Bill Ackman fired back Thursday against claims from political commentator Candace Owens that he orchestrated an “intervention” with Charlie Kirk over Kirk’s stance on Israel — including allegations of threats and blackmail.
The billionaire founder and CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management, posted a lengthy message on X on Tuesday aiming to rebut claims made by Owens and others that he sought to persuade Kirk to adopt a more pro-Israel stance during a Hamptons meeting a month before his assassination last Wednesday.
According to Ackman, Owens “slandered me by accusing me of ‘staging an intervention’ with Charlie Kirk in which ‘threats were made’ with respect to his supposed ‘evolving stance’ on Israel at an event I hosted in the Hamptons.”
“Candace also intimated that I ‘blackmail[ed]’ Charlie,” Ackman wrote on Tuesday.
Ackman wrote that “at no time have I ever threatened Charlie Kirk, Turning Point or anyone associated with him.”
“I have never blackmailed anyone, let alone Charlie Kirk,” Ackman wrote.
Ackman wrote that he “never offered Charlie or Turning Point any money in an attempt to influence Charlie’s opinion on anything.”
“In fact, my interactions with Charlie Kirk have been extremely cordial, albeit limited, regretfully so, as I was very impressed by him and his work and I will sadly never see him again.”
Ackman was responding to a clip of Owens from her podcast in which she claimed on Monday that Kirk was under “increasing amount of pressure” from pro-Israel groups and donors to silence dissenting voices.
According to Owens, Kirk declined significant funding from pro-Israel elements and was subjected to an “intervention” orchestrated by Ackman and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Owens cited a report on the far-left news site Grayzone, where stridently anti-Israel journalist Max Blumenthal wrote that Ackman staged a tense “intervention” in the Hamptons this summer where he and pro-Israel operatives allegedly “hammered” Kirk over his criticism of Israel.
According to one attendee who spoke to Grayzone, Natasha Hausdorff of UK Lawyers for Israel was “screaming” at Kirk during the Hamptons meeting.
Sources told the outlet Ackman pressed Kirk to rescind Tucker Carlson’s AmericaFest invite, presented him with a list of “offenses” against Israel and left him feeling subjected to “blackmail.”
Ackman has flatly denied the claims, calling them “totally false” and adding, “this was not an ‘intervention’ to ‘blackmail’ Charlie Kirk into adopting certain views on Israel.”
Prior to his assassination last week, Kirk made several public comments about Israel. While he was generally supportive of the Jewish state, Kirk frequently pushed back against what he saw as excessive attempts to silence critics of Israel in the US.
Kirk was sometimes frustrated with the constant pressure and scrutiny about his views on Israel, especially from both critics and donors.
Kirk said he received flack for allowing Dave Smith, a libertarian stand-up comic and frequent critic of Israel, to appear at the recent Turning Point USA student summit, where he denounced the Israeli war in Gaza.
Kirk’s comments about Israel and the criticism he received for inviting Smith sparked theories on social media insinuating an Israeli role in his murder, though no evidence has surfaced to support any link.
Law enforcement officials arrested Tyler Robinson, 22, of Utah, who is alleged to have killed Kirk.
A recent report by the Anti-Defamation League found more than 10,000 posts on X linking Kirk’s killing to Israel.
After Kirk was fatally shot during a Turning Point event at a university in Utah last week, Netanyahu mourned Kirk as a “lion-hearted friend of Israel.”
In his X post on Tuesday, Ackman revealed that Kirk told him on a Zoom call earlier this year that “young conservatives were getting tired of defending Israel, and this was very concerning to him.”
The Post has sought comment from TPUSA, the Israeli government and Hausdorff.
