University of California Horse Feathers

Hat tip Campus Reform

"There is no crisis concerning free speech on campuses in the United States," Chermerinsky and Gillman add. "Every day on virtually every campus, speeches are given without incident, including some by very controversial speakers. Walk across either of our campuses on just about any day of the week, and the cacophony of diverse speakers is readily apparent."

"Horse feathers"


UC Irvine chancellor Howard Gillman and UC Berkeley Law School dean Erwin Chemerinsky have a  long history of white washing campus disruptions of conservative or pro-Israel events on their campuses, to say nothing of denying campus anti-Semitism. Now, in response to President Trump's executive order demanding free speech protections for all  (if universities want to continue receiving federal funds), the UC system is reacting with defiance. First, Janet Napolitano issued a statement that can only be considered defiant. Now, Chemerinksy and Gillman say there is no problem on their campuses.

https://www.campusreform.org/?ID=12050

Gillman and Chemerinsky are full of it. Look what happened when Milo Yiannopoulos was supposed to speak at Berkeley. It had to be cancelled (by UCB) because a riot ensued while campus police posed as potted plants and did virtually nothing. While teaching at UC Irvine 1998-2016, I witnessed several disruptions of pro-Israel events, and I also missed a few. They continue to occur since I left. In May 2018, a College Republican event featuring Israeli military reservists was disrupted by a group of Antifa-type thugs. (SJP was on probation because of their prior disruptions.)

Not only that, but when Chemerinsky was law school dean at UC Irvine, people affiliated with his own law school participated in disruptions of pro-Israel events on campus in May 2016 and May 2017. How? Because Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and the Muslim Student Union enlisted the aid of "legal observers" from the National Lawyers Guild (NLG). In case you didn't know, NLG was founded in the 1930s as a legal arm of the Communist Party USA. When both of those incidents occurred, NLG had an official affiliation with the UCI law school. I was present at the latter event and videotaped the whole thing. I personally saw an NLG/UCI Law School representative present. (They wear lime green baseball caps with National Lawyers Guild-legal observer written on them.) I personally interviewed this young woman earlier the same week, and she confirmed her association with both the law school and NLG. 

If you get the impression that May is a bad week at UC Irvine, you are correct. That's because it is in May when the SJP and Muslim Student Union hold their annual hate-Israel week of events and Students Supporting Israel hold their annual I-Fest (I for Israel) celebrating Israel's independence day. (At leats they try to hold their events.)

But worse than the free speech issue, Gillman and Chemerinsky should be ashamed of themselves for failing to address the problem of campus anti-Semitism and failing to provide proper protection to their Jewish students. The same goes for UC Pressdint Janet Napolitanio and virtually all of her chancellors.