Where Have Higher Ed Administrators Been on the Trump Assassination Attempt?
“Today’s violence at a presidential political rally is a threat to our democracy. Violence has no place in American politics. Civility and respect are paramount to finding solutions that will collectively make us stronger.”
While public figures of all political stripes weighed in en masse with the condemnations over the weekend in the aftermath of the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, and academic “leaders” told on themselves, administrators at higher education institutions have, so far, been mostly silent.
It’s something Steve McGuire, a conservative writer who tracks the goings on at our institutions of higher learning, made mention of on the Twitter/X machine Monday:
Has anyone seen a statement from a college or university president on the attempted Trump assassination?
— Steve McGuire (@sfmcguire79) July 16, 2024
There have been a few, as McGuire and some of his followers pointed out, but they left quite a bit to be desired.
Among the few statements that were noted, they were strangely devoid of any well wishes for Trump. For instance, Arizona State University President Michael Crow seemed far more interested in protecting his school’s reputation than condemning the actual shooting (bolded emphasis his):
As social media promulgates the usual kind of unsubstantiated and ill-informed theories about the shooting of former President Trump, one post being circulated attempts to implicate Arizona State University. In response to all this nonsense, I would like to caution everyone once again about believing the things you read on social media. To be clear, the individual who attempted to assassinate former President Trump had no association with ASU and was not the person seen on a video on the ASU campus four years ago.
ASU concluded its investigation back in 2020, in conjunction with the FBI, and determined the subject in the video was not a credible threat – and that person has a different name and different date of birth than the suspect in the attempted assassination of former President Trump over the weekend.
Michigan State University President Kevin Guskiewicz couldn’t even be bothered to mention Trump’s name or that someone tried to kill him. He merely referred to the shooting as “violence”:
Today’s violence at a presidential political rally is a threat to our democracy. Violence has no place in American politics. Civility and respect are paramount to finding solutions that will collectively make us stronger.
— Kevin Guskiewicz (@KevinGuskiewicz) July 14, 2024
West Chester University of PA President Lorraine Bernotsky seemed to take a jab at Trump himself in her statement – also without mentioning his name, and leaving out any prayers for a full recovery:
Statement by West Chester University President Lorraine Bernotsky on the attempted assassination of former President Trump: pic.twitter.com/wbE8mY8Sbh
— Steve McGuire (@sfmcguire79) July 16, 2024
Now, in the aftermath of the massive backlash to how disgracefully some colleges and universities responded to the Oct. 7th Hamas terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians, something some have called “institutional neutrality” has been implemented at some of these places, which effectively means no statements on political issues, social issues, and international issues related to politics and social causes.
But we all know that wouldn’t hold if the target had been Joe Biden and not Donald Trump:
I’m sure you’re right. Situational neutrality has a nice ring to it!
— Steve McGuire (@sfmcguire79) July 16, 2024
“Situational neutrality” is indeed what this is. Bank on it.
— Stacey Matthews has also written under the pseudonym “Sister Toldjah” and can be reached via Twitter. —
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Comments
Where have they been? Probably crying silently because the shooter missed.
As I said, its been a tough few days for Democrats.
Dems are looking at a far tougher 4 years.
Oh, they aren’t silent about it.
The Smart Ones are
Why do we need them to say anything? I care about as much for University Presidents opinions on anything not directly related to their campi as I do movie stars incessant prattling on about subjects they know less about than a grade school kid.
This is true, however these intellectual pygmies happily attach themselves to what ever is the current leftist outrage without any hesitation. It would just be nice once in a while for these clowns to be consistent.
“Why do we need them to say anything?”
Exactly. I value the opinion of my mail carrier far more than the opinion of any university president.
Higher education has been compromised for years. No one should care what any university president has to say.
Apropros of nothing, my Letter Carrier told me perhaps two months ago that he is voting for Trump. He’s a 50-something? Union member and, incidentally, a Black guy.
Let me postulate an alternate theory for their 3 monkey non-responses. They know President Trump is going to be re-elected. They know that means the jig is up nationally for dei and speech suppression if you are receiving federal dollars. They know that changes are coming to their precious bubble that they live in. Their worst nightmare would be Governor DeSantis as Secretary of Education! A boy can dream can’t he? FJB
I agree, DeSantis would be a good choice. It could be a stepping stone, a chance to demonstrate his skills on a national level.
Political violence? Not sure what that means.
JFK died from a case of severe car sickness.
Selective neutrality
How about some educational neutrality? That would be a radical position (now) that I could embrace.
I honestly don’t know what the solution is to America’s higher education problem. Right now, they’re really nothing more than militant Marxist factories and as this story perfectly illustrates, the fish is rotting from the head at 99% of American colleges & universities. It’s not sustainable.
I do know that forgiving tens-of-billions in student loan debt is only making the problem exponentially worse.
A start could be no more Government funding (no student loans) for Universities outside of a very select few courses in Engineering types of learning (ie. no funding for a BA in Lesbian Dance Theory). If kids want to get a a degree outside of the very limited number Government funding is available for then they have to pay for it themselves.
Most of those stupid, useless majors were created for people who were too dumb to be in college.
The solution is cut off all federal funding and end automatic student loan approval, make the universities co-sign the loan and if it isn’t paid back, then at the end of the loan term the university has to pay back the balance.
These worthless ‘X studies’ degrees CANNOT EXIST in an environment where there isn’t endless free government loan money available.
I am sick of every joker of some managerial authority issuing statements about every holiday and current event.
Who gives a shit?
Democrat harridans demanding your local conservative school board candidate disavow David Duke. I am ALL over that.
Since they now agree that violence has no place in a civilised society, can we start arresting the democrat brown shirts?
The left has a problem because the shooting made women change their minds and the left’s old anxiety-forming technique no longer worked on their target audience. It’s a new soap opera problem and they haven’t quite found the solution yet. John Stewart did last night, start quoting Republicans urging attacks on democrats.
“Where Have Higher Ed Administrators Been on the Trump Assassination Attempt?”
Furiously wrestling with their demons to not say stupid stuff on social media…
The Morning Joe failed that test and were kept off the air by the adults. 50,000 people were disappointed
their silence is violence