Luke Perez Ohio State University (OSU) professor put on leave after wrestling filmmaker to the ground seeking to question former university president, E. Gordon Gee, a supporter of a large donor revealed to have ties to Jeffrey Epstein as the episode raises question of political interference, free speech and the role of academia in public institutions and ‘intellectual discourse.’
An Ohio State University assistant professor has been suspended after video showed them attacking a journalist attempting to conduct an interview in a school hallway earlier this week.
Luke Perez, an assistant professor at the Salmon P. Chase Center for Civics, Culture, and Society, was in a Smith Laboratory hallway after the academic hosting a guest speaker, E. Gordon Gee, a former university president during class when Gee was approached by two reporters on Monday, February 9.
One of the reporters, Michael Neuman, an independent documentarian attempts to question Gee as Perez stood nearby. Newman wanting to ask Gee another question is then told ‘No’ by Perez as he then knocks the reporter’s camera out of his hands and wraps his arms around him, bringing the filmmaker to the ground.
OSU professor takes exception to academic being questioned
The unfolding scene was captured by the second reporter, DJ Byrnes who shared it on Instagram.
Byrnes, the publisher of political journal, The Rooster, states the documentarian had tried to ask Gee a follow up question on student loan debt only for Perez to intercede.
‘He already said it was his last question, so we’re going to have to ask you guys to leave now,’ Perez says in captured video
‘Just one more?’ Newman asks as he moves towards Gee.
‘No,’ Perez responds, moving to block Newman, who appeared to be holding recording devices in each of his hands.
‘I told you not to put that in my face,’ Perez yells over Neuman. ‘Now, I’m not gonna ask you again, don’t touch me,’ the academic claims the reporter placing his hands on him.
‘I didn’t touch you, motherf–ker, who the f–k are you,’ Neuman is heard screaming in the video.
What if the reporters were representing a right leaning journal as opposed to a liberal or left leaning publication?
The two reporters claim Perez stepped into the hallway to tell them he didn’t consent to being filmed, but they weren’t looking for him, and instead had wanted to speak with Gee.
The altercation which soon went viral led to Perez being placed on leave the following day by school administrators as the school now investigates the episode. Neither reporter was subjects of the enquiry.
Not immediately clear is whether Dr Perez was aware of who the two reporters were, the journal that they both worked at, whether the academic would’ve taken similar exception had the two reporters been conservatives as opposed to liberal orientated and why the academic had been so adamant that the journal not engage the former university president.
Neuman, who attended the university, told The Chronicle of Higher Education that he went to the emergency room following the altercation. He claimed having pain in his shoulder and his neck.
Connecting the dots to donor money, corporate interests and political ideology
Gee recently made news for statements he’d made in support of billionaire Les Wexner, a substantial donor at the university, following revelations about his ties to convicted pedophile, Jeffrey Epstein in congress this month, WOSU reported. Gee reportedly defended Wexner and said that cries to take down the donor’s name from university buildings amounted to ‘cancel culture.’
Byrnes has since claimed Perez violating the two reporters First Amendment rights as Ohio State University is a public institution according to WSYX.
‘I thought we were in a bastion of free speech only to end up with a guy physically assaulted,’ Byrnes told the outlet. ‘There’s no other way to describe it other than assault. It was bizarre.’
Byrnes speaking to People Mag said the takedown was ‘one of the most shocking and disgusting acts of brutality in eight years on the beat.’
‘Luke Perez is a disgrace to The Ohio State University, and he never would have been in that position [had] Ohio’s Republican-gerrymandered State Legislature not mandated lightweight conservative thinking within public universities,’ he told the outlet.
Offered Neuman’s lawyer, Rocky Ratliff. ‘This is not the actions of an admirable professor or someone who’s professional. If the roles were reversed, he definitely would already be in jail.’
Free press and intellectual diversity
The Chase Center where Perez teaches, was created following a state bill mandating that Ohio State and four other public institutions promote ‘intellectual diversity.’
Ohio State’s American Association of University Professors chapter condemned Perez’s actions in the video.
‘Based on what we know now, this incident is a vivid illustration of a larger problem — the way the Chase Center and other so-called ‘intellectual diversity’ centers have been forcibly and unnecessarily imposed on Ohio’s universities,’ the chapter said in a statement to the Columbus Dispatch.
‘Unfortunately, this assault — and the embarrassing actions around it — make it clear these centers aren’t really about encouraging civil discourse and intellectual diversity. AAUP-OSU is in favor of free speech for everyone on campus, not just for the ideas that politicians want to promote.’
