Karen Chief (entrance) was positioned on “administrative leave” after right-wing social media accounts focused her feedback on Charlie Kirk. (all pictures courtesy Karen Chief)
“I’ve never been afraid to go outside in my entire life,” Chief instructed Hyperallergic in an interview. “I wouldn’t wish this on anyone.”
Chief, who additionally serves as the one college advisor to FAU’s School Democrats group, was positioned on administrative go away by the college on September 13 over her social media posts criticizing Turning Level USA Founder and right-wing commentator Charlie Kirk’s political viewpoints. She is among the reportedly dozens of educators throughout the nation who’ve been reprimanded for his or her feedback within the aftermath of Kirk’s assassination in Utah final week. This week, the American Affiliation of College Professors expressed “great alarm” over the wave of retaliation towards college and college students.
FAU is a chosen Hispanic-Serving public establishment with an enrollment of roughly 31,000 college students. It’s the most ethnically numerous faculty within the Florida public college system, in keeping with the FAU web site.
Chief’s posts in query, reviewed by Hyperallergic, have been largely reposts of different customers’ feedback about Kirk’s report of hateful statements, and didn’t particularly handle or condone his dying. Nonetheless, they have been rapidly focused by right-wing people on social media, who tagged the college.
A letter from FAU’s Division of Visible Arts and Artwork Historical past, obtained by Hyperallergic, notified Chief final Saturday that she can be positioned on paid go away associated to her social media conduct pending an investigation.
“The University has received complaints, which gives us reason to believe that your continued presence on the job adversely affects university operations,” the letter, signed by the division chair, learn. “The investigation will include a review of your conduct, including, but not limited to, your recent social media posts that the University reasonably believes might disrupt the efficient functioning of the University, and/or jeopardize the safety or welfare of other employees, colleagues, or students.”
Chief denied that any of her posts jeopardized the security of anybody on campus or espoused hate of any type. She stated her intentions have been to counter dominant narratives that Kirk practiced politics with civility, a view espoused in a extremely criticized opinion piece by Ezra Klein within the New York Instances, amongst others.
Certainly one of Chief’s posts, dated September 11, learn, “The predictable ‘blame the professors’ narrative is full circle, Charlie ‘Professor Watchlist’ Kirk. Ruining lives for fun and profit.” The remark made reference to the methods wherein Kirk’s group Turning Level USA focused college professors whose views it disagreed with.
Chief additionally annotated a sequence of X posts from September 11 and 12, republishing them with the caption “This was Charlie Kirk.” The posts she recirculated critiqued Kirk’s anti-LBGTQ+ and racist feedback. She reposted one other submit, which was later decided by X to be factually incorrect, claiming that Kirk had used an anti-Asian slur; Chief deleted it as quickly as she realized it was inaccurate, she stated.
One other repost was of a remark by an X person with the identify “I smoked Charlie Kirk.” Proper-wing commenters interpreted this as an endorsement of Kirk’s dying, however Chief stated that the person often modifications their identify in an identical format to mirror “smoking” trending headlines.
“I didn’t say anything or do anything that encouraged violence at all,” Chief instructed Hyperallergic. “I did not say or do anything that celebrated his death, that said he deserved it, that in any way, shape or form, condoned violence.”
FAU didn’t reply to a number of requests for remark.
Chief highlighted in an interview with Hyperallergic that Turning Level USA precipitated worry amongst fellow lecturers. One professor Chief is aware of intently, whom she declined to call, landed on the group’s “Professor Watchlist,” which targets professors that Turning Level claims “advance leftist propaganda.” Chief stated her pal feared for his or her life once they have been included.
“Anyone who’s on that list knows that there still might be people coming into their class, literally to surveil them, signing up for their class to record them,” Chief instructed Hyperallergic.
The college issued a public assertion on its X profile asserting the pressured go away of an unnamed professor after FAU’s president grew to become conscious of “comments on social media made by a tenured faculty member regarding the assassination of Charlie Kirk.” Chief stated she didn’t handle the dying of Kirk in her posts, and that she views the president’s assertion as a “mischaracterization” of her precise social media exercise.
In current weeks, Chief has turn out to be an more and more outstanding dissenting determine on campus. Over the summer season break, the college reportedly signed an settlement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) by the 287(g) program, a partnership that will permit federal brokers and native police to detain or establish people for deportation on the FAU campus. Chief spoke at a pupil protest condemning the settlement days earlier than Kirk’s assassination.
Among the many points Chief opposes on the college’s campus is the current appointment of FAU President Adam Hasner, a former GOP state politician and former government of the GEO Group, a personal detention firm that operates an ICE detention middle in neighboring Broward County.
Chief stated she has some protections from her union as she undergoes the investigation course of. Her courses have been moved on-line, she stated, however she doesn’t know who will instruct her roughly 105 college students, and she or he fears her doxxing may additionally put college students in hurt’s method.
“My free speech protects me from what I did,” Chief stated. “But the response to it might get me killed.”
