Texas A&M isn’t often known for being a hotbed of either activism or liberalism, but it certainly didn’t roll out the maroon carpet for Trump supporter Richard Spencer.
When white nationalist Richard Spencer took the stage at Texas A&M University on Tuesday, about two dozen of the 400 people in the room stood and applauded. Many others hissed.
“That means you love me,” he said to the hecklers. “Hisssss back to all of y’all.”
National Policy Institute president Spencer showed that he’d been watching Trump closely, as he followed his mentor’s lead to fat shame a woman in the audience and call a man a coward in an attempt to initiate violence.
The university didn’t invite Spencer to speak. Instead, a local white supremacist lined up the room and arranged the NAPI leader’s speech. Outside, groups arranged a variety of protests from a silent, candlelight vigil, and services from religious leaders to more active protests.
A school-sanctioned counter event at Kyle Field featured a string quartet made up of black faculty members. The quartet performed "Lift Every Voice and Sing," a song often referred to as the Black American national anthem. Texas A&M System Chancellor John Sharp denounced Spencer.
But as the school was encouraging unity, the leader of the “alt right” was showing the movement’s true nature.
“This is our goddamn country,” Spencer shouted at one point, raising his fist in the air. …
“We conquered this continent,” he said. “Whether it is nice to say that at all, we won and we got to define what America means. And we got to define what this continent means. America, at the end of the day, belongs to the white man.”
And while some students worried that speaking out only brought more attention to Spencer’s hateful statements, other community members couldn’t keep silent.
“He has a right to speak, but so do I — and I am going to speak louder,” said Kayclyn Hargrave, who said she didn’t attend A&M but lives near the campus. She was holding a sign that said, “Laundry is the only thing that should be separated by color.”