{"id":1985416,"date":"2023-07-28T18:47:02","date_gmt":"2023-07-28T22:47:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/university-will-pay-christian-student-80k-for-silencing-conservative-views\/"},"modified":"2023-07-28T18:48:19","modified_gmt":"2023-07-28T22:48:19","slug":"university-will-pay-christian-student-80k-for-silencing-conservative-views","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/university-will-pay-christian-student-80k-for-silencing-conservative-views\/","title":{"rendered":"Christian student awarded $80k by university for suppressing conservative opinions."},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Funiversity-will-pay-christian-student-80k-for-silencing-conservative-views%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1985416&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><h2>Southern Illinois University Settles \u200bLawsuit, \u2062Pays Student $80,000 for\u200c Silencing Conservative Views<\/h2>\n<p>Southern <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/topic\/illinois\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Illinois<\/a> University has reached a settlement with \u2064a \u2063Christian student, Maggie DeJong, who filed \u2064a lawsuit claiming that the school had suppressed her <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/after-leaks-hasbro-backs-away-from-critical-race-training-but-corporate-statements-show-commitment-to-anti-racism\/\" title=\"After Leaks, Hasbro Backs Away from Critical Race Training But Corporate Statements Show Commitment To \u2018Anti-Racism\u2019\">conservative political views<\/a>. DeJong, a graduate of \u2062the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/university-will-pay-christian-student-80k-for-silencing-conservative-views\/\" title=\"Christian student awarded k by university for suppressing conservative opinions.\">art therapy counseling program<\/a>,\u2064 alleged\u2063 that the university punished her after other students complained about her outspoken conservative\u200d beliefs.<\/p>\n<p>The lawsuit was\u2063 settled this \u200cweek for $80,000, according to DeJong&#8217;s legal team at Alliance Defending Freedom.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>&#8220;Public universities can&#8217;t punish students for\u2063 expressing their political and religious viewpoints. Maggie, like every other\u2063 student, is protected under\u200d the First Amendment to respectfully share her personal beliefs, and university officials were wrong to issue gag\u200d orders and silence her \u2064speech,&#8221; said \u200cattorney Mathew Hoffmann\u2063 of Alliance Defending \u2063Freedom in a press release Wednesday.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>As part of the settlement, three professors at Southern Illinois University will undergo mandatory First Amendment training. Additionally, the university will\u200d revise its student handbook and policies to ensure that students with varying political, religious, and ideological views \u2064are welcome in the art therapy program.<\/p>\n<p>In \u2062her lawsuit, DeJong claimed that the school launched an investigation \u200dand issued three &#8220;no contact&#8221; orders against her in response to complaints from other students about her conservative views, labeling\u2062 them as &#8220;harmful&#8221; and &#8220;harassment.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/onelink.to\/dwapp\">CLICK HERE \u2062TO GET THE DAILY \u2062WIRE APP<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>DeJong&#8217;s legal team explained, &#8220;Maggie wasn&#8217;t given \u2062a chance to defend herself. When they issued the orders, university officials didn&#8217;t even tell her what the allegations against her were, and they did not identify\u200b a\u2062 single law, policy, \u200bor rule that she\u200b had violated.\u200b That&#8217;s because she hadn&#8217;t \u2062violated any.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>DeJong, known for speaking up\u2064 and offering her conservative perspective during \u2064class discussions on topics such as race relations, religion, COVID, and censorship, also shared her views on her Instagram account. These included her <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/mcenany-rips-tapper-after-he-implies-shes-appealing-to-conspiracists\/\" title=\"McEnany Rips Tapper After He Implies She\u2019s Appealing To Conspiracists\">pro-life stance<\/a>, her defense of Kyle Rittenhouse, and her criticism of Critical Race Theory.<\/p>\n<p>Following Rittenhouse&#8217;s acquittal in 2021,\u2062 DeJong wrote, &#8220;Justice and truth prevailed in \u2064the face of\u200d lies and deception from the mainstream media trying \u200cto twist the narrative. This gives \u2064hope to Americans. Praying protection over those jurors who\u2064 have been threatened their lives.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Southern Illinois University Chancellor James Minor acknowledged the settlement in\u200c a statement, emphasizing the university&#8217;s commitment to protecting First \u2063Amendment rights and denying any \u2062policies that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/tom-cotton-introduces-bill-to-keep-critical-race-theory-out-of-military\/\" title=\"Tom Cotton Introduces Bill To Keep Critical Race Theory Out Of Military\">restrict free speech<\/a>\u200c or\u2064 support censorship.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Southern Illinois University will compensate a Christian student with $80,000 following her lawsuit alleging the suppression of her conservative political opinions. Maggie DeJong, an art therapy counseling program graduate, sued the university for punishing her after fellow students objected to her outspokenness.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":1985417,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[541],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1985416","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-daily-wire"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1985416","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1985416"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1985416\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1985417"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1985416"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1985416"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1985416"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}