Arizona State Rep. Quang Nguyen, R-Prescott Valley, told an audience in Scottsdale on Wednesday about what actions Republican lawmakers may take in the next session targeting public universities on free speech issues.
“We actually drafted quite a few things, including changes to ABOR – Arizona Board of Regents – to sort of make things a little tighter,” he said on a panel at the conservative American Legislative Exchange Council’s annual summit.
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Conservative leaders Charlie Kirk and Dennis Prager are scheduled to return to Arizona State University (ASU) for the “Health, Wealth & Happiness 2.0” event on Wednesday. The first event, held in 2022, sparked fierce opposition from faculty and staff, which in turn provoked hearings in the Arizona Legislature.
Prager and Kirk will host the event alongside Tom Lewis, a former ASU donor who was the primary benefactor of the T.W. Lewis Center where the first event was held last year. Ann Atkinson, who was the director of the center at ASU, and State Representative Austin Smith (R-Surprise), will also speak at the event.
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After Arizona State University released a report suggesting there was “no evidence” of a campaign to smear an event featuring conservative speakers, one Republican state senator is not satisfied with the outcome.
The T.W. Lewis Center at the school hosted an event in February with conservative media personalities Dennis Prager and Charlie Kirk, as well as financial author Robert Kiyosaki. The event sparked backlash from some faculty at Barrett, the Honors College, and some students. Following the intense backlash, Tom Lewis pulled funding for the center and its executive director, Ann Atkinson, lost her job, alleging she was fired.
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Arizona State University (ASU) professors who signed a letter labeling conservatives Dennis Prager and Charlie Kirk “purveyors of hate” and seeking to cancel their February 2023 appearance at the university’s now-defunct T.W. Lewis Center seemed to relish in their actions, sending emails to the center’s former executive director asking to be publicly named for their participation.
Former T.W. Lewis Center executive director Ann Atkinson provided emails to The Arizona Sun Times sent by two ASU professors who teach at Barrett, the university’s honors College where the center was housed, including two from a professor seeking to join the Professor Watchlist maintained by Turning Point USA (TPUSA).
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Tom Lewis, the founder and primary funder of the now-defunct T.W. Lewis Center at Arizona State University (ASU), revealed that he pulled his annual contribution of $400,000 due to the open hostility showed to conservative speakers by the majority of the institution’s faculty.
Lewis made the remarks during an appearance on The Mike Broomhead Show, describing “a steady beat down of realization” in which he determined universities “want your donations, but they don’t want your input, and they certainly don’t want your influence in the classroom or even selecting speakers.”
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Arizona State University (ASU) theology professor Dr. Owen Anderson claimed the university now uses Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) questions to “screen” and exclude job applicants during the hiring process. Dr. Anderson revealed this information to The Arizona Sun Times when reached to discuss a recent hearing in the Arizona Legislature that examined freedom of expression at the taxpayer-funded institution.
Anderson, who is also a pastor at the Historic Christian Church of Phoenix, told The Sun Times ASU uses “DEI questions in hiring to screen candidates,” which Anderson said “means only candidates that agree with their left wing agenda are hired.”
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Republican lawmakers led the first legislative committee hearing on Tuesday to investigate the freedom of speech in Arizona’s public universities and to look into the events surrounding a program titled “Health, Wealth and Happiness,” presented by Arizona State University (ASU)‘s T.W. Lewis Center.
The formation of the committee follows officials at ASU allegedly firing university administrator and director of the T.W. Lewis Center, Ann Atkinson, for bringing conservative speakers Dennis Prager and Charlie Kirk onto campus earlier this year for the “Health, Wealth and Happiness” program which focused on professional development and networking.
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Arizona Republican lawmakers have launched a new committee to investigate the freedom of speech in Arizona’s public universities and to look into the events surrounding a program titled “Health, Wealth and Happiness,” presented by Arizona State University’s T.W. Lewis Center.
This follows officials at Arizona State University allegedly firing University administrator and Director of the T.W. Lewis Center, Ann Atkinson, for bringing conservative speakers Dennis Prager and Charlie Kirk onto campus earlier this year for the “Health, Wealth and Happiness” program which focused on professional development and networking.
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A major benefactor is pulling funding from Arizona State University amid the firing of an ASU staff member who hosted an event featuring conservatives Charlie Kirk and Dennis Prager.
Tom Lewis of the T.W. Lewis Foundation previously helped fund ASU’s T.W. Lewis Center for Personal Development, which is housed in Barrett, The Honors College, at ASU.
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An Arizona lawmaker wants the state’s collegiate governing body to investigate why an Arizona State University employee lost her job shortly after organizing an event featuring conservative speaker.
State Rep. Austin Smith, R-Surprise, wrote to the Arizona Board of Regents on June 21 following the decision by ASU to terminate the employment of administrator Ann Atkinson.
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Turning Point USA’s annual AmericaFest continued its second day in Phoenix on Sunday, featuring a long lineup of well-known conservatives. Some of the standouts Sunday included Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake, who is currently fighting the results of a botched election in Arizona which resulted in Democrat Katie Hobbs being named the winner, co-founder of PragerU and talk show host Dennis Prager, and Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO).
The theme of many of the speakers was to stay positive and avoid the negativity and self-centeredness of the left, see the good in the country, and the values and institutions like marriage and children which formed it. Lake’s speech focused on voter disenfranchisement that occurred in her race, declaring, “My pronouns are ‘I won’” and “election integrity is the single most important issue of our lifetime.”
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