The Young America’s Foundation brings some of the great conservative speakers and debaters of our time to the stage, speaking around the country on some very important issue. Lately, however, many college campuses have been banning these speakers for safety concerns due to rights by alt-left protesters.
With that… it seems UC Berkeley has fined it’s own College Republican group $15,000 to host famed conservative debater Ben Shapiro on it’s campus.
As reported by The Daily Caller:
UC Berkeley is waiving approximately $13,000 in staffing and venue fees for the event in an effort to show its support for free speech, according to YAF. The incident comes a week after UC Berkeley announced that the 2017-2018 school year would be “Free Speech Year” on campus.
“Berkeley’s tendency to run to friendly press in feeble attempts to curry favor and salvage a damaged public image aren’t working. The outcry from students, conservatives across the country, and even liberal elites including Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren proves the indefensibility of Berkeley’s continued anti-conservative and anti-free speech actions,” said Spencer Brown, YAF’s spokesman. “The sincerity of any claims made by Berkeley should be questioned given the school’s past stated inability to find a venue for YAF’s lecture with Ben Shapiro, and public claims that they’d cover the cost of a venue when one suddenly appeared.”
UC Berkeley has occupied the center of a college free speech firestorm in 2017. The school cancelled conservative provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos’ February speech amid riots resulting in thousands of dollars in property damage. Ann Coulter also cancelled an April speech after YAF determined a significant threat to student safety.
“It is our police department, not the administration that determines the fee and it cant be ‘disclosed’ until the hosting organization makes up its mind about audience size and other event details,” said Dan Mogulof, spokesman for UC Berkeley, to TheDCNF. “As soon as the [Berkeley College Republicans (BCR)] decided on its audience size, they knew exactly what the fe [sic] would be.”