President Donald Trump says he expects “to do a very big number” regarding an anticipated executive order on free speech on college campuses potentially next week.
“When they don’t allow free speech, we’re going to do a very big number,” the president responded when asked by Breitbart News’ Deputy Political Editor Amanda House about the executive order he teased during his speech this month at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) hosted by the American Conservative Union (ACU).
“You know we give billions of dollars to these universities and they won’t allow free speech? That’s not what our country’s all about,” he said.
“I’ll probably be doing it next week,” Trump revealed, adding his administration is planning to make it “very tough.”
As for general tensions between conservatives and leftists, Trump observed:
It’s so terrible what’s happening. You know, the left plays a tougher game, it’s very funny. I actually think that the people on the right are tougher, but they don’t play it tougher. Okay? I can tell you, I have the support of the police, the support of the military, the support of the Bikers for Trump – I have the tough people, but they don’t play it tough until they go to a certain point, and then it would be very bad, very bad. But the left plays it cuter and tougher.
Asked by Breitbart News Washington Political Editor Matthew Boyle what his advice is to his supporters when they are under attack, Trump replied: “Well, I tell them, I told Covington I love the way they’re doing it. They’re going to teach people a lesson. The [Berkeley] young man that got hit, he’s going to become hopefully a rich man. And he’s suing the university, he’s also suing the wise-guy that did the hitting him.”
During this part of the interview, Trump specifically also mentioned recent incidents at Berkeley and Portland State University, where respectively a protester punched a Trump supporter and where a protester continuously rang a bell in the face of a conservative who attempted to speak.
After noting that the left plays it “tougher” than the right, Trump said it is “disgraceful” and “terrible.”
“When I see that – what’s going on on college campuses, when I see that young man get punched in the face, when I see that other one with cowbells – you know what I’m – I thought that was disgraceful,” Trump said. “I can’t believe that any one would have let him do that. If I was speaking, I tell you, there’s no way I would have been allowed to just stand there like that and keep trying to make a speech [while] the guy’s ringing a bell right in your face. You can’t even – that was a terrible – Did you see that picture? Did you see? You know what I’m talking about? I thought that was really terrible.”
Alexander Marlow is the Editor-in-Chief of Breitbart News, Matthew Boyle is the Washington Political Editor of Breitbart News, Amanda House is the Deputy Political Editor of Breitbart News, and Charlie Spiering is the Senior White House Correspondent for Breitbart News.