School officials at a Florida college ejected one student and two members of Young Americans for Freedom, a young conservative group, for displaying anti-Obama literature on their table. Apparently opposing far-leftist policies is offensive, and that can’t be tolerated.
On Tuesday September 7, 2010 at around 11:00am one Palm Beach State College (PBSC) student and two Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) members, state chairman Daniel P. Diaz and state vice chairman Eddie Shaffer, were shut down and had campus police called on them after tabling and recruiting during club rush at the College. The PBSC student, Christina Beattie, had received prior permission from college administrator Olivia Ford-Morris to promote her organization on campus via telephone and email communication.
On the day of club rush, officials approached the group and after seeing information about the organization and its ideals criticizing Barack Obama’s economic policy. Ms. Ford-Morris was visibly disturbed by the material presented, published by the Heritage Foundation, criticizing President Obama’s administration. College officials then called the campus police to assure the group left campus. Ms. Ford-Morris denied having ever talked to Ms. Beattie about giving permission to the organization to be a part of PBSC club rush.
“I was shocked and offended by her dishonesty. She outright denied giving me permission to table at Club Rush simply because she disagreed with my beliefs! The fact is, she was using her administrative power to silence the conservative opposition.” said Christina Beattie.
Christina Beattie, a student at PBSC has been the lead organizer of a weeklong recruitment event for YAF. Christina saw a need for a conservative club on campus and decided to create a YAF Chapter. Beattie inquired with college Student Activities Coordinator, Ms. Olivia Ford-Morris, via email about being allowed to recruit at the college rush. To Christina’s surprise Ms. Ford-Morris called her and allowed the group to table at the event.
Other groups on campus attended the event and tabled, but had not registered with the student activities coordinator. These groups remained untouched and were allowed to recruit even without permission. The Film Club, one of the groups not authorized to participate in the event, declined to comment for fear of reprisal from college administration.
Palm Beach State College is a public college, receiving funding from Florida taxpayers of all political orientations. And yet conservatives were thrown off campus and had the police called on them for daring to display anti-Obama literature at a time when the display of literature is considered acceptable.
You can find video of the incident at the link.
Let’s all pretend to be surprised that leftist college administrators shut down political dissent, punishing those who dare to oppose the policies of a far-leftist politician.


by Stephan Tawney on September 8, 2010