U.S.A. –-(AmmoLand.com)- Kyle Rittenhouse, the 18-year-old exonerated by a Kenosha, Wisconsin jury of murder who claimed on the witness stand he wants to study nursing at Arizona State University may get a course he hadn’t planned on, about social bigotry, and his critics are planning a Wednesday rally at the ASU campus to press their demands.
The event will be held this Wednesday at 3:30 p.m.
The New York Post is reporting how “leftist” student groups at ASU “are campaigning to get Kyle Rittenhouse kicked out of his studies — calling him a racist, “blood-thirsty murderer” even though the teen was acquitted of all charges.”
The Guardian describes this bunch as “a small but vocal alliance of left-leaning students.” Their report notes Rittenhouse has been taking a “virtual class” rather than actually attending the university.
Fox News identified the groups as Students for Socialism, Students for Justice in Palestine, Multicultural Solidarity Coalition, and MECHA de ASU. The network quoted from their “demand” letter which states, “Even with a not-guilty verdict from a flawed ‘justice’ system – Kyle Rittenhouse is still guilty to his victims and the families of those victims…Join us to demand from ASU that those demands be met to protect students from a violent blood-thirsty murderer.”
Here are their demands:
- Withdraw Kyle Rittenhouse from ASU
- Release a statement against white supremacy & racist murderer Kyle Rittenhouse
- Reaffirm support for the multicultural center on campus as a space safe from white supremacy
- Redirect funding from ASU PD to support the multicultural center and the establishment of a CAARE center on campus.
Rittenhouse was found not guilty on all counts following a week-long trial and more than three days of deliberations by a jury of seven women and five men. He had been charged after shooting three men—two fatally and one wounded—during a riot in Kenosha in August 2020. He claimed to have acted in self-defense, using a semi-auto rifle he was carrying.
Fox News quoted an unidentified spokesperson for the Students for Socialism group who asserted, “The goal of these demands is to let the ASU administration know that we as the ASU community do not feel safe knowing that a mass shooter, who has expressed violent intentions about ‘protecting property’ over people, is so carelessly allowed to be admitted to the school at all.” The spokesperson said the campus is “already unsafe.”
The university released a statement, “Kyle Rittenhouse has not gone through the admissions process with Arizona State University and is not enrolled in the Edson College of Nursing and Health Innovation.” Fox noted ASU has confirmed that Rittenhouse “enrolled as a non-degree seeking ASU Online student for the session that started Oct. 13, 2021, which allows students access to begin taking classes as they prepare to seek admission into a degree program at the university.”
On the stand, Rittenhouse testified he wanted to seek a career in nursing.
An article in The Atlantic analyzes the Rittenhouse “problem” facing university officials who seem to have determined they are smarter than a jury.
Rittenhouse, who reportedly hasn’t filed defamation lawsuits against anyone so far, might have even more potential defendants in such actions if this discrimination effort continues. As reported by KNPX, this is not the first time a Rittenhouse related problem has sprung up on the ASU campus.
“A Republican student group at the university received backlash last year for raising money for the 17-year-old gunman’s defense fund,” the station reported.
In the aftermath of his mid-November acquittal, rumors and social media have raised the potential for massive civil lawsuits against any number of people and news agencies, and perhaps even Joe Biden, for labelling the teen a “white supremacist” and “vigilante” last year following the incident.
Rittenhouse has become something of a folk hero among many conservatives, The Guardian reported.
However, there is more to the story than the teen, and that is the impact this case might have had on self-defense. As things stand now, the Rittenhouse verdict leaves the act of self-defense essentially unscathed. Contrary to what some on the left have been claiming, the verdict did not essentially put an “open season” on protesters, but it did reaffirm the right of people to defend themselves against physical attack.
Meanwhile, an Op-Ed published by the Duluth News Tribune takes issue with gun prohibition lobbying groups using the Kenosha case to push a gun control agenda. Moms Demand Action released an email blast ten days ago declaring the Kenosha verdict “a miscarriage of justice and an indictment of our broken criminal justice system.”
“A white teenager got his hands on a semi-automatic rifle,” the Moms group declared, “showed up to a demonstration for Black Lives, fatally shot Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber, wounded Gaige Grosskreutz, and he wasn’t held accountable.”
It wasn’t a demonstration; it was a riot. The three men Rittenhouse shot were all white. And as the Op-Ed in Duluth—co-authored by gun rights leader Alan Gottlieb and this correspondent—observed, “Anti-gunners don’t really care about the people he shot, only what he shot them with, and so long as it advances their narrative.”
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About Dave Workman
Dave Workman is a senior editor at TheGunMag.com and Liberty Park Press, author of multiple books on the Right to Keep & Bear Arms, and formerly an NRA-certified firearms instructor.
