Ian Valdes #
Introduction #
Ian Valdes, the president of the Turning Point USA chapter at Florida International University, stepped down from his leadership role in March 2026 after the Miami Herald published leaked WhatsApp messages in which he and other young conservative leaders exchanged racist, antisemitic and homophobic remarks — including variations of the N-word used more than 400 times. The FIU chapter of Turning Point USA, the organization founded by Charlie Kirk, confirmed on social media that its chapter president had stepped down, and Florida International University said the messages were under investigation. Valdes was among several conservative student figures taking part in the chat, which was created by Miami-Dade Republican Party secretary Abel Alexander Carvajal.
Background Information #
Valdes led the FIU chapter of Turning Point USA, the conservative youth organization Kirk co-founded, and was a visible figure in Miami-area conservative student politics. The group chat he joined was created by Carvajal as a space for conservative students connected to local political organisations and campus groups, and its participants included the College Republicans’ recruitment chair Dariel Gonzalez alongside Valdes. The messages that ended his leadership were exchanged over roughly two and a half weeks between September and October 2025 — beginning, the Guardian reported, after the killing of Kirk himself — and two people who were part of the chat confirmed the logs to the Miami Herald.
The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation #
Allegations. The chat’s contents are as reported by the Miami Herald, the Guardian and EDGE from leaked logs; the logs were verified by chat participants for the Herald but the messages have never been tested in any court proceeding, and Valdes has not publicly disputed their accuracy.
The Miami Herald’s publication of the chat logs showed participants using slurs targeting LGBTQ+ people alongside racist, antisemitic and misogynistic remarks, with references to Adolf Hitler’s politics and variations of the N-word used more than 400 times in the discussion. In one message reported by the newspaper, Valdes wrote: “I would def not marry a Jew.” According to the Guardian’s account of the logs, Valdes also responded to a antisemitic message from Gonzalez by agreeing with it, and renamed the group chat from “Uber [R-word slur] Yapping” to “Gooning in Agartha” — “Agartha” being a mythical white civilization promoted by Heinrich Himmler, one of the most powerful leaders of Nazi Germany. The EDGE described the leaked messages as revealing homophobic, racist and antisemitic language shared among conservative student leaders in Miami.
Public Reaction and Consequences #
Within days of the Herald’s reporting, the FIU Turning Point USA chapter announced that “the chapter president has stepped down from leadership,” and Florida International University confirmed the messages were under university investigation. The scandal engulfed the wider Miami conservative student ecosystem: Carvajal, the chat’s creator, faced removal proceedings as Miami-Dade GOP secretary and resigned later in March, and state Rep. Juan Porras was among the Florida Republicans publicly denouncing the messages. For an organization whose founder had been assassinated five months earlier and whose chapters were positioned as Kirk’s legacy, the sight of a TPUSA chapter president trading in Nazi-adjacent imagery and slurs was a reputational blow that no statement could fully contain.
Current Status #
Valdes’s resignation from the chapter presidency stands; what became of his student status is the open question. Unlike Carvajal and Gonzalez, both of whom were ultimately suspended from FIU for two years in conduct cases that produced federal litigation, no suspension of Valdes had been reported by the outlets covering the case. FIU’s investigation of the messages was confirmed but its findings as to Valdes specifically were not announced in the reporting on his resignation. His “I would def not marry a Jew” message and the chat’s rename remain part of the publicly circulated log of the scandal.
Impact on Their Career/Life #
Valdes lost the chapter presidency that was his political identity at FIU, and his name is now permanently attached to one of the most-cited young-Republican chat scandals of 2026 — the case reporters reach for whenever the next racist group chat surfaces, including the parallel leaked-chat scandals that swept other Florida and national youth chapters that spring. The resignation also cut him off from the Turning Point network at the exact moment the organization was canonizing its martyred founder, a cohort-defining event he instead missed while his own messages circulated in national coverage. Whatever political future he might have built in Miami-Dade’s conservative ecosystem, it now begins from a resignation statement rather than a platform.