The Kirk Record
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Aggregate casesClusterSept 2025

Higher-ed faculty & staff (documented cases)

Also: University professors · AAUP-tracked dismissals

Nationwide campuses · Founded N/A — occupational cluster

Importance

84

Size

70

Funding

48

Reach

~40 academics dismissed (AAUP); additional suspensions

Money

Not a funded organization. Public-university payrolls; several later won settlements totaling $2.7M+

Reported revenue

Unknown

Reported assets

Unknown

AAUP estimated around 40 faculty dismissals after Kirk's assassination. Documented celebration-level posts include University of Arkansas law professor Felicia Branch ('I will not pull back from celebrating that an evil man died'); Middle Tennessee assistant dean Laura Sosh-Lightsy ('ZERO sympathy'); University of Tennessee professor Tamar Shirinian ('the world is better off without him'); and University of South Dakota professor Michael Hook calling Kirk a 'hate-spreading Nazi.' Several later won six- and seven-figure settlements after universities reversed course.

“I will not pull back from celebrating that an evil man died by the method he chose to embrace.”

Felicia Branch, then University of Arkansas at Little Rock law professor, Sept. 2025

Documented conduct

  • AAUP: ~40 faculty fired in the weeks after the assassination
  • Named professors posted explicit celebration, 'FAFO,' or 'zero sympathy' language
  • Ole Miss administrator fired after calling Kirk a 'yt supremacist and reimagined Klan member'
  • Subsequent taxpayer-funded settlements exceeded $2.7 million for a handful of cases

Sources