Two weeks after an angry “pro-trans” mob at the University of North Texas shut down a conservative campus group’s event, the university’s president is speaking out and taking the side of the liberal mob.
On March 2, the Young Conservatives of Texas at UNT hosted Jeff Younger, a Texas father who advocates for parental rights and against forcing dangerous drugs and life-altering “sex-change” surgeries onto children in the name of “gender transition.”
Younger’s ex-wife got custody of their son James after Jeff refused to go along with her plans to “transition” the young boy into a girl. He’s now running for a seat in the Texas Legislature to help save kids like James.
But when Younger arrived to speak on campus, he was greeted by a group of protestors, mostly dressed in black, who filled the classroom. They constantly shouted obscenities, heckled, screamed, and used noisemakers to try and drown him out.
Protesters outside the building shouted, “F*** Jeff Younger” and “F*** Kelly”—a reference to Kelly Neidert, a graduate student at UNT who previously headed the YCT group and has been a frequent target of leftist threats and online harassment.
Neidert says she was forced to hide in a janitors’ closet after police could not safely escort her from the building.
Soon after the events, UNT President Neal Smatresk appeared to condemn the riotous behavior, saying it was “not reflective of the UNT I know and love.”
Since then, however, Smatresk has sided with the mob against YCT.
“I abhor what YCT has said and done,” Smatresk said last week, while noting that the First Amendment left the school “handcuffed” in terms of options to disband the organization, according to North Texas Daily.
“If I could snap my fingers and remove [YCT], I would do it,” Smatresk added. “But it’s not what we practice on this campus.”
In a new statement released Wednesday, Smatresk stated his “unequivocal support for the queer and trans members of the UNT community.”
“Offensive statements directed at these students by a student organization are abhorrent. It is unacceptable when people are hateful, or groups go out of their way to bully or demean marginalized populations. There is no place for this behavior on our campus,” Smatresk said.
The UNT president made no mention, however, of the harassment and behavior directed toward YCT.
