The University of West Florida has reinstated its College Republicans chapter after Breitbart News exposed the plight of the group and administrative errors were discovered in the ensuing investigation of their deactivation.
The College Republicans (CR) chapter at UWF was disabled due to a lack of attendance by their leadership at a compulsory SOLD course administered by the university. However, the current leadership were not informed in time of the course dates — because of clashes with prior commitments, nobody in the College Republicans could attend the course after receiving notice of the event hours before it was to be held.
It was discovered that a previous email notifying the CR chapter had been sent to the former chairman of the group, not the current leader that had been appointed for the present semester.
A UWF spokesperson told Breitbart News in an email:
It was discovered that during preparation for the renewal process, an administrative error occurred. On Aug. 15, 2016, an email was sent to all disabled student organizations which was pulled from a database that contained the previous year’s organizational leadership listed in the student organization portal. The error occurred in that the new contact information from all disabled student organizations had not been transferred to the system in which the email was deployed.
Breitbart News had contacted UWF earlier on Friday asking about the email in question, which had not gone to the current officers of the school’s CR chapter, despite a completed change of contact information form that was submitted on July 23 and approved by the school on August 8.
The spokesperson explained that “due to this error, University Commons and Student Involvement will immediately reinstate the registered status of the College Republicans and will work with the organization to provide information missed as a result of the administrative error.”
Cade Marsh, the State Chairman of the Florida Federation of College Republicans, told Breitbart News in response to these developments:
While I’m excited that the UWF administration made the wise choice in correcting their initial errors, this entire situation serves as a word of warning. Had the backlash been any less immediate and severe, the UWF CR’s plight would have been swept under the rug by UWF in the interests of bureaucratic continuity. FFCR will not stand for this kind of abuse of power, and will continue to be watchful and attentive to the administration’s further actions. To all College Republicans and conservatives out there, struggling under insane restrictions or liberal discrimination on your campuses – speak up. Know your rights. Fight back. We’re here to help.
UWF College Republicans President Charlotte Davis told Breitbart News:
I’d like to say “thank you” to every single person who helped us to get this issue noticed, who supported us, and who will continue to lift us up. Although we won our fight, there are still some chapters that aren’t winning theirs. There are still conservative organizations having their voices shut out and their rights trampled on by bureaucratic, liberal administrations. We will be hosting a silent protest on our campus next Friday specifically for those who are not winning their fight on campus. We encourage everyone to come out to support this protest. #StandWithUS will consist of us standing in support of every CR chapter that is facing discrimination from their University. We will stand against the liberal bias on Universities and will be sure our voices resonate through Florida and through the country.
Jack Hadfield is a student at the University of Warwick and a regular contributor to Breitbart Tech. You can follow him on Twitter @ToryBastard_ or email him at jack@yiannopoulos.net.
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