White Nationalist Richard Spencer Denied Michigan State Engagement

EAST LANSING, MI — A a request by a group led by Richard Spencer, a white nationalist who advocates for both a “peaceful ethnic cleansing” and an Aryan homeland for the supposedly dispossessed white race, was denied Thursday by officials at Michigan State University, who cited violence last weekend at a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.

“After consultation with law enforcement officials, Michigan State University has decided to deny the National Policy Institute’s request to rent space on campus to accommodate a speaker,” the university said in a statement. “This decision was made due to significant concerns about public safety in the wake of the tragic violence in Charlottesville last weekend. While we remain firm in our commitment to freedom of expression, our first obligation is to the safety and security of our students and our community.”

White nationalists protesting the proposed removal of a monument honoring Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee clashed with counter-protesters in Charlottesville Saturday, resulting in the death of 32-year-old Heather Heyer, who was mowed down when an alleged Nazi sympathizer drove a car into a crowd. James Alex Fields Jr., 20, of Ohio, who has been charged in Heyer’s death, has been said to idolize Adolf Hitler and the Nazi movement.

MSU President Lou Anna K. Simon said in an earlier statement that university officials aren’t aware of a connection between Spencer’s group and any Michigan State group or individual, but that such a connection isn’t required for someone to ask to use public spaces. (Click here to find your local Michigan Patch. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app.)

The National Policy Institute says on its website that it is “dedicated to the heritage, identity, and future of people of European descent in the United States, and around the world.” The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate groups nationwide, describes Spencer as a leading “academic racist” who takes a quasi-intellectual approach to white separatism.

“Michigan State takes seriously its obligations to accommodate a broad range of speech,” Simon said in a statement. “As our record shows, this university does not determine who can access public spaces based on what they think or say.

“Allowing access to public spaces would in no way constitute endorsement of messages that might be delivered there. NPI and similar groups’ events staged at American campuses are intended to provoke reaction that might seem to justify organizers’ racist and divisive messages, which we categorically reject.”

If Spencer is allowed to speak, Simon said, “We will not be intimidated, nor stoop to reciprocate hate.”

“The diversity they shun is a source of our strength, like America itself, and every day some 65,000 students, faculty and MSU staff—and half a million alumni—are the living proof,” Simon said.

Spencer, who took over as president and director of the National Policy Institute in 2011 after the death of the chairman Louis R. Andrews, is credited with popularizing the term “alternative right,” a rejection of mainstream conservatism with elements of racism, white nationalism and populism.

Michigan State students told the Detroit Free Press they don’t think Spencer should be allowed to speak.

“It’s hate speech,” Mary Richards, 19, of Grand Rapids, said. “I can’t see any reason why they should be allowed here.”

Lorenzo Santavicca, the student body president at Michigan State, told the Free Press he supports free speech but said the request should be turned down if Spencer’s group is not “providing any educational value to the institution.”

Auburn University in Alabama tried to keep Spencer from speaking, citing safety concerns, but a federal judge granted his request for an injunction, saying that “while Mr. Spencer’s beliefs and message are controversial, Auburn presented no evidence that Mr. Spencer advocates violence.”

Last weekend’s deadly rally in Charlottesville could give universities some muscle to keep Spencer off their campuses.

The University of Florida rejected the request by Spencer, who attended the Unite the Right rally last weekend, to hold an event at the Gainesville campus on Sept. 12. The “likelihood of violence and potential injury — not the words or ideas — has caused us to take this action,” university President W. Kent Fuchs said in a statement.

Image: White nationalist Richard Spencer, center, and his supporters clash with Virginia State Police in Emancipation Park after the Aug. 12 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, was declared an unlawful gathering. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images News/Getty Images)