The Republican presidential candidates participating in Wednesday’s debate spent much of their time bashing pro-Palestinian student activists and threatening their freedom of expression.
The one notable exception was Vivek Ramaswamy, who criticized students for siding with Hamas over Israel, but clarified that he would not limit their right to do so.
“We not destroy this of censorship because That creates a worse abdomen,” said Ramaswamy. “We suppress It Through leadership Through calling It out.”
To that end, Ramaswamy specifically called out rivals Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis for their willingness to punish offensive speech. DeSantis recently ordered the closure of National Students for Justice in Palestine at two Florida campuses, a move the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression called “dangerous and unconstitutional.”
Ramaswamy has previously warned conservatives against deploying cancel culture against anti-Israel voices; he opposed the professional blacklisting of Harvard students who had signed an odious petition that placed all the blame for Hamas’s terrorist attacks on Israel itself, claiming that “it is not productive for corporations to blacklist children because they are members of student groups that make stupid political statements on campus.”
The other candidates — DeSantis, Haley, Tim Scott and Chris Christie — took the opposite position. Each of them pledged to eradicate anti-Semitic speech on campus by deporting students who make such statements.
“To all the students on visas who encourage the Jewish genocide, I would like to deport you,” Scott said.
DeSantis himself sounded every bit like a progressive student, cynically weaponizing feelings of discomfort against the First Amendment.
“Their children don’t feel safe,” DeSantis said, referring to the children of Jewish parents.
Haley agreed, saying that “no one should ever feel in danger.”
College administrators and law enforcement already have sufficient authority to respond to legitimate threats of violence against all students. But they have no right to curtail offensive speech about Israel, no matter how bad the underlying views. In any case, it would be a disaster for conservatives to give authority figures more power to eliminate controversial speech, because bureaucrats on campuses and in the federal government often have progressive leanings.
Ramaswamy warned that conservatives who challenge school board leaders or express vaccine skepticism under such a paradigm could lose their right to free speech. He was right to do that. It’s not enough to just oppose cancel culture when your own side is under fire.