Two conservative federal judges have reportedly stated they would not be hiring clerks from Stanford Law after student protestors from the California university shouted down a federal judge appointed by former president Donald Trump.
After a group of students and an administrator at Stanford University shouted down and berated Judge Stuart Kyle Duncan of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals at a speaking event in March, U.S. Circuit Judges James Ho and Elizabeth Branch announced a hiring moratorium on law clerks hailing from the California university.
“We will not hire any student who chooses to attend Stanford Law School in the future,” Ho stated Saturday evening, according to the Washington Free Beacon.
NEW: James Ho and Elizabeth Branch, the circuit court judges who announced last year that they would no longer hire clerks from Yale Law, are adding Stanford to the boycott.
The judges won’t hire students who choose to attend Stanford Law in the future.🧵 https://t.co/NQCJj40Oc5
— Aaron Sibarium (@aaronsibarium) April 2, 2023
Ho’s remarks come after Stanford President Marc Tessier-Lavigne and Stanford Law School Dean Jenny Martínez were forced to apologize to Judge Duncan after his planned speech last month was overrun by protestors at the university who accused him of being a “scum bag and a liar,” the California Globe reported.
Duncan arrived at Stanford University March 9 to give a speech at the invitation of the school’s chapter of the conservative Federalist Society. Prior to his arrival, protestors reportedly distributed fliers shaming Federalist Society members for inviting Duncan, falsely claiming the judge had “fought to deny black Americans the right to vote,” according to the California Globe.
“Judge Duncan then took the stage — and from the beginning of his speech, the protestors booed and heckled continually. For about ten minutes, the judge tried to give his planned remarks, but the protestors simply yelled over him, with exclamations like ‘You couldn’t get into Stanford!’ ‘You’re not welcome here, we hate you!’ ‘Why do you hate black people?!’ ‘Leave and never come back!’ ‘We hate FedSoc students, fuck them, they don’t belong here either!’ and ‘We do not respect you and you have no right to speak here! This is our jurisdiction!'” legal writer David Lat recalled, according to the California Globe.
Rather than controlling the protestors, administrators present in the room seemed to encourage the antics with Tirien Steinbach, the associate dean for diversity, equity and inclusion, taking to the podium and reportedly stating, “For many people here, your work has caused harm. Is the juice worth the squeeze?” (RELATED: ‘Free Speech Crisis’: Stanford Law School Spent Years Building Out Its Diversity, Equity And Inclusion Bureaucracy)
“We are very clear with our students that, given our commitment to free expression, if there are speakers they disagree with, they are welcome to exercise their right to protest but not disrupt the proceedings,” Tessier-Lavigne and Martínez wrote in a letter to Duncan after the protests.
“Staff members who should have enforced university policies failed to do so, and instead intervened in inappropriate ways that are not aligned with the university’s commitment to free speech. We are taking steps to ensure that something like this does not happen again,” Tessier-Lavigne and Martínez continued.
“Freedom of speech is a bedrock principle for the law school, the university, and a democratic society, and we can and must do better to ensure that it continues even in polarized times,” they promised.
The hiring moratorium against Stanford Law students follows a similar ban placed on Yale Law students by Ho and Branch where conservative speakers at the university have also been met with “cancellations and disruptions,” according to Reuters.