Pence to speak at Notre Dame graduation, sidestepping debate over President Trump
The University of Notre Dame announced Thursday that Vice President Mike Pence would speak at its graduation in May, ending months of speculation and campus protests over whether it would invite President Donald Trump to deliver the commencement address.
Four of the last six presidents — Barack Obama, George W. Bush, Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter — accepted Notre Dame’s invitation in their first year in office to deliver the commencement address and receive an honorary degree. Some Notre Dame students, anticipating that the nation’s most prominent Catholic school would ask Trump to do the same, launched a petition in December asking the Notre Dame president, Rev. John Jenkins, not to do so. They argued Trump’s words and actions were antithetical to the values and mission of the school.
The petition was signed by thousands of Notre Dame students and faculty members, and there have been protests on the campus in South Bend, Ind., including one Monday, in which students demanded to know what the university was going to do.
But many other students and alumni wanted the university to follow tradition and invite the president to speak in his first year, saying it would be an honor to have the country’s leader address graduates.
“It goes beyond politics. It is not an endorsement of policy, it is an engaging of the office and showing respect for it,” said Dylan Stevenson, 22, a senior and vice president of the Notre Dame Republicans. “Simply because Donald Trump has said things that some might consider a bit off color, I don’t think that’s just grounds for not inviting him.”
But Mylan Jefferson, 21, a senior and co-chair of a student diversity council, was opposed to inviting Trump.