Conservative leaders Charlie Kirk and Dennis Prager are scheduled to return to Arizona State University (ASU) for the “Health, Wealth & Happiness 2.0” event on Wednesday. The first event, held in 2022, sparked fierce opposition from faculty and staff, which in turn provoked hearings in the Arizona Legislature.
Prager and Kirk will host the event alongside Tom Lewis, a former ASU donor who was the primary benefactor of the T.W. Lewis Center where the first event was held last year. Ann Atkinson, who was the director of the center at ASU, and State Representative Austin Smith (R-Surprise), will also speak at the event.
Details were posted to X, formerly Twitter, by TPUSA Field Representative Amber Kleinke.
We have some amazing guests joining us next week at Arizona State University!
Will YOU be joining us? Tickets are still available at: https://t.co/9iWvMnD2cW
We look forward to see you there 🇺🇸🙌🏼 @azaustinsmith @Ann_Atkinson_AZ @twlewis_ @charliekirk11 @DennisPrager @TPUSA… pic.twitter.com/BOGfpGObRX
— Amber Kleinke (@realamber_k96) September 21, 2023
Alleged intense institutional backlash for the event provoked ASU donor Tom Lewis to pull his funding for the center, which closed soon after. A hearing was then called in the Arizona Senate, which questioned whether the First Amendment was being curtailed at Arizona’s public universities, citing claims of an organized smear campaign against the conservative speakers and Atkinson for organizing the event.
Legislators ultimately required ASU to compile a report on the purported intimidation campaign, investigating whether the First Amendment was violated on campus. On September 19, ASU declared its investigation found “no evidence” of a campaign to smear the event featuring Kirk and Prager.
“The university’s review found the kind of passionate discussion and debate that the First Amendment celebrates, followed by a successful event where the invited speakers reached tens of thousands of audience members,” the university claimed in its report. “Answering the allegations brought by Ms. Atkinson, the university’s review did not find evidence that Barrett faculty ran a ‘national condemnation campaign.'”
State Senator Anthony Kern (R-Glendale) disagreed with their findings, calling the report an example “of the fox guarding the henhouse,” and declaring that the “complicity” of the university’s administrators “calls for further action from state legislators.”
For his part, in a post on X, Lewis called the report “shocking and laughable” and declared “the inmates are running the asylum at ASU.
It is both shocking and laughable that President Crow would defend his radical faculty who are the same ones who harassed and hurled insults and ugly comments at Prager and Kirk. It is also unfortunate that a major university president would support his politically charged…
— TW Lewis (@twlewis_) September 19, 2023
Atkinson, seemingly alluding to the significance of the hearing, wrote on X that she expects “no condemnation campaign, intimidation” or “censorship coming out of Barrett” for the upcoming event, adding that she believes “faculty will be on their best behavior in an effort to disprove their past behavior.”
The event will be held on Wednesday at 6:30 p.m., with doors opening an hour earlier. A registration website for the event reveals that tickets will be available on a first-come, first-serve basis, but notes that ASU students will have priority access. Students must show a valid student ID, and non-students must show a valid form of identification that matches their ticket.
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Tom Pappert is the lead reporter for The Georgia Star News and a reporter for the Arizona Sun Times. Follow Tom on Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Charlie Kirk and Dennis Prager” by Gage Skidmore. CC BY-SA 2.0.
