The University of Southern California valedictorian who was barred from delivering a commencement speech while accused of promoting antisemitic rhetoric has doubled down on her views.
“I stand by exactly what I stand by,” Asna Tabassum told KABC-TV Wednesday of the views that led to her ban. “It is the very values and the very lessons USC taught me that I stand by.”
The biomedical engineering major with a 3.98 grade point average spoke to the Los Angeles station after her speech was shelved due to “security” fears after she was accused of promoting “anti-Semitic and anti-Zionist rhetoric.”
University officials made the about-face after several on- and off-campus groups complained that the brainiac, who minors in resistance to genocide, “openly promotes antisemitic writings.”
“It has been a roller coaster, and I would say that’s the best way to describe it,” Tabassum said of the sudden snub. “It’s a very unstable set of feelings and emotions.”
“And I don’t believe it’s ironic for me to minor in something called resistance to genocide, and then speak out on it and then be revoked because I’m penalized for something that people have an issue with.”
Andrew Guzman, provost and senior vice president for academic affairs at USC, said Monday that allowing Tabassum to address her fellow graduates would present “substantial” security risks.
“The intensity of feelings, fueled by both social media and the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, has grown to include many voices outside of USC and has escalated to the point of creating substantial risks relating to security and disruption at commencement,” Guzman reportedly wrote in a statement.
Trojans for Israel Vice President Ella Echo objected to the planned speech because the senior “calls for the abolishment of the state of Israel, which is complete anti-Semitic, and that makes us Jewish students at USC feel unsafe, unheard, and targeted,” according to the article.
Guzman did not cite objections to Tabassum’s activism in his statement, saying the move was “necessary to maintain the safety of our campus and students.”
Colleges and schools across the US had been torn by Israel’s war against Hamas following the terror group’s Oct. 7 attack, which had inflamed antisemitism and reignited free speech debates as many students and teachers voiced their support for Palestine to achieve sovereignty as the humanitarian crisis in disputed territory worsened.
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