University of Wisconsin-Madison
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Thursday, October 31, 2024
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UW-MADISON’S UNFAIR POLICY
ADAM BRODY ON VOTING
UW-Madison’s new expression policies limit campus protest and dialogue on global events.
Actor Adam Brody talks to the Cardinal about youth voter turnout and early voting.
+ OPINION, PAGE 8
+ ARTS, PAGE 7
‘Top Chef’s Dan Jacobs announced as UW-Madison winter commencement speaker By Ellie Huber STAFF WRITER
‘Top Chef’’s Dan Jacobs will be the keynote speaker at the University of WisconsinMadison’s 2024 winter commencement, the university announced Tuesday. Jacobs, the head chef and co-owner of acclaimed Milwaukee restaurants EsterEv and Dandan, will share his “recipe for success” with graduates.
“I want to share the challenges I’ve faced, but also celebrate the journey itself,” Jacobs said in a press release. “Success, for me, will be seeing some heads nodding, some smiles, and maybe a few moments of reflection where they realize that they, too, can overcome whatever life throws at them.” Jacobs has raised over $90,000 to spread awareness on Kennedy’s Disease and was one of four Americans who spoke
to President Joe Biden on behalf of independent restaurant owners. He also helped raise $26.8 billion for the Restaurant Revitalization Fund and is actively involved in several charities like No Kid Hungry and Main Street Alliance. Jacobs intends on sharing his challenges and experience on “Top Chef” in his speech. “It was a crash course in tenacity, grit, and perseverance — all skills that are essential in
life, and that’s where the real growth happens,” Jacobs said. “Competing on the show was proof to myself that my disability doesn’t have to limit or define my potential.” Senior class president Sam Mahlum said “[Jacobs] epitomizes the aspirations of so many Badgers — to do good in this world and to live lives of integrity and compassion.” Winter Commencement 2024 will be held on Sunday, Dec. 15 at the Kohl Center.
Evers warns against UW-Madison’s neutrality UW-Madison stustatements, says GOP doesn’t need a ‘daddy’ dent protests were larger in the 1960s and 1970s. Why? By Tomer Ronen FEATURES EDITOR
MARY BOSCH/THE DAILY CARDINAL
By Iain Chang SENIOR STAFF WRITER
Gov. Tony Evers expressed concerns about the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s institutional neutrality policy, discussed the gender divide in politics and shared his confidence in Harris’ handling of Israel’s war in Gaza ahead of the Nov. 5 election in an interview with The Daily Cardinal on Thursday. The governor is unsure of the impact UW-Madison’s recent neutrality policy will have on individual expression. UW-Madison announced their institutional neutrality policy in September, following criticism of previous statements from administration on Israel’s war in Gaza and the encampments last spring. But a spokesperson for UW-Madison previously told the Cardinal that the policy was not a direct response to these events. “The policy seeks to clarify when and how the university addresses issues with its institutional ‘voice,’ with the goal of limiting statements to situations when UW–Madison is directly affected,” John Lucas, a spokesperson for the university, told the Cardinal Tuesday. Evers said the university’s lack of discussion on particular topics may affect students’ willingness to participate in “robust,” non-disruptive conversations, something he feels is “healthy” for college campuses. “I think universities are places where all sides have an opportunity to discuss controversial things,” Evers said. Evers said it is up to UW-Madison and Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin to figure out how the policy impacts the university weighing in on uncertain topics, such as promoting civic engagement, but emphasized students should play a non-disruptive role in discussion as well. He also expressed doubt that the policy would discourage students from voting on campus.
“I’m a firm believer that we can resolve these things and talk about these things without people interfering with [others’] study or conversation,” Evers said. “I think conversations around difficult topics are really important.” The policy specifies it only applies to faculty speaking in their “official capacity” or on behalf of the university and makes clear that staff and students maintain the ability to discuss any topic as “private citizens” or “individual scholars.” Evers addresses the gender divide in politics, recent Mitch McConnell comments Leading up to the 2024 election, an October survey conducted by the New York Times and Siena College found that the gender gap between party preference has widened as women maintain their yearslong support for the Democrats while men move toward former President Donald Trump. Much of the gender divide is driven by young voters, with polls showing 69% of women ages 18 to 29 favoring Vice President Kamala Harris compared to 45% of young men. While the Harris-Walz ticket is talking about abortion rights, according to Evers, Trump and his running mate Ohio Sen. JD Vance haven’t, he said men, too, should care about women’s health care. “Reproductive health is as important to men as it is to women,” Evers said. “I am a male, and I think it’s really important that [Harris and Walz] talk about issues of reproductive health.” U.S. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell recently said the Republican Party has become “unrecognizable” from the Ronald Reagan era. Evers said it’s “sickening” how Tucker Carlson called Trump “daddy.” “We have people in the Republican Party assuming that Trump is actually somebody that we should put in the same category as
our fathers,” Evers said. “I can tell you young people that are Republicans, they don’t need another daddy. They need a good president.” Evers added young Republicans have the right to vote for whoever they want to, but said if they look closely at Trump’s proposals, they are “wrong headed.” Evers is confident Harris will address Israel’s war in Gaza Evers also reassured voters who may be hesitant to vote for Harris in the 2024 election after taking a similar policy stance on Israel’s war in Gaza as President Joe Biden. He said Harris and vice presidential running mate Tim Walz will be the “group to solve” conflict in the Middle East, calling them “great foreign policy people.” Around 32% of voters in UW-Madison-area wards voted uninstructed, a warning to the Biden administration that sending U.S. military aid to Israel and not pushing for a permanent ceasefire would lose him support among younger voters, a demographic he relied on in 2020 to win Wisconsin. “Clearly it’s not something that there’s an easy answer to, but my experience with both of them is that they’re going to be right on top of this,” Evers said. Since launching her campaign in July, Harris has publicly addressed Israel’s war in Gaza with more sympathetic rhetoric toward Palestinians than Biden but has not broken from the Biden administration’s stance on sending military aid to Israel. Voter turnout on college campuses is crucial for determining the winner of the 2024 Presidential election. Biden beat Trump in 2020 by around 20,000 votes, and there are more than 160,000 four-year students in the UW-System and Marquette University, according to Wisconsin Watch.
Since the 20th century, students at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have protested, most notably in 1967, when over 3,000 students banded together to rally on Bascom Hill in protest against The Dow Chemical Company. At its peak, last spring’s pro-Palestine encampment drew about 10% of that mark. The encampment — which demanded full divestment of all UW-Madison companies tied to Israel — failed to achieve its ultimate goal, and UW-Madison Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) has said no progress has been made on divestment. At an Oct. 21 SJP general body meeting, organizers discussed a lack of internal engagement. SJP declined to comment on this story. It’s not just a UW-Madison phenomenon. At the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, protesters barely showed up. A month later at August’s Democratic National Convention, organizers expected tens of thousands of activists to gather in Chicago — a number which would’ve surpassed that drawn by anti-Vietnam protesters in 1968. Instead the number was in the thousands, “fewer” than organizers had hoped. Ultimately, the DNC did not see a single speech addressing the pro-Palestinian side of the issue, and the Israel and Hamas have yet to reach a ceasefire, while over 40,000 Palestinians have died. Kacie Lucchini Butcher, director of the Rebecca M. Blank Center for Campus History, told The Daily Cardinal the reason for this may lie in direct impact. “With the war in Vietnam, people’s friends were dying,” Lucchini Butcher said. “I think there was a sense of urgency to those protests that made people feel as though they wanted to get involved.” Lucchini Butcher also thinks emerging media has changed the way we protest. In 1944, Lucchini Butler said, a group of students got together to protest the use of universityapproved private landlords. Students talked to their peers face-to-face and got the signatures of over 5,000 students, a third of the student body at the time. “Students don’t have those same opportunities to talk to each other,” Lucchini Butler said.
+ Protests page 2
“…the great state University of Wisconsin should ever encourage that continual and fearless sifting and winnowing by which alone the truth can be found.”