First, Texas A&M regents have coughed up settlement money for former president Mark Welsh, who was unofficially pushed out the door into resignation a week ago.
His push was actually related to a faculty member he said he wouldn't fire, then did, and a student commenting to a prof about transgender and transsexual issues in a children's lit course.
Even though he resigned rather than be fired, Welsh may have retained legal counsel and started action, per the story.
And, yes, his push-out was not directly over Kirk issues, but the intolerance that the Lege has generated through legislation against diversity, equity and inclusion issues got whipped into higher heat earlier this month.
Second, a court has ordered reinstatement of fired Texas State University professor Thomas Alter:
Thomas Alter was fired on Sept. 10 after a video of him at an online socialist conference was posted online depicting him talking about political organization, which university administration said allegedly “advocate[d] for inciting violence.” Alter, whose tenure officially began on Sept. 1, subsequently sued the university, alleging they violated due process by terminating him abruptly.
As the Trib noted in the story of his firing, the video was a deliberate editorial hit job.
Meanwhile, per the second link, this is part of a recent history of stifling dissent related to St. Charles of Kirk at Texas State:
The professor’s firing was one of several recent cases at Texas State University where administration has stepped in to respond to comments made by students and staff on and off campus. A Texas State University student was given the decision to be expelled or withdraw his enrollment after he mocked conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s death. A faculty recruiter was also fired for comments she made online related to the student, according to Rep. Erin Zwiener, D-Driftwood, and a spokesperson for the university.
There you are.
The Observer notes this is nothing new, citing the firing of Homer Rainey as president of UT in the 1940s over a wingnut witch hunt of alleged Communists that had already fired four faculty members. The author says Rainey lost the battle but won the war in that case. The same may not happen this time.
At The Barbed Wire, Taylor Crumpton says the free speech crisis is even worse for Black academics.
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Update: That said, the "fore-lash" is still going strong. The state's top educational Nazi, complete with horn-rimmed version of Heinrich Himmler glasses, Mike Morath, is threatening to jerk certifications of K-12 teachers reported for Charlie Kirk comments. And, in reality, per the Observer, many of the reported comments almost surely were NOT incitations to violence, surely far less than Donald Trump did on Jan. 6, 2021.
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