Katherine H. Tachau, Edward Wasserman and Ann Rhodes
Guest Columnists
The right of the people to express opinions free from government interference is protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution. So it was disappointing to see the right of free speech weaponized in a recent hearing held by the Iowa House Government Oversight Committee. (“‘Unsafe just because they disagree’: University of Iowa dean apologizes for infringing on rights of conservatives on campus,” Feb. 3).
In that hearing, Dean David Johnsen of the University of Iowa s College of Dentistry apologized to the committee for his actions last fall when he and other faculty circulated a memo to the college deploring an Executive Order issued by then-President Donald Trump. The order prohibited recipients of federal funding from offering certain kinds of training on diversity and white privilege, and teachers at recipient institutions from “endorsing” ideas that the government defined as “divisive co