HERE WE GO AGAIN: Concordia College Leftists Try To Rescind Funding For Shapiro’s Speech

In what has become the time-honored tradition of attempting to keep Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief Ben Shapiro from speaking on a college campus, the heads of the student government at Concordia College in Moorhead, Minnesota, issued an email to all students alerting them of an emergency senate meeting to discuss rescinding the funding for Shapiro to speak.

The Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) chapter at Concordia College had secured $7,080 from the student government to fund Shapiro’s event; the vote was 13-10 vote on November 30. But as YAF reports, “Over the weekend, members of the student government were bombarded by emails and phone calls from intolerant students outraged over the decision to fund part of Ben Shapiro’s honorarium.”

Conscious that the decision to rescind funding would be implemented with a simple majority of the vote, an email from the “Student Government Association Executive Team” began by noting the SGA’s first-ever State of the Students Address on the evening of Thursday, December 7. It continued:

A senate meeting will be convened immediately following the event. This senate meeting will address the response the student body (SGA’s constituents) has given regarding the recent approval to allocate $7,080 to aid the Concordia student organization of Young Americans for Freedom and their pursuit to bring conservative speaker Ben Shapiro to campus. SGA’s first goal is to listen to, represent, and act on the feedback of its students, and there will be a motion put forward to rescind the funding.

Part of the motion to rescind funding reads:

Whereas there has been outcry from Concordia’s student body (Student Government Association’s constituents) regarding the allocation of $7,080 to Young Americans for Freedom to assist in the cost of bringing Ben Shapiro to Concordia, and whereas Student Government Association’s constituents have asserted that Student Government Association should be dedicated to supporting its underrepresented and marginalized students and the greater goal of promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion at Concordia; and whereas Student Government Association’s constituents have asserted that Ben Shapiro’s harmful messages targeting LGBTQ+ communities and other marginalized identities is in direct opposition to the dedication of Concordia and Student Government Association to support diversity, equity, and inclusion from all backgrounds and identities, therefore, be it resolved the resolution of $7,080 allocated to Young Americans for Freedom on the Senate meeting of November 30th, 2017 be rescinded.

YAF at Concordia released this statement:

All the YAF chapter at Concordia wants is for SGA to help offset the cost of bringing a conservative speaker to campus. Instead they compromise their integrity and call for a rescinding of the vote due to vocal opposition from students on campus not one week after we received partial funding. Bringing Ben Shapiro to campus would be a sign from Concordia College that they value intellectual and political diversity and that they care about the marginalized and underrepresented conservative voices on campus.

The vote to rescind funding will take place at 8:15 p.m. Thursday night.