Donors push for firing of Wichita State University president after canceling Ivanka Trump's commencement address

Previously, First Daughter and White House senior adviser Ivanka Trump was set to make a commencement address to the graduates of Wichita State University. However, the last-minute cancellation decided by the WSU president resulted in backlash from its donors, who are now pushing for the university president’s resignation.

ABC News reports that the donors of WSU are now calling for the state’s board of higher education to fire the university’s president Jay Golden or urge him to resign. The donors or Kansas Board of Regents held a Zoom meeting on Wednesday, two days after former Wichita board member Steve Clark urged them to call for Golden’s resignation.

Clark, who sought Golden’s resignation, reasoned that canceling Ivanka’s virtual graduation speech would put the university’s relationship with multimillion-dollar conglomerate Koch Industries, at risk. However, a spokeswoman for Koch Industries has given the assurance that the corporation would continue to honor its financial commitments to WSU, and their funding is not tied to the actions that personnel from WSU would take.

At the same time, the chief financial officer and executive vice president for Koch Industries, Steve Feilmeier, expressed that the cancellation of Trump’s speech would play a big part in his decision of whether or not to serve on the Wichita State Foundation board.

Golden canceled Trump’s virtual graduation speech following protests from both students and faculty, that criticized the Trump administration’s handling of the ongoing Black Lives Matter protests. They added that this was their stand against the administration’s keenness in sowing division, especially as Ivanka is the senior adviser to her father Donald Trump.

“In light of the social justice issues brought forth by George Floyd’s death, I understand and take responsibility that the timing of the announcement was insensitive. For this, I’m sorry that was never the intent, and I want you to know I have heard you and we are responding,” said Sheree Utash, WSU Tech president.

However, upon the cancellation, Ivanka took to Twitter to express her displeasure, saying that schools are supposed to be “bastions of free speech” and even noted that cancel culture was what caused the cancellation of her virtual address. She later uploaded her recorded message.