PORTLAND, Maine – TPUSA Faith is bringing its “Make Heaven Crowded Tour” to the Portland Expo Center on Friday, May 15, placing Portland in the middle of a national conversation over faith, free speech, public facilities, and conservative Christian outreach.
The event will be held from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the Portland Expo Center, 239 Park Ave., Portland, Maine, with doors opening at 5 p.m.
The gathering is being co-hosted by Calvary Chapel Greater Portland and is described by organizers as a night of worship, preaching, prayer, and gospel outreach. TPUSA Faith has called the tour a “gospel-centered gathering” focused on repentance, faith, and obedience to Jesus.
The Portland event has drawn criticism from progressive activists and some local officials, including Portland City Councilor Wes Pelletier, who publicly criticized the gathering amid broader opposition to Turning Point USA Faith’s appearance at the city-owned venue. Portland officials have said the city cannot deny access to a public facility based on the viewpoint of the speakers or organizers.
A counter-event, “Love is the Point: A Multi-Faith Response to the Turning Point USA Event,” is scheduled for the same evening from 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at First Parish Portland, 425 Congress St., Portland. Organizers say that event is intended to support immigrant and transgender communities.
Calvary Chapel Greater Portland is based in Westbrook and led by Pastor Travis Carey. Carey has said the Expo event was planned as a gospel outreach from the beginning and pushed back on critics who portrayed it as something else.
Carey’s own background has shaped his ministry. According to Calvary Chapel Greater Portland, Carey is a Bangor native who has publicly shared his testimony of addiction, incarceration, faith, recovery, discipleship, and pastoral ministry. He serves as senior pastor of the church.
Turning Point USA was founded in 2012 by Charlie Kirk as a conservative nonprofit focused on organizing students around fiscal responsibility, free markets, and limited government. TPUSA Faith is the organization’s faith-focused arm, aimed at churches, pastors, and Christian civic engagement.
Kirk became one of the most recognizable conservative youth organizers in the country before his assassination in September 2025. After his death, Turning Point USA’s board named his widow, Erika Kirk, as CEO and chair of the organization.
The Portland stop now arrives not only as a worship event, but as a flashpoint in a city where conservative religious expression, progressive activism, and the limits of government control over public venues are colliding in full public view.
A friend wrote a monograph, “The Red-Green Axis”, over a decade ago that explains how the communists began taking over the Christian churches back in the 50s and 60s. The First Parish church in Portland has definitely been infiltrated by Lefties masquerading as believers. Don’t be fooled by their phony altruism.
Didn’t Marilyn Manson perform at the Portland Expo?
If people want to say that TP USA is not moral enough to perform at the Portland expo, perhaps they ought to go down the list of people who did perform their since it was built. Wasn’t it supposed to be the place that Elvis was gonna perform next when he died?
May I suggest that the fascist on the left, and they are fascist, need to think very carefully about the precedent they are setting by trying to prevent TP USA from renting the expo for whatever event they want to have.
As an educator, I consider Marilyn Manson concerts to be down dangerous and STRONGLY advise parents to absolutely not let their children attend one. But I’m not standing outside one with a baseball bat trying to prevent people from attending!!! I believe in the first amendment, I believe the city no right to determine the content of speech and the court has consistently agreed with me on that.
But there are any true liberals left on the left, I suggest they consider the consequences of activist groups preventing people from speaking and the consequences of that. And while this happened before a lot of people were even alive, do not forget the fact that Buddy Franklin, minister of the Bangor Baptist Churcwas almost elected Governor of this state. In the 1980s, Maine had an obscenity referendum that would have criminalized —well all of Marilyn Manson, but a lot of other things, including a lot of widely read books.