On Tuesday’s ABC News Special Report about Utah County officials formally announcing charges against the suspect in Charlie Kirk’s murder, chief national correspondent Matt Gutman expressed affinity for the suspect and admiration for his love story with a trans person, gushing the text messages released by authorities were “lovingly” stated, “very intimate,” and “very touching.”
Gutman was reporting from the site of the press conference when he told World News Tonight anchor David Muir something “that stood out” was “those text messages” between the suspect and his roommate/lover.
“I don’t know if we have seen an alleged murder with such specific text messages about the alleged murder weapon, where it was hidden, how it was placed, what was on it, but also it was very touching in a way that I think many of us didn’t expect,” Gutman declared.
But, wait, there was more: “A very intimate portrait into this relationship between the suspect’s roommate and the suspect himself, with him repeatedly calling his roommate, who is transitioning, calling him ‘my love’ and ‘I want to protect you, my love.’”
He finished this stunning piece of outrageous analysis by asserting a “duality” of both murder and love:
So, it was this duality of someone who the attorney said not only jeopardized the life of Charlie Kirk and the crowd, but was doing it in front of children, which is one of the aggravating circumstances of this case. And then, on the other hand, he was, you know, speaking so lovingly about his partner. So, a very interesting and, as Pierre [Thomas] said, riveting press conference[.]
Who does Gutman think this is? The director of a Hallmark movie? Another attempt at humanizing the trans-loving assassin like Rolling Stone propped up one of the Boston bombers? Is Gutman trying to get fired? He’s already been suspended twice in the last five years for his reporting on Kobe Bryant and Covid, respectively.
In the comments to the above X post (and inside the NewsBusters newsroom), Gutman’s idiocy called to mind the all-time utterance from then-Boston Globe writer Charles Pierce in 2003 humanizing Ted Kennedy, saying Mary Jo Kopechne would have appreciated his work on health care (minus the part about having left her to die in a sinking car).
Incredibly, Gutman doubled down less than ten minutes later on the network’s streaming platform, ABC News Live, calling the case “heartbreaking on so many levels” with Kirk having been “murdered brutally in front of a crowd of thousands of people” plus the “duality of a very a portrait of a very human person, a very human experience from this entire family.”
Gutman then continued to dig himself a pit of controversy, including his use of the word “touching” to describe the suspect’s relationship with a trans person:
[T]he kid who had got a 34 out of 36 on the ACT, who had a 4.0, who got a full ride to college here, that that kid was the one who alleged perpetrated....And then those text messages and I don’t think I’ve ever experienced a press conference in which we’ve read text messages that are A, so fulsome, so robust, so apparently, allegedly self-incriminating and yet, on the other hand, so touching — right — with the suspect reaching out to his roommate, who was allegedly his boyfriend, who we understand, you know, identified as male at birth, now identifies as female. And the terminology he used, he was trying to protect him. He kept calling him “my love.” “My reason for doing this is to protect you,” you know, but also asking him to delete the messages and not speak to law enforcement. So there’s this, this heartbreaking duality that we’re seeing very tragically playing out here.
To see the relevant ABC transcript from September 16, click “expand.”
ABC News Special
September 16, 2015
2:57 p.m. EasternDAVID MUIR: Let’s get right to the room. And Matt Gutman, who asked a couple of those questions you saw at that news conference, Matt, again, the Utah County attorney, Jeff gray, saying, what I laid out here today is what I would have had to file publicly anyway, indicated that he was very comfortable with the information he revealed here today.
MATT GUTMAN: And I think he feels like he has a lot of information. I think you and Pierre both noted there is what they say is the DNA on the trigger of the murder weapon, those text messages, the other evidence that they’ve managed to gather from the scene, it’s pretty damning. But what was very interesting about how Attorney Gray phrased this is that this is a suspect who in this system is still presumed innocent until we prove to a jury his guilt beyond reasonable doubt. He is very much trying to play by the rules here. And I asked him specifically about FBI director Kash Patel sort of getting out in front of this investigation, revealing some of these key details that we’ve been talking about, that this group here in Utah, the DPS — the Department of Public Safety — has been very, very circumspect, trying to keep it close to the vest. He said, well, it doesn’t exactly help us. We typically like to have more control over that information. It was sort of an oblique swipe at the director, but it does seem that they have a pretty significant amount of information. The other thing that stood out to me, David, is those text messages. I don’t know if we have seen an alleged murder with such specific text messages about the alleged murder weapon, where it was hidden, how it was placed, what was on it, but also it was very touching in a way that I think many of us didn’t expect — a very intimate portrait into this relationship between the suspect’s roommate and the suspect himself, with him repeatedly calling his roommate, who is transitioning, calling him “my love” and “I want to protect you, my love.” So, it was this duality of someone who the attorney said not only jeopardized the life of Charlie Kirk and the crowd, but was doing it in front of children, which is one of the aggravating circumstances of this case. And then, on the other hand, he was, you know, speaking so lovingly about his partner. So, a very interesting and, as Pierre said, riveting press conference, David.
MUIR: It was Tyler Robinson, the man you speak of now facing the death penalty. Jeff Gray, the Utah attorney making that clear. Our thanks to Matt Gutman.
(....)
ABC News Live
September 16, 2025
3:04 p.m. EasternMATT GUTMAN: It’s heartbreaking on so many levels, Kyra. Obviously, Charlie Kirk was murdered brutally in front of a crowd of thousands of people who watched him being shot through the neck and then essentially bleed out in front of him. And I think one of the things that the attorney here made a very fine point about is that a lot of these charges — seven charges — were aggravated because children were present, children witnessed this, children were put in harm’s way. And that was something that obviously is aggravating here. And that’s one of the reasons that the suspect, in addition to the alleged murder being political in nature, is facing the death penalty. They’re going for the death penalty. And on the other hand, there is this duality of a very a portrait of a very human person, a very human experience from this entire family. As you mentioned it, the mother who essentially discovered that it was her son who had done this, the kid who had got a 34 out of 36 on the ACT, who had a 4.0, who got a full ride to college here, that that kid was the one who alleged perpetrated. She saw those pictures and said — identified him essentially. And then those text messages. And I don’t think I’ve ever experienced a press conference in which we’ve read text messages that are A, so fulsome, so robust, so apparently, allegedly self-incriminating and yet, on the other hand, so touching — right — with the suspect reaching out to his roommate, who was allegedly his boyfriend, who we understand, you know, identified as male at birth, now identifies as female. And the terminology he used, he was trying to protect him. He kept calling him “my love.” “My reason for doing this is to protect you,” you know, but also asking him to delete the messages and not speak to law enforcement. So there’s this, this heartbreaking duality that we’re seeing very tragically playing out here.
