Catholic college alumni protest DeVos speech

AVE MARIA — A group of alumni from a conservative Catholic university wants the Florida school to rescind an invitation to Education Secretary Betsy DeVos to speak at the school’s graduation, citing rollbacks she has made to programs aimed at protecting civil rights and the disabled.

Some 36 graduates of Ave Maria University are protesting the secretary’s scheduled speech at the May 5 ceremony. University President Jim Towey said he will not rescind the invitation and that he supports DeVos’ positions. Towey served as President George W. Bush’s office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives.

The protesters oppose DeVos’ revisions to regulations governing how schools deal with people with disabilities and her cuts to the Education Department’s civil rights office, saying her appearance “casts the University in a pointedly partisan light.”

“A liberal arts institution, especially one of a Catholic character, must be free of political indoctrination to be the proper marketplace of ideas for its members,” the letter reads. Furthermore, the alumni wrote, “Mrs. DeVos’s policies are callous and unjust towards marginalized persons.”

“Jesus identified with marginalized people. We should give love and compassion to those people,” said Matthew Barry, a Sarasota attorney who helped write the letter.

Ave Maria University was founded in 2003 by Tom Monaghan, the founder of Domino’s Pizza.