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White Nationalists Push Kanye's Antisemitic Agenda at Florida Atlantic University

A table was set up at the north end of the Breezeway outside the College of Business with a tablecloth that read, “Ye is Right. Change my mind” and contained tweets from antisemite Kanye West. 

When the University Press staff arrived on the scene, there was a large crowd around the table. Some supporters of Israel were holding up pro-Israel signs.

While on the scene, the man behind the table was dressed to be unrecognizable- wearing a blue hat that read “America first,” sunglasses, with a total face covering. Another individual was recording on behalf of the unidentified man and, at one point, told him that the footage was no good and could not be posted on YouTube.

The NGO StopAntisemitism tweeted and identified the individuals as Dalton Clodfelter and Tyler Russell.

While this event was occurring, the crowd grew more significant, with students yelling at the group to leave campus. Student Body Vice-President Dalia Calvillo was present and spoke to Clodfelter. She expressed her concern for the student body being upset and said that he needed to leave campus immediately. After a short exchange, he left with his camera crew.

“To my knowledge, they didn’t have permission to be in the Breezeway because they didn’t need one,” Calvillo added. “They aren’t an organization on campus. I asked them for an email confirmation with evidence of approval to be there, and when they didn’t show me one, I was told they weren’t FAU associated. Unfortunately, they were permitted to be there due to the area being a free speech area.”

Calvillo details that the hate against the Jewish community has left her heartbroken. She wrote that a line was crossed between free speech and hate speech at FAU.

“When I arrived at the table in which these events were occurring, I went directly to the disturbance on the Breezeway, to these non-university affiliated people, and urged them to leave our Breezeway,” Calvillo wrote in a statement. “I made it very clear that they had two options: me kindly asking them to leave or me calling our FAU police department.”

Calvillo wrote that her executive position in SG left her with an obligation as vice president and a human to stand up for students. 

Since the FAU community has received an email from Interim President Stacy Volnick, which details that all forms of hate are condemned on campus. “The University strongly and unequivocally condemns hate and Anti-Semitism. Florida Atlantic University believes in the freedoms provided by the First Amendment; however, we also denounce Antisemitism in all its forms,” the email from Volnick read.

Ariana Hoblin, founder and president of Students Supporting Israel at FAU, feels that the FAU Administration did not do anything to protect its Jewish student population, as it allowed the group of unidentified individuals to continue.

“As a Jewish student on campus, I no longer feel safe knowing that the FAU Administration failed to protect Jewish students. The FAU Administration must protect the students on campus,” Hoblin wrote in a statement.

Mia Evans, the former president of Hillel on campus, agreed with Hoblin and thinks that the FAU administration should have done more to protect the students. Evans wrote a statement detailing that these “boys” shouldn’t have been allowed to stay on the Breezeway for two hours.

“These boys were claiming ‘Ye is Right,’ denouncing the Holocaust, comparing abortion to slavery, and many other extremist ideologies. There is no room in this world for hate or bigotry. I understand FAU is a public campus, but when is enough, enough? We are your students who fund this campus. Why isn’t more being done to protect us,” Evans wrote in a statement. 

“The incident today was not acceptable and goes against our University values of Diversity and Self Respect. I am proud that my fellow Student Leaders in Student Government took a stand with me against Antisemitism. Antisemitism and all other discrimination are not tolerated in our community,” Inbal Shachar, an SG House of Representatives official, wrote in a statement.