Members and leaders of several SUNY Oswego student organizations met on campus March 29 to discuss the controversial arrival of Cherise Trump, a speaker invited to campus by the College Republicans student organization.

Trump, who will come to Marano Campus Center’s auditorium on April 5 to discuss free speech, is the executive director of Speech First, a nonprofit that, according to its website, protects free speech rights on American college campuses through advocacy and litigation. 

The meeting, which was moderated by SUNY Oswego’s Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer, Kendra Cadogan, as well as Women’s Center Director of Programming Dennis Molina, was described by Molina in an email as a way to express concerns between students in a peaceful and non-argumentative manner. 

Trump has engendered controversy among some on campus due to her advocacy for conservative viewpoints in published opinion articles, views which some students in the meeting felt were unsettling and threatening to members of the LGBTQ community. 

Thomas Tribunella, professor of accounting and faculty advisor to the College Republicans, said that he does not believe that students should worry about the presence of Trump on campus. 

“I’m trying to understand,” Tribunella said. “I guess I’m a little confused as to why people feel threatened by a presenter.” 

Student organizations like Two and a Half, the Women’s Center and the Black Student Union had a significant presence at the meeting, composing the majority of the roughly 30 students, faculty and staff members actively involved in the discussions of the evening. The general consensus of these groups was that Trump’s presence on campus brought into question the safety of the LGBTQ community and people of color on campus.

“Throughout her career, she has done numerous things that go against the people in this room,” Tyler Ray Johnson, a first-year student at Oswego and LGBTQ rights activist, said.

Kyle Camille, the vice president of the College Republicans, said that he believes Trump speaking on campus will have a positive impact on Republican students on campus and make them feel more comfortable joining the organization and embracing their political identity. 

“We’re trying to get the quiet people to come out and express their beliefs a little bit and have our club be a safe space for them,” Camille said. “I think, with Cherise coming, that would be good for our club and expanding our reach to kids that don’t know how to get involved in a Republican club.” 

Some students present at the meeting were concerned about the content of the presentation, worrying that hateful things might be said. They asked the College Republicans to ensure that it would be respectful.

“Oftentimes you can say what you’d like them to say, but you never know,” Ziyah Myers, a graduate student and advisor for Two and a Half, said. “A lot of us feel uncomfortable because we don’t know what’s going to be said.”

Abigail Jordayle, president of the College Republicans, emphasized that Trump is coming to campus to discuss the First Amendment guarantee of free speech, and stated that the club did not intend to cause controversy by inviting her. 

“I think what she speaks on is really valuable and as Americans is something that we should all value and we should all love,” Jordayle said. “We’re not doing this to annoy people or to make people angry because in all honesty we just want to feel the same as other clubs and be included as other clubs, and be treated like the same thing.”

The moderated conversation grew more contentious and emotionally charged near the end of the roughly 90-minute meeting, until it was concluded by moderators Cadogan and Molina. Cadogan finished off the discussion by thanking all of those present for “being willing to hear and being willing to be heard,” and applauded the student leaders for bearing with the discomfort of the conversation.

For more details on the April 5 event, visit calendar.oswego.edu. For more information on the student organizations represented during the meeting, visit lakerlife.oswego.edu. 

Photo via oswego.edu