Penn State Cancels Proud Boys Founder’s Event, Citing Threat of Violence

A comedy event at Pennsylvania State University (known colloquially as Penn State) was to feature Proud Boys founder, Gavin McInnes, a co-host of the now canceled show. Proud Boys is a far-right, fascist and authoritarian group in the United States and has been deemed a terrorist group by both Canada and New Zealand.

A petition to cancel Monday’s event had been circulated by students weeks prior to the show’s date. The Student Committee for Defense and Solidarity had organized protests against the university’s decision to allow McInnes to co-host the alt-right event on campus and to pay the 52-year-old using student fees. The petition was signed with over 3,000 signatures.

Penn State decided to cancel the event just 45 minutes before it was supposed to begin at 8 PM due to a “threat of escalating violence” following aggravated clashes between protestors. According to the university’s president, Neeli Bendapudi, the peaceful street protest against the event erupted when one of the co-hosts of the show, Alex Stein, decided to enter the crowd and subsequently raised tensions.

Penn State was hosting the Proud Boys but when students protested it had the nerve to admonish them by talking about polarization and rising violence...isn't that the definition of what the Proud Boys do? https://t.co/0SOqPcmID3

— Ida Bae Wells (@nhannahjones) October 25, 2022

Here's the moment that a right-winger went into a crowd of anti-ProudBoy protestors trying to start a fight. Then pepper-sprayed the people around him (including me and @FordFischer). The police watched, not doing anything.

I'll add my coverage of the #PennState protests here.🧵 pic.twitter.com/mNqYtjsk2W

— Zach D Roberts - Photojournalist for hire (@zdroberts) October 25, 2022

The event, called “Stand Back & Stand By” in reference to a statement made by former President Donald Trump, was to be hosted by the Penn State chapter of Uncensored America, which calls itself a free speech organization.

Penn State initially allowed the event to go forward despite finding themselves in the “unenviable position of sharing space with individuals whose views differ dramatically from our University’s values of inclusion, diversity, equity and respect,” saying that it was an “undeniable constitutional right” for a student organization, including Uncensored America, to select speakers they wish to host even without the university’s endorsement.

“It is unclear which individuals on-site then resorted to physical confrontation and to using pepper spray against others in the crowd, including against police officers,” said Bendapudi.

According to the New York Times, Penn State did not immediately respond to a request for further comment, while the campus police wholly declined to comment.

Penn State should never have put their students in a position to be confronted by Proud Boys and their founder Gavin McInnes. But they did, so students and the community responded by successfully shutting down the event. https://t.co/K8po7BoY9W

— Read Jackson Rising by @CooperationJXN (@JoshuaPHilll) October 25, 2022

Well got peppersprayed by a Proud Boy. Several other media got direct hit. Thankfully it hit my glasses but my face and body is burning like the worst sunburn. #PennState campus cops watched and did nothing. pic.twitter.com/d1q0SJKkSL

— Zach D Roberts - Photojournalist for hire (@zdroberts) October 24, 2022

The group Uncensored America was founded in 2020, according to their website, as a “non-partisan organization dedicated to fighting for freedom of speech” in an effort to make “American culture free and fun again.” The group’s founder, Sean Semanko, is a former Penn student and field organizer for Trump’s 2020 campaign.

The canceled comedy event had promised to be a “politically provocative” comedy night that would apparently fall in line with the nonprofit’s mission to host “honest and fun conversations with controversial figures to fight censorship and cancel culture.”

Stein, who is described as a “professional troll,” was spat on by a Penn State protestor after the right-wing agitator taunted and mocked Penn State protestors. After the female protestor spat on Stein, he said, “I like that fetish—that turns me on. Now she turns me on!”

Absolute Mayhem & Chaos at Penn State University with the most Mentally Insane College Students in America! pic.twitter.com/jskjRi2cz8

— Alex Stein #99 (@alexstein99) October 25, 2022

McInnes, a Canadian podcastor, co-founded Vice, a media company that was initially founded as a Canadian-American alternative magazine in 1994 when he was just 24 years old. McInnes then moved to the United States in 2001. He founded the first chapter of the Proud Boys in New York in 2016. The group has an undeniable link to Trump, after they were found to be leading major breaches in the January 2021 riot on the United States Capitol.

In June 2021, the New York Times reported that more than 40 members of the Proud Boys were indicted in connection with the Capitol Hill riots. The Select Committee to Investigate the January 6 Attack also found the group played an instrumental role in the breach of the Capitol.