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What happened at Tennessee State University this week was not a peaceful exchange of ideas but a calculated attempt by outside agitators to provoke and then complain when students pushed back. Conservative commentator David Khait and his crew, calling themselves Fearless Debates, set up an unapproved table on campus to challenge Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion orthodoxy and were quickly surrounded and driven off by an increasingly hostile crowd. Campus police later confirmed the group had not sought the required approval for demonstrations, and university staff escorted them from the grounds.
Eyewitness video and posts from the group show signs reading blunt slogans like “DEI should be illegal” and “Deport all illegals now,” and footage appears to show students attempting to remove or destroy their materials as tensions escalated. The visitors say what began as a civil conversation deteriorated into a mob that stole signs and threatened physical harm, forcing Khait and his team to leave for their own safety. Those visuals undermine any attempt to sanitize the incident as a purely peaceful campus response; this was intimidation, plain and simple.
TSU’s official statement called the group “hostile” and emphasized safety and permitting rules, which is understandable on procedural grounds but rings hollow when the administration then appears to side with the students who launched the confrontation. Universities have a constitutional obligation to protect free speech, not to tacitly endorse tactics that silence dissent by intimidation. When campus leaders rush to label conservative visitors as the villains and excuse the actions of crowds that physically chase people away, they set a dangerous precedent that rewards mob rule over civil discourse.
This incident fits a larger pattern: conservative activists now face organized, sometimes coordinated pushback when they try to test prevailing campus narratives, especially at HBCUs and other minority-serving institutions. Whether you agree with the message or not, peaceful persuasion should be allowed; what cannot be tolerated is theatrical provocation followed by celebrating the mob that enforces conformity. The stakes go beyond a single confrontation — they speak to whether our institutions will protect the marketplace of ideas or surrender it to intimidation.
Patriotic Americans should be clear-eyed about responsibility: those who bring controversial messages onto campuses must follow the rules, but universities must also ensure those rules are not used as an excuse to suppress speech they dislike. Tennessee State was right to enforce permitting requirements, but it was wrong to effectively praise a crowd that used forceful tactics to shut down a viewpoint. If colleges want to rebuild trust, they will uphold both safety and free expression equally, not pick winners and losers based on political alignment.
In the end, this episode should be a wake-up call for conservatives and defenders of free speech everywhere: we cannot allow political correctness and campus mobs to dictate which voices survive in the public square. Stand with peaceful debate, demand consistent enforcement of campus rules, and refuse to let intimidation become the new normal on our campuses. America is built on the hard work of honest debate, not the theatrics of grievance, and hardworking patriots must keep fighting for that principle.
