Self-described white advocate Jared Taylor made a controversial appearance on the campus of Salisbury University drawing a large crowd of student and faculty protesters. Delmarva Public Media's Don Rush has this report.
RUSH: A controversial speaker stepped into spotlight in Salisbury this week, a self-described "white advocate." This is Don Rush.
SPEAKER: Join me in warmly welcoming Jared Taylor to the podium. Thank you so much.
RUSH: His name is Jared Taylor, who with a mild, professorial manner declared that the United States was founded as a white country. It was an unusual event for Salisbury University, which noted that since he was invited by an outside group, he could not be denied his appearance, but it stressed he did not represent the values of the university. During his lecture, he warned that what he called white culture could be subsumed by the growing minority population. He claimed that white people were the moral backbone of the country, omitting any mention of the achievements by minorities or the long civil rights tradition of the country. In short, he declared that the only way forward was a segregated society. That is what he called a "divorce."
TAYLOR: I think people must be able to live in a society in which they set the rules, they elect their rulers, they elect their leaders, they set up their own courts, and they know that they will rise or fall strictly according to their own capacities. That is the way to seek real fulfillment.
RUSH: How such a divorce would they place in such a highly integrated society? He did not say. Meanwhile, the Maryland Republican Party denounced his appearance, but Taylor issued this warning.
TAYLOR: Now, the boomers who run the party, they may think my views are despicable, but I can assure them that their sons and daughters don't. They refuse to march off the cliff like lemmings. They refuse to live in a country where Ta-Nehisi Coates and Zohran Mamdani make the rules they are fed up with [?]
RUSH: Colin McEvers, chairman of the Maryland College Republicans was the one who invited him on campus, portraying this as a free speech issue. But as he introduced Taylor, it was clear that it becomes something more than that.
MCEVERS: In addition to having Jerry Taylor here today, I'm also very honored to announce the formation of the new Maryland White Republican Council, which will aim to fully represent and fight for the interests of the white conservative community in this state.
PROTESTORS: "Love not hate makes S.U. great!"
RUSH: Meanwhile, outside the building on the campus was a large crowd of students and faculty who protested his appearance... even booing his arrival. Caroline Dagnes is president of the Salisbury College Democrats who said it was important to demonstrate the rejection of Taylor's views.
DAGNES: My initial reaction was deep confusion and a lot of disappointment and kind of a sense of fear. And so I think if I felt that in the initial, then people feel so much more and that's why we're all here today.
RUSH: So [you speak of] fear. What do you mean by that?
DAGNES: Fear for the future. That it's hard to believe that we have to come out here and just kind of say that we don't stand for any sort of racism.
RUSH: There's been a recent focus on such right-wing leaders during the Trump years. On hand was Joe Venosa, who is an associate professor of history at Salsbury University.
VENOSA: So this is an event here that we are in support of freedom of expression and our beliefs that his ideas, which as a historian, I think they sort of belong on the ash heap of history. Eugenics, racial hierarchy... these are things that we thought were discredited after World War II and unfortunately have resurfaced in recent years.
RUSH: Venosa is also a candidate for a seat on the Wicomico County Council. This is Don Rush for Delmarva Public Media.
