October 4, 2024 • 19 mins
Whistleblower Ann Atkinson, a staunch defender of free speech, gave a talk at the STARRS Rally for Our Republic in September 2024 in Arizona. She was introduced by rally emcee Ray Semko, the D*I*C*E Man.
Advocating for free speech in academia can be a path fraught with peril. Ann Atkinson, former executive director of the TW Lewis Center for Personal Development at Arizona State University, courageously stood her ground amidst a storm of opposition of her of promoting traditional American values by hosting an event with speakers like Dennis Prager and Robert Kiyosaki. Her story provides a gripping look into the ramifications of censorship in higher education and reveals the broader implications on students' freedom to explore diverse perspectives.
Listeners will gain insight into the personal and professional fallout Ann faced, including her termination and the subsequent legislative actions in Arizona. Through Ann's powerful narrative, the theme of integrity in the workplace is discussed as well as the crucial role of authenticity in fostering an environment conducive to free speech. Ann’s talk is a testament to her unwavering commitment to truth and transparency, showcasing the vital necessity of safeguarding open dialogue on university campuses. Prepare to be inspired by Ann's resilience and the lessons her story imparts on the importance of standing up for one's beliefs against all odds.
Listeners will gain a sobering perspective on the pervasive influence of DEI in higher education. Ann has taken these issues to massive platforms—from the Wall Street Journal to Fox Business to the Arizona State Legislature. She illuminates how the issues stemming from the DEI cult extend beyond Ivy League campuses, revealing a crisis where institutions promote one ideology while practicing another.
Her talk unveiled covert tactics used by the academic bureaucracy to intimidate and silence dissenting voices and suppress certain opinions. It's a rallying call to action, urging attendees to awaken to these realities, defend intellectual diversity, and confront the higher ed ideological cartel.
_______________________________________
For more information about STARRS, go to our website: https://starrs.us which works to eliminate the divisive Marxist-based CRT/DEI/Woke agenda in the Department of Defense and to promote the return to a warfighter ethos of meritocracy, lethality, readiness, accountability, standards and excellence in the military.
Join our Mailing List for our weekly newsletter on this issue.
Follow STARRS:
X | Facebook | LinkedIn | Rumble | YouTube | Truth | Gettr | Gab
Support the Mission: Make a tax-deductible donation to STARRS.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Ray Semko, Emcee (00:06):
Okay.
So now our next speaker.
She's going to be good.
You were terrific, everybody'sgoing to be terrific.
Okay, I've never been part ofsuch a star-studded cast.
Ann Atkinson, don't jump up.
When I met her last night, I'mlike are you kidding me?
(00:30):
This lady is unbelievable.
And then Kim and I'm going Ifeel like leftover.
Yeah, not, like what am I evendoing here?
Then I remembered I'm holdingthe microphone, even doing here.
Then I remembered I'm holding amicrophone.
Ann Atkinson paid for freespeech at Arizona State.
She paid a heavy price.
She's going to tell you that.
(00:50):
But the thing I thought thatwas amazing.
She is an entrepreneur,educator, former public company
executive, healthcare, realestate investor, wife, mother,
triathlete oh God, I can't dothat and free speech advocate.
Now that I am All of that, itis amazing that you you you're a
(01:18):
mother and you do all thesethings.
She's going to tell you thatshe did something that most
people would not do.
They would have just let it go.
She paid a price for it.
Ann Atkinson, thank you You'rewelcome.
Ann Atkinson (01:37):
All right, good morning.
How is everybody today?
Good, this is a veryintelligent, looking, factually
intelligent audience and I'msure those that are streaming
online, that's also you.
So I'm going to start with thequestion and first I need to ask
you to please go back toyourself when you were in
college or your highest form ofeducation.
(01:59):
Remember yourself in thatclassroom and think if your
professor expressed a view thatyou disagreed with, would you
have been comfortable justexpressing that you had a
different opinion?
Show of hands, how many wouldhave been comfortable expressing
(02:20):
?
Look, I think differently abouta controversial political topic
or anything.
So FIRE, which is theFoundation for Individual Rights
and Expression, which is aprestigious national free speech
organization, put out anational survey this week, two
days ago, and they surveyednationally 58,000 college
students in public privateuniversities.
Of 58,000 college students, 53%were uncomfortable with that
(02:45):
answer.
They would be uncomfortableexpressing a disagreement with a
professor in their classroom.
53% were silencing thisgeneration.
Now.
61% of those students would beuncomfortable publicly
disagreeing with theirprofessors.
So what I'm here to show youtoday I'll walk you through a
personal experience at thelargest university in the nation
(03:08):
, right here, arizona StateUniversity, and will allow you
to see just how the ideologicalcartel is censoring our students
, causing them to alsoself-censor, and is rotting the
very intent of higher education,which is the pursuit of truth
and the discovery of knowledge.
I'm first going to lay a littlegroundwork for you.
(03:31):
My background, as Ray said, is apublic real estate health care
real estate executive.
I've acquired over $5 billionof medical office buildings on
behalf of investment companies.
I've had a 20-year career inthis.
Higher education was not in mycards, but I got recruited to
run this center as the executivedirector of what was the TW
(03:53):
Lewis Center for PersonalDevelopment at Arizona State
University.
Asu has 144,000 studentsenrolled.
It's a massive institution herein Arizona and this center
served its entire Honors Collegeof 7,000 students.
So it was my honor to take abreak from Healthcare Real
(04:13):
Estate Investments to come andserve these next generations of
students.
So what was the Lewis Center?
This was a donor-funded centerthat was new, only a couple of
years old when I joined, withthe specific intent to teach the
traditional American values ofpersonal finance, personal
responsibility, entrepreneurship, free enterprise, career
(04:33):
success.
These are points that are sorare in our education
institutions and it was a brightlight not just in the Honors
College but also within theuniversity at large.
So we put on events and as theexecutive director it was my job
to bring in speakers and put onspeaker programs and workshops
(04:53):
that aligned with that intent.
And boy we did.
In two years we had over 150speaker programs with all sorts
of different leaders,entrepreneurs, philanthropists,
some former politicians andpeople to basically bring the
real world into these classrooms.
The Lewis Center was successful,but from day one the faculty
(05:14):
were threatened by simply thehappy capitalists, as they
mockingly called us.
I think a happy capitalist is agreat compliment.
So the Lewis Center was thisprogram, it was this gem, it was
a community for students and itwas something different than
what existed.
But the faculty didn't like it.
For a while we had a dean whowas the dean for 20 years of
(05:37):
Barrett, the Honors College, whosupported diversity of
intellect and supported ourright to exist to put on
programs which are differentthan what you would typically
see in the Honors College.
But then we got a new dean.
So let me finish thisgroundwork and then I'm going to
tell you the conflict thathappened that you might have
read about in the Wall StreetJournal or in various
(05:59):
publications here in Arizona.
As executive director, I invitedspeakers to come and made the
decision, along with our donor,Tom Lewis, to invite Dennis
Prager, robert Kiyosaki andCharlie Kirk to come and speak
at ASU.
The faculty threw a fit.
They threatened us, they tookaction and showed us that speech
(06:22):
is not really free at ArizonaState.
It's not really free in highereducation.
So this event was to take placeat Gammage Auditorium, which is
the most prestigious stage andthe largest university in the
country, in February of 2023.
And this speaker program wascalled Health, wealth and
(06:42):
Happiness and truly, for thoseof you who know me personally,
I'm not a lightning rod thatwants to come in and shake
things up.
I wanted to provide a greateducational program for the
students, for the community,that would be free for any
students high school wouldn'tmatter and I brought in really
great speakers that are expertsin these areas of health, wealth
(07:03):
and happiness.
Great speakers that are expertsin these areas of health,
wealth and happiness.
But once the program wasannounced, 39 of the 47 honors
faculty at Barrett, the honorscollege launched an all-out
assault on the center, on ourdonors, on our speakers and on
me.
These are the professors whoare supposed to be helping our
students and our childrendiscover truth and learn and be
(07:25):
ready for the real world.
But instead they decided toattack and they used their
university resources, emailingacross the university to other
schools and departments andchairs saying join us as we
mobilize and protest becauseDennis Prager and Charlie Kirk
are white nationalist extremists, they're a threat to democracy
(07:47):
and they're purveyors of hate.
I mean, they were going to talkabout happiness, so then the
faculty they take to Twitter andthey talk about how they're so
offended.
This isn't what their schoolrepresents.
I have all this documented, andone that stood out to me was a
professor saying that ourcollege sold its soul to the
(08:10):
highest bidder by having adonor-funded center that's
optional for students to attend,funded by Mr Tom Lewis, who is
an incredible philanthropist inArizona.
And they say our college soldits soul Like we're the darkness
.
I mean, I think that'sgaslighting is maybe a fairly
accurate way to describe thattweet.
So the professors are talkingand then they write this
(08:34):
petition that, with 39 of the 47professors sign this petition
outlining all the reasons whythese speakers are purveyors of
hate and threats to ourdemocracy, and they cite media
matters for all of theirexamples, which is basically a
left-wing rag that it loses allcredibility.
So all of this happened andmaybe that's just faculty being
(08:58):
faculty.
But then the deans took down ourmarketing because it offended
the faculty.
Now this is a line that is aline to cross.
For the dean of the HonorsCollege to physically remove
marketing and to order for theTV screen marketing to be taken
down because their faculty wereoffended, which was discussed
and decided in a secret meetingthat I was not invited to and
(09:20):
then for the deans dean and vicedean to take me in a conference
room and tell me specificallywhat these speakers would or
would not be allowed to talkabout.
They set ground rules and saidDennis Prager and Charlie Kirk
are not to talk about highereducation or anything that could
be deemed as political or usedas a political platform, which
(09:43):
it's hard to understand whatthey could even mean by that.
So they tried to censor speechby some of the most prominent
voices in the nation who werecoming to talk about a very
vanilla topic health, wealth andhappiness.
And then the deans decided andthey hired an outside crisis
management firm to handle ourhealth, wealth and happiness
program.
(10:03):
And in a meeting with the deansand the crisis management firm,
they told me look, what's goingto stop you from inviting the
KKK to campus, ann?
Because these speakersbasically share the same values.
Okay, my one funny line of theday and it's, I think, a sad
funny but these speakers we hadone was from Sri Lanka, one is a
(10:24):
Japanese American and one is areligious Jew and the crisis
management team compared them tothe KKK.
I think that gave me very sadtears to think about that.
Those are the people educatingour children.
So at this point I thought thisis ridiculous.
It can't get worse.
We have the faculty that isassaulting our program.
(10:48):
The deans are censoring us, andI talked to the speakers.
I had a heart-to-heart withRobert Kiyosaki, with Dennis
Prager, with Charlie Kirk andtheir teams and with Tom Lewis
and said look, I mean, thisprogram is being cast as a white
supremacy rally and that's notat all the intent.
Do we want to continue?
(11:08):
And all of us, we stoodlockstep together and said yes.
We stood lockstep together andsaid yes, we will stand up, we
will speak up, we will hold thisprogram.
And we did, and it was asuccess, and we had 1,600 people
in the audience.
And the program is stillavailable on YouTube today.
And if it was anything like howthey tried to paint this, just
(11:31):
because the faculty and deansdidn't like our speakers, well,
it would have been taken down.
Or I would have one comment onthe YouTube video saying look at
this hate speech.
How am I on time?
Okay, so with all of this Ihave, I'm an alma.
Asu is my alma mater.
I went to Barrett the honorscollege and I thought you know,
we have a very reasonablepresident of the university and
(11:54):
I'm going to address what?
Because what's the worst theycan do?
I'm not a higher educationlifelong person, I'm a
healthcare real estate investor.
I'm going to take this on, Idon't care the cost.
I'm going to address theproblem through all the proper
channels, do it respectfully andmake a change, because this is
ridiculous.
So, after everything was saidand done, the dust settled.
(12:16):
There's so much detail thathappened in this you'd just be
appalled.
But I took these issues up tothe university and I thought the
one thing that would stand outthe most to university admins
would be how those facultymembers actually went into their
classrooms Before our program.
They told our students do notattend because this event is for
(12:39):
white supremacists.
The teachers instructed thestudents and told them what to
believe, what was okay tobelieve.
And you wonder why 53% of thosenationally surveyed students
were uncomfortable, disagreeingwith their professors, because
this is what's happening in ourclassrooms.
So I thought of everything thathappened.
The dean censoring speech andthe professors going into their
(13:01):
classroom would not resonatewith Michael Crow.
Michael Crow was a respecteduniversity president.
I have a lot of respect forwhat he's done with the
university and I thought he willnot stand for this.
I was wrong.
I went through HR, through allthe acronym levels of the
university.
I went all the way up to thepresident.
(13:22):
The president and the board ofregents reached out to them
personally, provided evidence,provided student testimonials
about what happened in theseclassrooms and nothing, nothing
happened.
So I asked for a meeting withPresident Crow.
He deferred me to meet with theprovost, nancy Gonzalez lovely
(13:45):
lady and also have a lot ofrespect for her, but I disagree
with how she handled this.
When I told her all that I justtold you, her response to me
was well, ann, we allowed thespeakers, but you then have to
take the consequences.
Invite the wrong people, faceconsequences.
What were my consequences?
I lost my job.
I was fired over this.
The events organizer at ASUGammage, who did nothing but
(14:08):
simply allow a universitycolleague to put on an event.
She was fired and the entireLewis Center that I ran, a
million-dollar center, was shutdown.
I can't tell you the speakersthat we had lined up for the
next year.
We had a bus of 100 studentsready to go to Microchip
Technologies to meet the founderand CEO of this mega company.
(14:30):
We had Joe Polish, who's herein the audience of the Genius
Network, who's the connector ofall connectors, lined up to come
and spend his time teachingthese students.
By the way, do you want to knowhow Trump and RFK became
connected?
Joe Polish introduced ourmutual friend, callie Means to
Robert F Kennedy Jr, who's areally good friend of Joe Polish
(14:51):
, and Callie Means is the personwho connected Donald Trump and
RFK.
So, by the way, thank you, joefor that.
And that was a Lewis Centerspeaker.
Joe Polish, that is.
He will not get the chance togo back and maybe you're going
to go back and you know to thepeople who remain, but the
center's gone.
(15:11):
So the consequences speaking outis that I was fired, lynn Blake
was fired and the entirecenter's gone and all those
students who I still keep intouch with my daughter has a
bracelet business and she's six.
The students like to buy herbracelets.
I keep in touch with a lot ofthem and they have nothing.
They have no community.
That is even resemblant of whatwe had at the Lewis Center.
(15:35):
So to wrap this up about whathappened it you know I went to
the University Provost andexhausted all resources
internally, went through all thechannels, respectfully so, and
when she told me that you knowyou, we allowed the speaker, but
you have to take theconsequences.
That's when I went public.
(15:55):
So that's where I wrote anop-ed in the Wall Street Journal
, an op-ed at the NationalReview.
I've been on Dakin McDowell andSean Duffy with Fox Business.
I've been on Maria Bartiromowith Fox Business.
I've been on the Rubin Report,dennis Prager, charlie Kirk,
sharing this message and thegovernment picked this up.
And we have had multiplelegislative hearings in Arizona.
(16:16):
We have legislation that hasbeen drafted and we are taking
action.
The university will not fixitself and for those of you who
have woken up, you need torealize we have to stay awake,
we have to take action.
These institutions, themilitary and higher education,
will go to incredible lengths totreat these instances like PR
(16:38):
crises, not like problems thatneed addressing.
So stand up, speak up and never, ever give up.
Thank you.
Ray Semko, Emcee (16:56):
Nothing like doing your job and getting fired
for it.
I don't know about you, but nowI'm realizing that when they
tell me the rest of the story,I'm getting madder, and it's
such a shame.
I mean colleges they'resupposed to be for expanding
your horizons, Actually teachingyou to do analytical thinking,
(17:20):
not just following the bouncingball with the loudest voice.
And for what you did, yeah, Ican only commend you, Ann,
because most people wouldn't.
Most people would have justsaid, okay, fine, I'm not going
to do it.
It's just like me, after everyjob that I lost because I was
telling the truth.
You know why I tell the truth.
(17:41):
I'm not smart enough toremember lies.
That's why I could never be apolitician.
So in this case here, peoplewould go you can't tell people
that, yes, I can tell peoplethat Am I lying?
And they'd say no, but you'reupsetting them.
Oh well, forgive me, I knowyou're going to find this hard
(18:03):
to believe, but I was adifficult employee.
I really was, Because I toldthem.
You know what, If you have togive somebody a bad efficiency
rating to even out the curve,give me the bad one.
I can take it, because I don'tneed your approval to do my job.
(18:24):
I know how to do my job.
I told every supervisor I everhad if you don't show up for
work, I'm in charge.
Please do me a favor, Take myvacation days.
We'd all appreciate it.
I'm tired of placating stupid.
And this is what we're fighting.
That's what you were fighting.
(18:45):
Unbelievable that that ladysaid you got to pay the price.
What about you?
I was always on the road andevery time I come back and go
well, where were you?
Yesterday?
I said I have receipts.
I got hotel parking a wholenine yards.
What did you do yesterday?
I have witnesses who saw mework.
Anybody see you do anything?
Yeah, and the class I alwaysattended was dealing with
(19:11):
difficult employees.
I always attended those becauseI wanted to know what they were
going to do for me.
Try and do to me, and that'swhat the bad guys do all the
time.
So, and thank you for yourcourage and for being a
whistleblower.
That's a tough thing to do.
It really is.
And so we got to get to thenext speaker because Casey's
(19:35):
going to slide me if we go late.
Okay.
So now our next speaker.
She's going to be good.
You were terrific, everybody'sgoing to be terrific.
Okay, I've never been part ofsuch a star-studded cast.
Ann Atkinson, don't jump up.
When I met her last night, I'mlike are you kidding me?
(00:30):
This lady is unbelievable.
And then Kim and I'm going Ifeel like leftover.
Yeah, not, like what am I evendoing here?
Then I remembered I'm holdingthe microphone, even doing here.
Then I remembered I'm holding amicrophone.
Ann Atkinson paid for freespeech at Arizona State.
She paid a heavy price.
She's going to tell you that.
(00:50):
But the thing I thought thatwas amazing.
She is an entrepreneur,educator, former public company
executive, healthcare, realestate investor, wife, mother,
triathlete oh God, I can't dothat and free speech advocate.
Now that I am All of that, itis amazing that you you you're a
(01:18):
mother and you do all thesethings.
She's going to tell you thatshe did something that most
people would not do.
They would have just let it go.
She paid a price for it.
Ann Atkinson, thank you You'rewelcome.
Ann Atkinson (01:37):
All right, good morning.
How is everybody today?
Good, this is a veryintelligent, looking, factually
intelligent audience and I'msure those that are streaming
online, that's also you.
So I'm going to start with thequestion and first I need to ask
you to please go back toyourself when you were in
college or your highest form ofeducation.
(01:59):
Remember yourself in thatclassroom and think if your
professor expressed a view thatyou disagreed with, would you
have been comfortable justexpressing that you had a
different opinion?
Show of hands, how many wouldhave been comfortable expressing
(02:20):
?
Look, I think differently abouta controversial political topic
or anything.
So FIRE, which is theFoundation for Individual Rights
and Expression, which is aprestigious national free speech
organization, put out anational survey this week, two
days ago, and they surveyednationally 58,000 college
students in public privateuniversities.
Of 58,000 college students, 53%were uncomfortable with that
(02:45):
answer.
They would be uncomfortableexpressing a disagreement with a
professor in their classroom.
53% were silencing thisgeneration.
Now.
61% of those students would beuncomfortable publicly
disagreeing with theirprofessors.
So what I'm here to show youtoday I'll walk you through a
personal experience at thelargest university in the nation
(03:08):
, right here, arizona StateUniversity, and will allow you
to see just how the ideologicalcartel is censoring our students
, causing them to alsoself-censor, and is rotting the
very intent of higher education,which is the pursuit of truth
and the discovery of knowledge.
I'm first going to lay a littlegroundwork for you.
(03:31):
My background, as Ray said, is apublic real estate health care
real estate executive.
I've acquired over $5 billionof medical office buildings on
behalf of investment companies.
I've had a 20-year career inthis.
Higher education was not in mycards, but I got recruited to
run this center as the executivedirector of what was the TW
(03:53):
Lewis Center for PersonalDevelopment at Arizona State
University.
Asu has 144,000 studentsenrolled.
It's a massive institution herein Arizona and this center
served its entire Honors Collegeof 7,000 students.
So it was my honor to take abreak from Healthcare Real
(04:13):
Estate Investments to come andserve these next generations of
students.
So what was the Lewis Center?
This was a donor-funded centerthat was new, only a couple of
years old when I joined, withthe specific intent to teach the
traditional American values ofpersonal finance, personal
responsibility, entrepreneurship, free enterprise, career
(04:33):
success.
These are points that are sorare in our education
institutions and it was a brightlight not just in the Honors
College but also within theuniversity at large.
So we put on events and as theexecutive director it was my job
to bring in speakers and put onspeaker programs and workshops
(04:53):
that aligned with that intent.
And boy we did.
In two years we had over 150speaker programs with all sorts
of different leaders,entrepreneurs, philanthropists,
some former politicians andpeople to basically bring the
real world into these classrooms.
The Lewis Center was successful,but from day one the faculty
(05:14):
were threatened by simply thehappy capitalists, as they
mockingly called us.
I think a happy capitalist is agreat compliment.
So the Lewis Center was thisprogram, it was this gem, it was
a community for students and itwas something different than
what existed.
But the faculty didn't like it.
For a while we had a dean whowas the dean for 20 years of
(05:37):
Barrett, the Honors College, whosupported diversity of
intellect and supported ourright to exist to put on
programs which are differentthan what you would typically
see in the Honors College.
But then we got a new dean.
So let me finish thisgroundwork and then I'm going to
tell you the conflict thathappened that you might have
read about in the Wall StreetJournal or in various
(05:59):
publications here in Arizona.
As executive director, I invitedspeakers to come and made the
decision, along with our donor,Tom Lewis, to invite Dennis
Prager, robert Kiyosaki andCharlie Kirk to come and speak
at ASU.
The faculty threw a fit.
They threatened us, they tookaction and showed us that speech
(06:22):
is not really free at ArizonaState.
It's not really free in highereducation.
So this event was to take placeat Gammage Auditorium, which is
the most prestigious stage andthe largest university in the
country, in February of 2023.
And this speaker program wascalled Health, wealth and
(06:42):
Happiness and truly, for thoseof you who know me personally,
I'm not a lightning rod thatwants to come in and shake
things up.
I wanted to provide a greateducational program for the
students, for the community,that would be free for any
students high school wouldn'tmatter and I brought in really
great speakers that are expertsin these areas of health, wealth
(07:03):
and happiness.
Great speakers that are expertsin these areas of health,
wealth and happiness.
But once the program wasannounced, 39 of the 47 honors
faculty at Barrett, the honorscollege launched an all-out
assault on the center, on ourdonors, on our speakers and on
me.
These are the professors whoare supposed to be helping our
students and our childrendiscover truth and learn and be
(07:25):
ready for the real world.
But instead they decided toattack and they used their
university resources, emailingacross the university to other
schools and departments andchairs saying join us as we
mobilize and protest becauseDennis Prager and Charlie Kirk
are white nationalist extremists, they're a threat to democracy
(07:47):
and they're purveyors of hate.
I mean, they were going to talkabout happiness, so then the
faculty they take to Twitter andthey talk about how they're so
offended.
This isn't what their schoolrepresents.
I have all this documented, andone that stood out to me was a
professor saying that ourcollege sold its soul to the
(08:10):
highest bidder by having adonor-funded center that's
optional for students to attend,funded by Mr Tom Lewis, who is
an incredible philanthropist inArizona.
And they say our college soldits soul Like we're the darkness
.
I mean, I think that'sgaslighting is maybe a fairly
accurate way to describe thattweet.
So the professors are talkingand then they write this
(08:34):
petition that, with 39 of the 47professors sign this petition
outlining all the reasons whythese speakers are purveyors of
hate and threats to ourdemocracy, and they cite media
matters for all of theirexamples, which is basically a
left-wing rag that it loses allcredibility.
So all of this happened andmaybe that's just faculty being
(08:58):
faculty.
But then the deans took down ourmarketing because it offended
the faculty.
Now this is a line that is aline to cross.
For the dean of the HonorsCollege to physically remove
marketing and to order for theTV screen marketing to be taken
down because their faculty wereoffended, which was discussed
and decided in a secret meetingthat I was not invited to and
(09:20):
then for the deans dean and vicedean to take me in a conference
room and tell me specificallywhat these speakers would or
would not be allowed to talkabout.
They set ground rules and saidDennis Prager and Charlie Kirk
are not to talk about highereducation or anything that could
be deemed as political or usedas a political platform, which
(09:43):
it's hard to understand whatthey could even mean by that.
So they tried to censor speechby some of the most prominent
voices in the nation who werecoming to talk about a very
vanilla topic health, wealth andhappiness.
And then the deans decided andthey hired an outside crisis
management firm to handle ourhealth, wealth and happiness
program.
(10:03):
And in a meeting with the deansand the crisis management firm,
they told me look, what's goingto stop you from inviting the
KKK to campus, ann?
Because these speakersbasically share the same values.
Okay, my one funny line of theday and it's, I think, a sad
funny but these speakers we hadone was from Sri Lanka, one is a
(10:24):
Japanese American and one is areligious Jew and the crisis
management team compared them tothe KKK.
I think that gave me very sadtears to think about that.
Those are the people educatingour children.
So at this point I thought thisis ridiculous.
It can't get worse.
We have the faculty that isassaulting our program.
(10:48):
The deans are censoring us, andI talked to the speakers.
I had a heart-to-heart withRobert Kiyosaki, with Dennis
Prager, with Charlie Kirk andtheir teams and with Tom Lewis
and said look, I mean, thisprogram is being cast as a white
supremacy rally and that's notat all the intent.
Do we want to continue?
(11:08):
And all of us, we stoodlockstep together and said yes.
We stood lockstep together andsaid yes, we will stand up, we
will speak up, we will hold thisprogram.
And we did, and it was asuccess, and we had 1,600 people
in the audience.
And the program is stillavailable on YouTube today.
And if it was anything like howthey tried to paint this, just
(11:31):
because the faculty and deansdidn't like our speakers, well,
it would have been taken down.
Or I would have one comment onthe YouTube video saying look at
this hate speech.
How am I on time?
Okay, so with all of this Ihave, I'm an alma.
Asu is my alma mater.
I went to Barrett the honorscollege and I thought you know,
we have a very reasonablepresident of the university and
(11:54):
I'm going to address what?
Because what's the worst theycan do?
I'm not a higher educationlifelong person, I'm a
healthcare real estate investor.
I'm going to take this on, Idon't care the cost.
I'm going to address theproblem through all the proper
channels, do it respectfully andmake a change, because this is
ridiculous.
So, after everything was saidand done, the dust settled.
(12:16):
There's so much detail thathappened in this you'd just be
appalled.
But I took these issues up tothe university and I thought the
one thing that would stand outthe most to university admins
would be how those facultymembers actually went into their
classrooms Before our program.
They told our students do notattend because this event is for
(12:39):
white supremacists.
The teachers instructed thestudents and told them what to
believe, what was okay tobelieve.
And you wonder why 53% of thosenationally surveyed students
were uncomfortable, disagreeingwith their professors, because
this is what's happening in ourclassrooms.
So I thought of everything thathappened.
The dean censoring speech andthe professors going into their
(13:01):
classroom would not resonatewith Michael Crow.
Michael Crow was a respecteduniversity president.
I have a lot of respect forwhat he's done with the
university and I thought he willnot stand for this.
I was wrong.
I went through HR, through allthe acronym levels of the
university.
I went all the way up to thepresident.
(13:22):
The president and the board ofregents reached out to them
personally, provided evidence,provided student testimonials
about what happened in theseclassrooms and nothing, nothing
happened.
So I asked for a meeting withPresident Crow.
He deferred me to meet with theprovost, nancy Gonzalez lovely
(13:45):
lady and also have a lot ofrespect for her, but I disagree
with how she handled this.
When I told her all that I justtold you, her response to me
was well, ann, we allowed thespeakers, but you then have to
take the consequences.
Invite the wrong people, faceconsequences.
What were my consequences?
I lost my job.
I was fired over this.
The events organizer at ASUGammage, who did nothing but
(14:08):
simply allow a universitycolleague to put on an event.
She was fired and the entireLewis Center that I ran, a
million-dollar center, was shutdown.
I can't tell you the speakersthat we had lined up for the
next year.
We had a bus of 100 studentsready to go to Microchip
Technologies to meet the founderand CEO of this mega company.
(14:30):
We had Joe Polish, who's herein the audience of the Genius
Network, who's the connector ofall connectors, lined up to come
and spend his time teachingthese students.
By the way, do you want to knowhow Trump and RFK became
connected?
Joe Polish introduced ourmutual friend, callie Means to
Robert F Kennedy Jr, who's areally good friend of Joe Polish
(14:51):
, and Callie Means is the personwho connected Donald Trump and
RFK.
So, by the way, thank you, joefor that.
And that was a Lewis Centerspeaker.
Joe Polish, that is.
He will not get the chance togo back and maybe you're going
to go back and you know to thepeople who remain, but the
center's gone.
(15:11):
So the consequences speaking outis that I was fired, lynn Blake
was fired and the entirecenter's gone and all those
students who I still keep intouch with my daughter has a
bracelet business and she's six.
The students like to buy herbracelets.
I keep in touch with a lot ofthem and they have nothing.
They have no community.
That is even resemblant of whatwe had at the Lewis Center.
(15:35):
So to wrap this up about whathappened it you know I went to
the University Provost andexhausted all resources
internally, went through all thechannels, respectfully so, and
when she told me that you knowyou, we allowed the speaker, but
you have to take theconsequences.
That's when I went public.
(15:55):
So that's where I wrote anop-ed in the Wall Street Journal
, an op-ed at the NationalReview.
I've been on Dakin McDowell andSean Duffy with Fox Business.
I've been on Maria Bartiromowith Fox Business.
I've been on the Rubin Report,dennis Prager, charlie Kirk,
sharing this message and thegovernment picked this up.
And we have had multiplelegislative hearings in Arizona.
(16:16):
We have legislation that hasbeen drafted and we are taking
action.
The university will not fixitself and for those of you who
have woken up, you need torealize we have to stay awake,
we have to take action.
These institutions, themilitary and higher education,
will go to incredible lengths totreat these instances like PR
(16:38):
crises, not like problems thatneed addressing.
So stand up, speak up and never, ever give up.
Thank you.
Ray Semko, Emcee (16:56):
Nothing like doing your job and getting fired
for it.
I don't know about you, but nowI'm realizing that when they
tell me the rest of the story,I'm getting madder, and it's
such a shame.
I mean colleges they'resupposed to be for expanding
your horizons, Actually teachingyou to do analytical thinking,
(17:20):
not just following the bouncingball with the loudest voice.
And for what you did, yeah, Ican only commend you, Ann,
because most people wouldn't.
Most people would have justsaid, okay, fine, I'm not going
to do it.
It's just like me, after everyjob that I lost because I was
telling the truth.
You know why I tell the truth.
(17:41):
I'm not smart enough toremember lies.
That's why I could never be apolitician.
So in this case here, peoplewould go you can't tell people
that, yes, I can tell peoplethat Am I lying?
And they'd say no, but you'reupsetting them.
Oh well, forgive me, I knowyou're going to find this hard
(18:03):
to believe, but I was adifficult employee.
I really was, Because I toldthem.
You know what, If you have togive somebody a bad efficiency
rating to even out the curve,give me the bad one.
I can take it, because I don'tneed your approval to do my job.
(18:24):
I know how to do my job.
I told every supervisor I everhad if you don't show up for
work, I'm in charge.
Please do me a favor, Take myvacation days.
We'd all appreciate it.
I'm tired of placating stupid.
And this is what we're fighting.
That's what you were fighting.
(18:45):
Unbelievable that that ladysaid you got to pay the price.
What about you?
I was always on the road andevery time I come back and go
well, where were you?
Yesterday?
I said I have receipts.
I got hotel parking a wholenine yards.
What did you do yesterday?
I have witnesses who saw mework.
Anybody see you do anything?
Yeah, and the class I alwaysattended was dealing with
(19:11):
difficult employees.
I always attended those becauseI wanted to know what they were
going to do for me.
Try and do to me, and that'swhat the bad guys do all the
time.
So, and thank you for yourcourage and for being a
whistleblower.
That's a tough thing to do.
It really is.
And so we got to get to thenext speaker because Casey's
(19:35):
going to slide me if we go late.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!