Education

School May Ban Protest Against Teacher Who Made Students Remove Trump T-Shirts

REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

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Anders Hagstrom Justice Reporter
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A Georgia high school has threatened to bring in police to prevent a Wednesday protest against a teacher that forced two students to flip their shirts inside out because they displayed the slogan “Make America Great Again.”

River Ridge High School (RRHS) announced that the Sept. 27 protest posed a danger to students and staff. State Sen. Michael Williams, a Republican candidate for Georgia governor, organized the protest and explicitly called for it to be peaceful. Williams claimed Thursday that the school is infringing on protesters’ First Amendment rights.

“The school claims to have pre-determined that our peaceful protest, ‘will significantly disrupt teaching and learning and may endanger the safety of more than 3,200 students and staff,'” Williams said in a statement provided to The Daily Caller News Foundation. “The arrogance of such statements is insulting to myself and our peaceful protestors. We will not be intimidated by your deceitful statement meant to prevent our lawful right to assemble. The protest will continue as planned. Once again, this school has failed to properly handle simple situations”

video recorded by a student Sept. 2 shows an RRHS teacher equating President Donald Trump’s campaign slogan with a swastika before forcing two students out of the classroom to turn their shirts inside out.

“You cannot wear a swastika to school … you cannot wear ‘Make America Great Again’ like that,” the teacher said in the video. “Please go, at least for this class. I don’t care what you do in other classes.”

Williams’ campaign claimed that any attempt by the school to prevent the protest was unwarranted because the local county sheriff had deemed the event to be legal. Regardless, RRHS plans to monitor and perhaps cease the event.

“School police officers and other public safety personnel will be monitoring the driveway entrances and elsewhere on campus to ensure students and employees stay safe and secure; and the campus will be on Code Yellow all day,” school spokeswoman Barbara P. Jacoby wrote in a statement.

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