YAF Pulls Support from Coulter Event Due to Berkeley Police “Stand-Down” Order

Citing credible evidence of violence,Young America’s Foundation has pulled its support from Ann Coulter’s speech at the University of California-Berkeley campus this Thursday.

YAF released a statement on Tuesday night, via Breitbart:

“When Young America’s Foundation confirmed Ann Coulter would speak at UC-Berkeley as part of YAF’s nationwide campus lecture program on April 27, we assumed UC Berkeley would take all steps necessary to ensure the safety of students attending the educational event,” the group declared in a blog post on Tuesday. “In the meantime we discovered that the University of California Police Department at Berkeley has an official ‘stand-down’ policy for any situation that develops on campus as long as the situation doesn’t involve the imminent loss of life, allowing the leftist thugs who have terrorized Berkeley’s campus to do so without consequence.”

Earlier, the Washington Post reported that Trump supporter, conservative commentator and author of 12 books, despite a genuine concern for violent confrontation, would go ahead with her lecture on campus. Coulter was expected to speak at the famous Sproul Plaza.

The earlier Post story unsuccessfully attempted to frame the narrative as potential battle between far-left and far right forces when, in fact, it has been far-left groups that have used violence and threats of violence against persons exercising their right to free speech, particularly the speech of those like Coulter who support Trump.

It goes without saying that the Young America’s Foundation isn’t afraid of a few red hats.

The irony is that the UC-Berkeley gave birth to free speech protests some fifty years ago, long before many of these violent, anti-free-speech activists and assault-and-battery miscreants were even born.

In the past, previous protests between Trump supporters and Trump detractors, while perhaps vocally passionate, have been relatively calm. When anti-Trump protesters attacked Trump supporters at Berkeley in March, for example, even the left-of-center Christian Science Monitor noted that the violence at the pro-Trump event was “the exception, not the norm.” Indeed, as the dust settled, we learned that the violence was perpetrated against participants in the pro-Trump rally, which preceded the anti-Trump melee. Said one eyewitness about the anti-Trump crowd,

These people are violent.

A February event at UC-Berkeley featuring Milo Yiannopoulos had to be cancelled due to violence from protesters advertising that they were “anti-Facists,” when in fact they were anarchists using highly-organized, commando “Black Bloc” tactics. When the smoke had cleared, these hoodlums had destroyed parts of the Berkeley campus to the tune of $100,000, and had outdone themselves within the City of Berkeley itself, causing nearly a half-million dollars of damage there.

So, kudos to Saint Ann for standing up to these snakes. And say a prayer for her, won’t you, as she contemplates her next move?

 

 

Thanks for sharing!