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Lynne Chandler García, U.S. Air Force Academy

July 2021
U.S. Air Force Academy (Public college or university)
Air Force Academy, CO, United States

Identity of Speakers

  • Lynne Chandler García
    Faculty/Staff
    Other

    Lynn Chandler García is an assistant professor of political science at the U.S. Air Force Academy.

Resources

Additional Information

  • Incident Nature:
    Course Content
  • Incident Political Orientation:
    Left-of-spectrum
  • Incident Responses:
    Other
  • Incident Status:
    No litigation
  • Did not involve Speech Codes

Summary

Lynn Chandler García is an assistant professor of political science at the U.S. Air Force Academy. On July 6, 2021, García penned a column in The Washington Post titled: “I’m a professor at a U.S. military academy. Here’s why I teach critical race theory.” On July 7, 2021, Senator Tom Cotton reacted to the op-ed by declaring that she “should start looking for a different place of employment.” The next day, U.S. Representative Mark Green, a Republican from Tennessee, urged the Acting Secretary of the Air Force to remove García from her position, writing in a statement that “Professor García’s comments on Critical Race Theory are utterly unacceptable and incompatible with the mission of our United States Military Service Academies.”

The Academic Freedom Alliance, an organization of college and university faculty dedicated to promoting academic freedom, released a statement defending García and calling Cotton and Green’s calls for her termination a “clear threat to her academic freedom.”