Charlie Kirk chuckled as he looked up from his phone, his face reflecting the glow of a half dozen cable news channels, each flashing silent White House headlines from across the dimly lit room.

Kirk sat at a V-shaped desk stamped with his personal logo, surrounded by his life’s work: a sprawling Phoenix campus housing the nation’s preeminent conservative student group, Turning Point USA, and its increasingly influential campaign arm, Turning Point Action. At 31, the GOP juggernaut couldn’t help but grin — it had been a good summer.

Fresh off a week co-hosting “Fox & Friends,” where he had made his national debut more than a decade before, Kirk was riding high. A recent cameo on South Park only added to his swagger. The irreverent satire had mimicked his debate tactics almost word-for-wo

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