Megyn Kelly invokes Charlie Kirk to argue UK's case against Russell Brand was smear campaign

Megyn Kelly offered a defiant defense of Russell Brand after the actor's rape conviction this week.

Kelly, 55, invoked the late Charlie Kirk to cast doubt on a Monday ruling that found the 51-year-old actor guilty of raping one woman and sexually assaulting three more,  

'You know, Samantha, all I can think of as I cover this case is my friend Charlie Kirk, who did interview Russell,' she told UK comic Samantha Pressdee while discussing the verdict on The Megyn Kelly Show Wednesday.  

'And as with virtually everything, Charlie saw the story correctly from the beginning,' Kelly continued. Footage of Kirk's on-stage conversation with Brand at the Student Action Summit in Tampa, Florida, in August 2025 followed.

Kirk was heard telling the crowd in one snippet: 'The entire government is going after Russell; I hope you guys know that.'

He added to Brand: 'You're under attack from the UK government on, I think, completely fake stuff.'

Kirk pointed to Brand's then-recent conversion to Christianity as proof the Forgetting Sarah Marshall star was being subject to a 'Satanic attack.' He pointed out how, from Hebrew, the word 'Satan' can even be translated to 'the prosecutor' or 'deceiver.'

Kelly cut in to offer her two cents, first claiming Kirk 'saw exactly what was happening to Russell.'

Megyn Kelly, 55, defended convicted rapist Russell Brand while discussing the UK's ruling against him with Samantha Pressdee, a UK comic said she had a respectful romantic encounter with Brand in 2006

Kelly played a clip of Brand's conversation with the late Charlie Kirk  at the Student Action Summit in Tampa, Florida, in August 2025 to bolster her argument. Kirk framed the allegations against Brand as baseless, at the time. He was killed a little more than a month later 

'There are demons out there, and the entire UK wants us to believe that Russell is one of them,' Kelly said, echoing one of Kirk's statements.

She instead framed Brand as 'a big star with a lot of groupies who threw themselves at him.'

'He did not have to perform non-consensual sex acts on women. He had hundreds, if not thousands of options for consensual sex,' Kelly continued, before commending Brand for publicly converting to Christianity in 2024.

'[He] found God, reformed himself, changed his political outlook, found someone he truly loved, had three children with her,' Kelly gushed.

Progressives, she said, 'are completely resistant to that narrative.' 

The Catholic conservative maintained it was 'the new version of Russell' that 'they find truly deplorable.'

'The old version of Russell, they completely supported, allowed, promoted - it was the new version that they objected to,' Kelly said.

Pressdee agreed, after maintaining she had a consensual 'romantic encounter' with the soon-to-be imprisoned star in 2006. Kelly framed the dynamic as a 'double standard' and the case 'a political witch hunt.'

Brand - sentenced to more than a decade in prison on Monday - spoke about the allegation during an appearance on the Megyn Kelly Show in April, where he framed his relationships with women as immoral rather than criminal 

Brand was sentenced to 10 and a half years in prison following a lengthy investigation that started in 2023 and resulted in charges being brought against the comedian who became a household name in the mid-2000s.

He was found guilty of raping a 21-year-old fan he picked out of the crowd after one of his Hammersmith Apollo gigs in 2009, and three counts of sexual assault.

Brand spoke about the then-allegations during an appearance on the Megyn Kelly Show in April. He framed his behavior as immoral rather than criminal.

'I did sleep with a 16-year-old when I was 30,' he said at a point, addressing the relationship that became public when the Times of London and Britain’s Channel 4 published a joint investigation into him in 2023, paving the way for the criminal case.  

'But when I was 30 I was a different person. I was a lot younger and I was an immature 30-year-old,' he added.

The UK probe centered on alleged incidents that occurred between 2006 and 2013 – the height of Brand’s fame.