Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, was the scene of yet another “woke” attack on patriotism in the United States. While flags representing LGBTQ pride and Black Lives Matter hung all over the campus, employees of the university were sent to remove a United States flag bearing the famous Gadsen symbol — a coiled rattlesnake with the words “Don’t Tread on Me” — and a “Blue Line, Green Line, Red Line” flag in support of police, military, and firefighters.
The flags were put up on October 26 and removed the next day. The women charged with removing the flags reportedly said that hanging them constituted a safety danger.
Roommates Finn McCole and Lucas Turco hung the flags when they noted the flags of left-wing causes hanging from other dorm windows at the school.
But that act of patriotism was too much for Trinity’s administration to bear, so they sent staffers Veronica Hills and Susan Salisbury on a mission to remove the flags. Standing on a ladder removing the flags, Hill told the two students, “You are directed to take it down. The Dean’s office has requested … everyone’s going to be requested,” Hill told the students, who filmed the episode over her protests.
The university employee told the students to put their phones away in an attempt to get them to stop filming the incident, but they continued to film, arguing that they had a First Amendment right to do so. Hill attempted to confiscate the flags and take them to the dean’s office, but it appears as if the students were able to get them back.
“They had LGBTQ flags, they had transgender flags, BLM flags,” Turco told Fox News’ Jesse Watters. “We have no problem with any of those flags hanging. We believe that everyone has a right to their own opinion and their own beliefs and that everyone should be able to put their flags up.”
Reasonably, Turco and McCole felt it was their right to express their own opinions.
“So, me and Finn thought, ‘why don’t we put up some flags that we personally believe in?’… They said that the reason they were taken down was because some people viewed the flags as offensive,” Turco said. “And I think it’s absolutely a shame that those flags could be offensive…. They’re just about loving your country and the people who protect us.”
Officially, the college said that all of the flags — including the leftist ones — were a violation of handbook rules.
“This event has highlighted the need for more consistent enforcement of handbook rules, and the college is working with the student body to create awareness and compliance,” a spokesperson told Fox News. “The dean of student life is addressing the issue with the entire student body to ensure compliance with the handbook and has reiterated the rule to the student body in a communication this week. The dean’s office will directly work with students for more consistent enforcement.”
In a letter addressing the incident, Trinity College President Joanne Berger-Sweeney assured students and faculty that removing the flags was not an attempt to squelch anyone’s First Amendment rights, but, rather, simply an attempt to enforce the student handbook.
“There have been suggestions that the removal of the flags reflects an attempt to restrict student speech on our campus. I write to reaffirm and restate clearly that Trinity College supports the freedom of speech and expression of our students,” Berger-Sweeney wrote.
“The college did not intend for the flag removal to be seen as a political statement,” she emphasized.
And, according to Sweeney, the university apologized, so all should be forgiven: “As I understand the matter, an apology was issued on the same day of the removal to the students who own the flags for the manner in which the policy was enforced.”
“We will work harder to ensure greater awareness and consistent compliance moving forward,” the school’s president assured.
Unfortunately for Sweeney and the school’s administration, the incident was captured for the world to see, and it certainly looked as if the flags of the two conservative students were being singled out for removal over the leftist ones. Would the LGBTQ flags and the Black Lives Matter flags have been removed at all without the publicity surrounding the removal of McCole’s and Turco’s flags? We’ll never truly know.
