment, Trump granted that maybe Erika Krik, who joined him on stage at the end, could talk him out of his vengeance and grievances.

Erika Kirk speaks at her husband’s Charlie Kirk’s memorial service Sunday Joe Raedle/Getty Images

“He could always draw a big crowd … this is a big crowd,” Trump stated of Sunday’s turnout, naming cabinet members, senators, congressional representatives and other in attendance. “He was an all-American in everything he did.”

Seemingly jumping off his circumspect prepared remarks and adopting a different approach than most of the day’s previous speakers, Trump launched into one of his favorite topics – taking over Democratic-run cities. “One of the last things he said to me was, sir, please save Chicago,” Trump said of the Illinois-raised Kirk. “We’re going to do that, we’re going to save Chicago,” Trump added to applause from the MAGA crowd over his threat to bring federal troops to the Windy City.

Praising his tariffs policy, troops on the streets of DC and mocking Joe Biden, Trump appeared to go off script several times. Frequently sounding like the speech from his close adviser Stephen Miller, Trump also pitched his promise to announce Monday the origins of autism that his administration has apparently discovered. “I think it is going to be one of the most important news conferences I’ll ever have, and I look forward to it,” he said.

Punctuated by tones of revival and restraint, pyrotechnics and bulletproof glass-protected administration officials like longtime ally VP JD Vance, Kirk’s packed-to-the-rafters memorial comes 11 days after the MAGA activist was tragically shot and killed in front of thousands of students and his own family.

Praising Kirk for helping him break through with younger male voters, Trump told the audience how he kicked “very powerful people” out of the Oval Office when he heard the news of the shooting.

After a couple of days of confusing reports from FBI director Kash Patel, a suspect was arrested.

In fact, local law enforcement was notified by Tyler Robinson’s family of what the 22-year-old Utah native may have done after seeing photos and video footage released as part of the investigation. Robinson, whose parents walked him into a local sheriff’s office, was charged last week with aggravated murder and six other charges including obstruction of justice and witness tampering. Utah prosecutors say they will seek the death penalty.

Amid partisan finger-pointing over Kirk’s death and the rise of political violence in America, the day after Robinson was charged, Disney “indefinitely” pulled Kimmel’s long-running ABC late-night show off the air.

The widely criticized move came in the fallout of comments Kimmel made on-air on September 15 about the MAGA crowd and Trump’s response to Kirk’s death. As Trump and his FCC chair Brendan Carr threatened more repercussions against media who cross them and their base, Kimmel’s Live! remains dark, though there are ongoing talks between Disney leaders and the host and his team for a pathway for him to return.

A gathering of the MAGA elite, today’s widely covered memorial saw Trump sitting for most of the gathering in a private box with UFC boss and close pal Dana White (who at one point could be seen looking over POTUS’ speech) and, for a short but surprising time, Elon Musk – as Fox News noted:

The biggest donor to Trump’s 2024 campaign, Musk, the world’s richest man, had a very public falling-out with Trump over the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill not long after exiting as the head of the Department of Government Efficiency. The rift widened in early June when Musk tweeted on his X platform: “Time to drop the really big bomb: @realDonaldTrump is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public. Have a nice day, DJT!”

Going up and down over the summer amid the White House’s frustration and distraction efforts, there has been growing discord among MAGA supporters over Trump, the DOJ and the FBI reneging on their promise to release the files on longtime Trump buddy and convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, who died from what has been called suicide in 2019 while in custody.

In the final months of his life, Kirk urged for the full release of the Epstein material. The activist softened his demands after a meeting with Trump, though he continued to call for transparency from the feds. Nobody mentioned any of that today.