MADISON, Wis. — University of Wisconsin students who disrupt speeches and demonstrations could be expelled and campuses would have to remain neutral on public issues under a bill Republican legislators are pushing this week.
The bill comes as free speech issues have grown more contentious on college campuses across the country. Conservatives are worried that right-wing speakers aren’t given equal treatment as liberal campus presenters and some students have complained about free expression fanning racial tensions.
In Madison, home to the University of Wisconsin’s flagship campus, students shouted down and traded obscene gestures with ex-Breitbart editor and conservative columnist Ben Shapiro during a presentation in November. This week, supporters of conservative commentator Ann Coulter rallied behind her after the University of California-Berkeley canceled her speech citing concerns that violence could erupt.
The bill is based on a model proposal the conservative Arizona-based Goldwater Institute put together to address campus free-speech issues. Legislation based on the model has been enacted in Colorado, with others being considered in five states, including Michigan, North Carolina and Virginia, according to the institute.
The lawmakers sponsoring Wisconsin’s bill said it represents Republicans’ promise “to protect the freedom of expression on college campuses.”
“All across the nation and here at home, we’ve seen protesters trying to silence different viewpoints,” Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, one of the bill’s chief sponsors, said in a news release Thursday. “Free speech means free speech for everyone and not just for the person who speaks the loudest.”
UW-Madison’s policy already calls for facilitating free speech equally and objectively, school spokesman John Lucas said. Mandating sanctions eliminates the ability of a disciplinary committee to consider all the circumstances of the situation, he said.
