08/20/2026
Candace Owens is an American far-right political commentator, author, and conspiracy theorist. She has promoted conspiracy theories on a wide range of subjects throughout her career.
Owens has gained recognition for her conservative activism—despite being initially critical of President Donald Trump and the Republican Party—as well as her criticism of Black Lives Matter. Owens was the communications director for the conservative advocacy group Turning Point USA (TPUSA) from 2017 to 2019. In 2018, Owens co-founded the BLEXIT Foundation along with former Tucson police officer Brandon Tatum. After working for PragerU, in 2021 Owens joined The Daily Wire and began hosting Candace, a political talk show. She was dismissed in March 2024 following a series of comments regarded as antisemitic, and months of tensions with co-host Ben Shapiro and other Daily Wire staff.
CHARLIE KIRK ASSASSINATION
In the weeks following the September 2025 assassination of Charlie Kirk in Utah, Owens questioned aspects of the investigation on her podcast, suggesting that Tyler Robinson did not act alone in killing Kirk. Owens initially suggested, without evidence, that Utah politician Phil Lyman, who was attending the event at which Kirk was assassinated, was connected to a conspiracy to kill Kirk. This accusation was denounced by Governor of Utah Spencer Cox, Lyman's former opponent.
Owens has implied, without explicitly stating, that an Israeli conspiracy was responsible for Kirk's death. Several organizations and media outlets criticized Owens's comments as promoting antisemitic conspiracy theories, while her supporters defended her right to raise questions. To support her claims, Owens released several private text messages from Kirk, showing that Kirk, a vocal supporter of Israel, had in private showed more ambivalence towards Israel and Zionist activists. These include, most notably, texts from a WhatsApp group chat where Kirk, around 48 hours before his death, revealed to coworkers he had "no choice but to leave the pro-Israel cause".
Owens has also accused the Egyptian and French governments of playing a part in the assassination, inaccurately claiming that Egyptian airplanes were stalking Erika Kirk. Owens claimed to have had a dream in which Charlie Kirk told her he had been betrayed. Owens claimed the dream was an example of her "prophetic vision" and "female intuition" which would lead her to the truth about Kirk.
During an interview with Elle Reeve, Owens inaccurately claimed that messages written by Robinson that were released to the public were Discord messages, when they were in fact text messages. Owens claimed these messages were fabricated by the federal government, while admitting she had not read the federal indictment of Robinson. Owens would further suggest that unspecified members of Turning Point USA were complicit in Kirk's assassination.
