Hey, folks.
It is Saturday, April eighteenth, and Utah Valley University, the site of the death of Charlie kirk Well. They were set to have their commencement this month, but they just dropped plans for a commencement speaker. And the reasons are well a bit unclear. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ Rohlds. I say unclear. It's clear to some, not so much to other. I guess what's the real answer as to why Utah Valley University. And this would have been a big one ropes, the
first commencement since that assassination on their campus. But now they said, nope, we're not gonna have a speaker.
Yes, because the speaker that they chose, her name might not be a household one.
Her name is Susan McMahon.
She's commonly referred to as America's government teacher, but she's a New York Times bestselling author.
She's a podcaster.
All of that sounds great and inspirational, and she talks about political unity. She's non den off, she doesn't take side. She's doesn't say she's a Republican or a Democrat. Perfect right to unite this group, the student body graduating from a university that was put on the map for all the wrong reasons.
Well, unfortunately, she made a statement.
On Facebook the day of Charlie Kirk's assassination, but then she went on two days later to put some posts out on social media that ruffled the feathers and really angered a lot of folks on campus who were Charlie Kirk fans.
Okay, so let me you've done a deeper dive on this story than I have, so I have a few questions that other people might have as well. First of all, did it cause an uproar at the time, were people attacking her at the time of his death, or these are things now that people went back and checked her out and are discovering now.
It appears that people went back and took a look at who this woman was once she was announced at the end of last month as the commencement speaker. So this is a fairly new announcement. Actually, I feel like that's kind of a short period of time, and maybe they knew what was perhaps on her resume, so to speak, and what might be upsetting to some folks.
I don't know why they chose her.
Clearly, you would think they would have vetted her her social media posts at this point. We know that's a part of vetting anyone to speak publicly or be a part of your campus or your organization.
So maybe they waited.
But they waited until the end of March before they made this announcement, and pretty quickly folks started making comments about how they were not happy with this decision and frankly outraged by the decision.
Oh but I didn't realize it was that quick.
This was weeks they made the announcement and she's out as a speaker in a matter of weeks. Now, the question are, well, I have several questions. What do we want to answer? First what she said and let people hear that.
Okay, maybe we start from that point.
So one thing that she and her camp have pointed to is on the day of Charlie Kirk's assassination, that was September tenth, twenty twenty five, she immediately condemned the act. She went on to Facebook and she said, this isn't the kind of America I want to live in. I am sure Charlie Kirk and I would not agree on many things, and my heart is broken for his family.
That was the first that was her.
On the day of his assassination, she went to Facebook and she said that. However, two days later, on September twelfth, she made a post that has since been deleted. She had quotes from Charlie Kirk, and here was her caption. These aren't sound bites taken out of context. Millions of people feel they were harmed, and the murder that was horrific and should never have happened does not magically erase
what was said or done. The controversy isn't about being politically incorrect, having a different opinion, or preaching the gospel. It is about repeating bigoted ideas on a stage that reached tens of millions. It's important to remember that the incredible tragedy of a public assassination does not erase the harm many experienced from his work, words and the ensuing actions his followers took. Is that the one that's the
one that really upset people. And then she added to many Americans, especially if you're black, LGBTQ, or Muslim, Charlie Kirk was not a person who was simply engaged in good faith debates on college campuses.
It was that same part of the same.
One she put up.
And all of these posts there was a caption, there were quote. All have been deleted, but she did put them up.
Can I ask when were they when they were? Okay, So if this happened in the past couple of weeks, that's the Yeah.
All I know is that they were.
They've been referred to as since deleted deleted tweets.
All right, So, folks on campus, I guess what started bubbling up? I guess ropes? Was it a me as soon as she was announced. I assume people started looking into her and this came up. But what has been the I hate using backlash all the time.
But here's the interesting thing.
When there was starting to be some backlash, it's really interesting what the university said. Initially, this was on April eighth. They put out a big public statement. They said the response to her speaking for commencement have been overwhelmingly positive. She focuses on a non partisan approach to history and civics, which is consistent with our standards as a university. And the university added that she had spoken on campus previously
and was well received, so they were defending it. When there started to be some comments that were negative about their decision. They immediately came out and defended their decision.
And one, what do we know how recently she had been she had spoken on campus? Any chance she's spoken on campus since his death?
That was what the reference was.
Yes, that she had spoken, Yes, and they had all received so they I think this is why they felt comfortable having her be the commencement speaker. And look, there were plenty of positive comments and a lot of positive feedback. However, the opposition voices that surely contributed to their decision were from the Turning Point USA chapter president, who was there
on campus obviously, and several notable Republicans. You had Congressman Burgess Owens, who wrote an open letter to Sharon mccannon this week on April fifteenth.
Saying what well, asking her to step down.
She said, I write a letter, he said, I write a letter regarding your planned participation.
You should withdraw.
This is not a casual disagreement over ideas, nor is it an attempt to suppress your voice.
The issue is judgment and timing.
It is whether this moment calls for restraint, humility, and respect, or for something else entirely huh on an open letter on x Then US Senator Mike Lee also said UVU couldn't even wait a year before scheduling a commencement speaker who defamed Charlie Kirk in the days immediately following his horrific murder on UVU campus. Then you had Congresswoman Celest Malloy saying, I am disappointed in UVU's tone deaf decision.
A commencement should bring a campus together, and UVU needs that more than ever, So just saying that they should reverse course choose a speaker who will unite the student body. Yes, Basically, every prominent Republican lawmaker from the state of Utah was upset and very public about their concerns about.
Having her speaking.
Okay, a Republican, every Republican. Okay, this is confirming here, correct, Okay, So this is what we talked about at the top. The reason that she was that she's no longer speaking. It's not because she was dumped as a speaker. Is how they're putting it. Is that the same face I you know, I don't know.
And they did not give any specific security threats, but they blamed it on that they This was the official statement from UVU. They made this announcement, I believe, on Thursday due to increased safety concerns related to the speaker and in consultation with public safety professionals and Sharon McMahon, Utah Valley University has decided to proceed without a featured commencement speaker for this year's ceremony. So they blamed security concerns,
and they're very well may have been. Who knows if there were death threats called in, if there were threats of violence, and given what that campus has already endured with the assassination, the very public assassination of Charlie Kirk, it's just fascinating to me though, because look, there was
an opportunity for learning, growth and all of that. However, I do also wonder how this wasn't more carefully considered, given just how close in proximity it's been to Charlie Kirk's assassination, and given the fact that this campus did have a very public assassination, just the concerns surrounding that period.
With do you say a period or having her or anybody.
Or having anyone who has any any connection at all or weighed in at all on his assassination being put there on a stage in the middle of a massive graduation ceremony.
I don't know. That would just be a little frightening.
It I I don't know. I don't have, like you said, anyone who has a background. So what are they supposed to do? Do we need to make sure this year, on this one, we have got to nail this right and make it perfect. And does that mean we need to have somebody who is in full support of Charlie Kirk, who agreed with all the ideas of Charlie Kirk, or someone who just didn't say shit about Charlie Kirk after he died.
Is that what you do?
Or should you have somebody from your campus community, have somebody who a senior, have a professor that's respected, have your school president. Should you bring anybody in at all outside of your community, bring in a pastor bring in something. Maybe that's the way they should have gone, Robes.
I still.
Struggle with what you just said, A missed opportunity, Right, This is a woman who I think the statement you read about she had about Charlie Kirk two days later was one of the most eloquent ones I've heard said. Because a lot of people aren't respectful in how they say, Well, who cares about his death? He used to say this, this, That's not the right tone. She found a good She sounded like an academic. She sounded like a bright, smart
lady who could engage a college campus in ideas. And she seemed to be maybe almost the perfect fit.
Except Robes. Am I wrong in all that?
Because you have to understand it is too soon, and it is too sensitive. Still, this is too raw, and don't toy with us at all, with anybody who even tiptoed around something like this.
And I think you just nailed it with that last bit, because I agree with everything you said. But remember, was it nearly I believe I think USA Today one of the papers this week in response to this story, I believe, counted it was nearly one hundred people, prominent folks who were doctors, lawyers, teachers, educators who lost journalists who lost their jobs because they said something publicly on social media that didn't feel respectful to everybody who followed and respect
to Charlie Kirk. That's how sensitive this particular subject has been around the country. Now you have it specifically here on the very campus where he was murdered. That it's even more intense in terms of what's acceptable and what's not, at least what people will tolerate and what they won't, and the question being would it bring peace, would it bring unity or would it create more division?
Do we think they knew they were aware of these I think they had to have known, sed Okay, So then there's there's no way I'm on a committee and you present that to me and I vote yes, we should do her, right, There's no way I'm there, guys. Yeah, that's not even toy with this a little bit. Do you remember how hot things were in this country when he got shot, how hot it became afterwards, in the back and forth and in the left and the right over a guy's death. We should all just be in mourning,
and instead we were fighting each other. Again, Bro, there's zero chanin if you're in that committee room and the chancellors say, hey, this is who we want to pick. She had these messages a few years ago or last year after he died.
I think this will be a problem.
Yes, okay.
Would you have voted to have her as a commencement speaker if you had to vote no?
Okay? Well we're two no votes.
Yeah, and I probably would have said, hey, I appreciate her tone, I appreciate what she had to say, and maybe we can consider her maybe.
A year from now or five years from now.
When things have when the intensity of emotions have been able to settle a little people or able to maybe look at it more reflectively and less emotionally, and then maybe this would be a good speaker from that perspective. But within months of his assassinations, I can see.
Now, Yeah, I'm actually confused why they thought this was a good choice.
Again, the one I'm not getting onto the woman for doing anything wrong, saying anything wrong. And again I give her credit for the way she said it. What robes This is the u v U September we were talking for or of that seven months ago, he died on your campus. It has been the most impactful thing to happen on your campus. You're still recovering from that. Kids are still walking by the area where this man died. And yeah, exactly, Yeah, this is not the one to play cute with.
But when we come back, we're going to talk about what Susan McMahon said in defense of herself. It's really interesting and may cause you to think, well, maybe she would have been the actual perfect person to be the commencement speaker at this year's graduation ceremony.
Welcome back, everyone to this episode of Amy and TJ.
We're talking about the decision by the Utah Valley University to have no commencement speaker at its graduation ceremonies happening at the end of this month. This was a major, major reversal, of course, because just earlier this week the university was defending its decision to have Susan McMahon. She is a New York Times bestselling author, She is a podcaster, and she has been commonly referred to as America's government teacher.
She's nonpartisan, she is a uniter, she is philosophically. She engages folks and students and people in her community to think with an open mind and an open heart. So she seems like she would be the perfect person to be the commencement speaker at a university that frankly was the home of a national tragedy, the assassination of Charlie Kirk. The problem is, Susan McMahon made some comments on her social media about Charlie Kirk in the days after his assassination.
That did not sit well with a lot of folks, and they were upset that she even said anything about his messaging, even though at the same time she still condemned his assassination.
Can we say anything.
About how we personally feel about something or a topic and still say it respectfully and still have it be received in a way that could engage conversation.
It seems like it's the answers.
No, it's too political. It wasn't just a matter of criticizing Charlie Kirk. Afterwards, if you put any message out that wasn't supportive of Charlie Kirk and his messaging and his life, I think people were just were even getting attacked. That was a very hot time in this country. Ropes to where you were better off not open your mouth and to be honest, robes it when somebody passes. I
think about Frankly Kobe Bryant. This is the first thing that came to mind where people immediately started bringing up past issues he'd had and suggesting almost, well, why are you mourning a guy who did this? Why are you mourning? Like some of those messages that came out of the time. It's not right if you can't, just as a human being, give it a beat. Somebody just lost a husband, a father, a brother, a son in the most horrific way anybody
could imagine. You gotta give it a beat just to respect the family before you open your mouth, I would say, Robes, just as a human being, and you have the right to say what you want. But is there no part of you when somebody is down that you just want to hold your tongue for a second, just as much as you might your biggest enemy right now, Robes, whoever it is, if they die, the first thing out your mouth publicly is not going to be well, yeah, that mother did this to me back.
You're not gonna do that.
Some people do, though, But that and therein lies the problem. You have a right to say it, of course you do, but there's some part of timing and just being decent that factors into this. And I don't the woman didn't bash Charlie Kirk. She was engaging in the conversation that was having happening nationally, right, But man.
Bab you just made such a good point, and I think that was part of what some people said.
Timing is everything, and there is.
We've done so many of these stories where instead of giving it a beat, or just taking some time to reflect on your feelings, maybe what you've thought about this person leading up to their death and just or whatever is happening to them and take a beat, we've just
we've been doing stories about people just mouthing off. And I think just having these phones or these computers right at our yeah availability where we can just whatever we're feeling in the moment, just type type, type, type and click and send, and we don't recognize the impact those words will have on someone else. And maybe if we just took a moment, took a week, took a beat, we would say, why do I need to add this?
Like what's the value in me adding this? Is it me serving me, me feeling good?
Like I was right? You were wrong?
See I do think there's an element to that where we all want to kind of show that we were right all along and look at you, And I just think in that spirit, it never elevates the conversation, It never moves things forward, it never unites anybody, It makes things worse.
Just you can it's okay to mourn, rogues, to let somebody mourn and you I asked anybody who said, well, I have the right or this was on my mind or this was on my heart. And does your desire or your need to say something negative about somebody that just passed, does that trump the pain that Charlie Kirk's widow was feeling in the days that followed. Is it more important to you to have your moment than for
her to have hers? Ask yourself that robes and if you still feel yep, then you go ahead and tweet knock yourself out. But rhabe, It's that simple. There's nothing any of us could say about Charlie Kirk that was more important than just letting that family more and have the mind. Now, I'm not talking about a movement, I'm not talking about the right and not talking about MAGA, just that family.
Yep.
We humanize people, Kirk, Ye there, humanized people to get our point across.
But and now look that's good.
I'm gonna write that down.
We dehumanize to get our point across.
That is true, right, And then look, Susan McMahon went into defense mode, as you might imagine, when she saw all of this incoming from Republican leaders and certainly folks hit there on campus who represented Charlie Kirk and his ideas, But this is what she had to say. This was a statement released by her camp. Sharon unequivocally condemned the murder of Charlie Kirk, repeatedly and publicly, calling his death a tragedy and stressing that public debate must never be
met with violence. Sharon's goal is to unpack what is happening in society and help people understand how government works. That spirit is reflected in her work bringing together voices from across the aisle, in closed door conversations with her book club community, from Amy Cony Barrett to Kamala Harris, and in interviews with Utah Governor Spencer Cox and Nikki Haley, to foster the kind of dialogue and perspective democracy depends on.
She believes what we need most is more bridge building and more people willing to show up for one another.
So that's her message, that's her mantra.
That's what she claims she wanted to speak about in her commencement address, which all sounds wonderful. Unfortunately, those comments she or those posts she put out on her social media, we're just too tall of a mountain for her to overcome.
And look, she deleted them, so that might say something to think about that.
If you've ever had to delete a post, maybe that's kind of the aha moment when you recognize you shouldn't have posted it in the first place. And just by the mere fact that she did delete them kind of means she didn't stand by them, which I think says a lot.
Oh, maybe she was trying to get ahead of this and say make sure this was not gonna be a problem, just in case.
I don't know.
I don't know Rhodes, but it's too bad missed opportunity. And even her tone and wasn't necessarily defiant, it was the right tone. It's kind of how she goes about I'm not that familiar with her, but all I've seen and read and that's usually her tone of reconciliation. But still she has a message, she has a point, and she stands by it and she makes it but still is like kind of an openness in conversation and ideas, which is cool.
I might look this lady up now and check her out.
She seems like a wonderful person. And again, her her posts weren't and everything she said was true. She did not applaud in any way the assassination or any violence towards anyone, and that certainly doesn't seem to be her mo at all, but just by the mere fact that her presence would upset enough of the student body, I don't know. Do you think the university made the right call ultimately and reversing its initial decision.
Look, if they have a security at this campus is everything. If there is a hint, then this was the right move.
I agree.
I agree because obviously it's not just the threat of violence or any sort of security concern on any campus. This is the campus where Charlie Kirk was assassinated, so that absolutely makes sense. But again, I don't know what it's going to be like on their graduation to not have a commencement speaker.
But this I'm sure will be talked about for some time.
But I'm sure better decisions and maybe more thoughtful decisions will be made in the future when it comes to who they choose to address their student body at graduation. But with that, everyone, thank you so much for listening to us. We always appreciate you. I mean me Robach alongside TJ. Holmes We will talk to you soon.