#NotMyCampus, University of Michigan Trump Voters Say

ANN ARBOR, MI — Hundreds of University of Michigan students have turned around the rallying cry of anti-Donald Trump “not my president” protesters with an online petition — #NotMyCampus — that calls out U-M President Mark Schlissel as not only anti-Trump but also unsympathetic to students who say they have been targeted because they voted for the president-elect.

Some conservative-leaning students who signed the petition said they feel marginalized and, in some cases, unsafe because they voted for Trump. Others accused Schlissel and university officials of coddling students rather than helping preparing them for the real, post-college world where things may not always go their way.

Schlissel spent about an hour giving solace to U-M students who were dismayed by Trump’s election last week, classes were canceled and exams rescheduled in some cases, and counselors were made available to students who felt overwhelmed by the outcome of the election.

"Your voices worked out to be a 90/10 decision in favor of the unsuccessful candidate yesterday,” Schlissel said at the post-election rally to promote love and equality, according to video footage posted on YouTube by The Michigan Daily, the campus newspaper. “Ninety percent of you rejected the kind of hate and the fractiousness and the longing for some sort of idealized version of a nonexistent yesterday that was expressed during (Trump's) campaign.”

In a campus email alert Sunday co-signed by seven administrators, Schlissel did address harassment directed at students who voted for Trump who were “shouted out and accused of being racist because of their political views.”

But the missive focused primarily on a spate of hateful attacks on or near campus directed mainly at minority students. Among the incidents he cited were a report of a Muslim student who was threatened she would be lighted on fire because she wore a hijab, and another student who said that when he left his apartment to go to class, he discovered a swastika with a message telling him to go home.

Threat to Set Fire to Hijab-Wearing U-M Student Probed as Hate Crime

• “Stop it,” President-elect Donald Trump said in a direct appeal to his supporters on “60 Minutes” Sunday.

Schlissel and his co-signers expressed hope that “all members of our community can agree that we must not stand silent while facing expressions of bigotry, discrimination or hate that have become part of our national political discourse,” and said that “only by speaking out against personal attacks, hate and threats can we move on to have the discussions that will be necessary for our campus and our nation to reach its full potential.”

“Diversity is Ugly”

By mid-day Tuesday, about 350 students had signed an online petition criticizing Schlissel and other university officials. More than 60 pages of personal statements were included with the signatures.

Diversity isn’t a one-way street, wrote Frank Morton, a senior business major.

“I detest Donald Trump’s views on many issues,” he wrote, but as long as Trump’s supporters don’t engage in violence, “they have the right to exist on this university without being belittled by the administration.”

“Diversity is ugly,” he wrote. “It is more than Title IX, scarier than LGBTQ acceptance, and by definition encompasses beliefs at odds with prevailing wisdom.”

Conner Marion, who is studying statistics, accused Schlissel and other university officials of creating an atmosphere where he and other Trump supporters are unsafe. He denounced attacks like that one reported by the Muslim student who said she was forced to remove her hijab, but said intimidation against Trump supporters don’t seem to rise to the same level of concern.

“I wear my hat with Trump's slogan on it, ‘Make America Great Again,’ around campus and I might as well be in full KKK ensemble judging by how I am treated,” he wrote. “There could have been 100 crime alerts sent out for what has happened to me in the past week if they were sending them out in accordance to what justifies a crime alert for other demographics that are apparently more deserving of the university’s support. ...

“I will be walking around in the light of day, proudly supporting the next president of the United States, minding my own business, and I have been called every name in the book. I have been shoved, had my hat thrown off my head, drinks dumped on me, things knocked out of my hand, been spit on, been told to kill myself, get the (expletive) off this campus, and much, much more,” he wrote. “These actions were performed by fellow students, in the presence of fellow students, and not even once has anyone stepped in to defend me, ask the aggressor to step down, or offer me any sort of support. …

“This is the kind of campus you are creating. …”

Lincoln Merrill, an engineering student who expects to graduate in 2020, wrote that he was attracted to the school because its diversity would spark debate and inspire intellectual thinking. He’s disillusioned now, he wrote:

“The diversity the University promotes and the ideals it preaches are not, I have recently learned, intended to protect everyone. Rather, it exists as an attempt to target, change, and convert specific viewpoints based on the perfect yet unachievable vision the University has to create a student body that solely consists of people who reject those who may believe certain things. I voted for Donald J. Trump for president, and I feel as though the University does not care for the ideas that I can contribute to this campus because of it. I am not a racist. I am not a bigot. I am just a kid from New England who got into this university just like everyone else. …”

He said Schlissel’s email was “just another action the university has taken to try to undermine those who do not have the same ideals as those the university so vigorously protects.”

“You Are Perpetuating the Problem”

Lauren Neumann, a junior business major, accused the university of coddling students who were upset by the election’s outcome and said it’s time to accept the results and move on.

“Providing students with extensions because of the election results is doing students a disservice. The real world will continue to function. If an employee does not attend work because of an election later in life, they will be fired,” she wrote, then added:

“Finally, President Schlissel, by continually sending emails and promoting programs about diversity, equality, and inclusion, you are perpetuating the problem. When children are born they do not recognize there is a difference in skin color. This is taught to them by people like you. If race is not an issue, why do you make it one?

“The United States has spoken. Let us see what we can do with respect for each other, respect for the family, and respect for humanity.”

Sophomore Sam Junge got right to students’ point: “If Trump is not your president, then perhaps you aren’t mine.”

Photo by Jason Crotty via Flickr Commons