A leader of a prominent conservative group at USC was among the campus student leaders at the White House on Thursday to watch President Donald Trump sign an executive order that requires U.S. colleges to protect free speech or risk losing federal funding. Maxwell Brandon, president of USC's Young Americans for Freedom club, is one of 14 YAF leaders from across the country to attend the event.
"I immediately called my mom and dad [after I got invited]," Brandon told Annenberg Media. "I was pretty excited because I didn't think that I was actually going to get picked."
In a speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference this month, Trump announced the order, saying the country's federally funded universities would lose the government's money if they don't support free speech on campus.
The Young America's Foundation, a self-described "conservative youth organization," brings controversial conservative speakers to campuses across the country and took legal action in instances where administrators moved to block such visits. In one such incidence, The Daily Californian reported that the group was awarded $70,000 in a 2017 settlement with UC Berkeley, and the university's administrators pledged to revise campus event policies. Trump threatened to take away the university's federal funds after the incident.
USC's chapter says it aims to "improve our campus by advancing the ideas of our founding document." Brandon, who founded USC's YAF chapter, cites the group's goal of championing the First Amendment's right to free speech as the reason he got invited to the White House.
"Every day when we're out doing our activism, our main objective is emphasizing the importance of free speech on campus," Brandon said. "YAF is willing to take steps to protect free speech not just for conservatives, but all students."
YAF's unwavering stance on free speech caused controversy at USC in fall 2018 when the group hosted controversial conservative firebrand Ben Shapiro on campus. Shapiro has made comments about transgender people, race and religion that many students deem hate speech. Students protested outside his sold-out speech at Bovard chanting "no to Shapiro, no to bigotry" and "racism, sexism and bigotry not welcome."
Brandon believes that if what some think is hate speech is targeted on campuses, all speech is at risk.
"My problem with hate speech is that it's really a subjective term," he said. "Once you try to police speech that you deem hate speech – something that doesn't have a clear definition – you really start getting into murky waters of infringing on the first amendment."
Despite Trump's public dismissals of supposed "fake news" and claims that the media is "the enemy of the people," he has championed free speech for conservative voices.
"Social media is totally discriminating against Republican (and) conservative voices," Trump wrote in a tweet. "Let everybody participate, good and bad, and we will all just have to figure it out," he wrote in another.
The Shapiro event came after USC changed its speech policy in summer 2018 to require students to register campus protests two weeks in advance. The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, a nonpartisan nonprofit that seeks to protect First Amendment rights, gave USC a "red-light" rating for poor protection.
"USC is a private university, but it clearly promises its students free speech rights in its policies, and it needs to live up those promises," FIRE wrote. "Forcing students to apply for a permit two weeks in advance in order to conduct all sorts of demonstrations — whether involving a group of three people or one of three hundred — is nowhere near reasonable."
Despite FIRE's criticism of the school's free speech policies, Brandon has never felt his rights infringed on at USC.
"I'm pretty satisfied with the way the administration has handled anything I've been a part of," he said. "And I think Trump's order might get out in front of the problem at some places like USC that could go down the rabbit hole like some other schools have."
Brandon is currently in D.C. to attend the signing of the bill, and he is excited to meet Trump.
"I get a leg up on my brothers because I get to say I met President Trump, and they're all jealous right now," he joked. "Regardless of who's holding the office, I think it's pretty cool to be invited to the white house to attend an event… It's definitely something I'm not going to soon forget."
Trump is slated to sign the bill at 3 p.m. ET on Thursday.