The Cornell Daily Sun (https://cornellsun.com/tag/cornell_republicans/)
Cornell Republicans, the Cornell Review and the Cornell Political Union hosted an event to discuss topics surrounding free speech and expression amid national attention at Cornell on the topic.
Cornellians protested against Ann Coulter, conservative media pundit who visited Cornell as a guest speaker, citing her past anti-muslim, sexist and controversial remarks; in response, several students were escorted out.
“There isn’t necessarily a clear rationale that can be established, because it is large scale voting in large scale conversations,” said Weston Barker ’21, president of The Cornell Republicans.
At a Zoom event hosted by the Cornell College Republicans, Love discussed her background and career as a two-term Congresswoman, but largely focused on what she sees as the importance of pro-life policies.
To the Editor:
On Saturday, the executive board of the Cornell Republicans published a response to a column written by Andrew Lorenzen ’22 a day prior, which criticized the group’s lack of response in the wake of the murder of George Floyd. In light of the recent Black Lives Matter protests that have gripped America’s largest cities and brought issues of police brutality and racial injustice to the forefront of the media once again, we found in the group’s response little more than a vapid attempt to legitimize their continued inaction. We call here for the Cornell Republicans to publicly acknowledge that Black lives matter, and, in doing so, affirm the existence of systemic racism, institutional oppression and widespread racist police brutality. In their response meant “to set the record straight” on past silence, the Cornell Republicans reasoned that “an expression of discontent with current popular opinions, such as defunding police departments” would cause unrest in the campus political climate. However, the Cornell Republicans have previously not shied away from entertaining potentially contentious discussions – however unpopular – with little regard for the impacts they may have on campus climate.
To the Editor:
The Cornell Republicans executive board has been pained and anguished by the unjust killing of George Floyd. His death, the latest in a long series of injustices, has brought to the fore critical, and painful, conversations about police brutality and race. As the leadership of the Republican Party at Cornell, we have witnessed the intense discussion, action and outrage this tragedy has provoked. Realizing, however, that our positions might not align fully with those which have received widespread approval, we chose to take the present moment as one in which we would listen and reflect. While there are of course several policy measures we support, such as prohibiting chokeholds and reforming police unions, we thought it better to take this moment of national pain for reflection on how we can better live up to our founding ideals.
In an October Letter to the Editor, the E-Board of the Cornell Republicans lied to readers of The Sun. They boldly asserted that they “are an organization that relishes the opportunity to engage in good-faith debate,” yet when the national conversation turned to police brutality and the daily endangerment of black lives by law enforcement, they stayed notably silent. Their social media makes absolutely no mention of the murder of George Floyd nor any protests. Neither does their website. They have issued no public statement on the vitally important discourse on police brutality reverberating throughout our country.
To the Editor:
When I first learned that former Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker was visiting Cornell, I must admit, my interest was piqued. Then, I read Irene Hartmann’s grad letter, followed by the response from the Cornell Republicans. While striking, these letters do not paint a full picture of Gov. Walker, and I would encourage everyone to dig a bit deeper. For instance, while Hartmann notes that Walker attacked public-sector unions and blocked consumer protection laws, she failed to mention that Scott Walker turned down over $1 billion in federal dollars to expand Medicaid, meaning state funds were used instead. Nor did she note in her letter that Walker orchestrated the biggest corporate handout to a foreign company in American history, $4 billion, complete with the right to ignore environmental regulations, which has been disastrous.
Last week, I received a text containing the picture shown: An artful take on Cornell Republicans’ controversial decision to invite former Wisconsin governor Scott Walker to speak on Nov. 4. Hilarious. Let’s talk about it. Forms of expression like this have managed to poke the Big Red free-speech bear in nearly all seven of my semesters here at Cornell.
.Reading Irene Hartmann’s grad letter to the editor regarding our upcoming event with former Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker on Monday, Nov. 4, we could not help but think about how Hartmann may have benefited from attending our first event of the semester with David French, then of National Review, now with The Dispatch. French spent much of his time here warning us against embracing the politics of war, enmity and assumption. It is clear that this prudent advice has not been heeded. One need only make use of the link Hartmann provided in her letter to dismiss the careless charges of defending pedophiles she leveled against Gov. Walker.