Trinity College removed flags supporting first responders, including an American flag with green, blue, and red stripes, and a “Don’t Tread On Me” flag and an American flag. Roommates Luca Turco and Finn McCole noticed two women had suddenly appeared outside their dorm with a ladder and started tearing down the roommates’ “Don’t Tread on Me” and American flag-supporting first responders that were hung outside their windows.
Video posted by Libs of Tik Tok shows staff member Veronica Hills climbing a ladder and ripping the flags off the outside of Turco and McCole’s dorm at the college in Connecticut’s capital.
.@TrinityCollege forcibly removed a student’s “don’t tread on me” American Flag and a red, blue, and green line flag. Meanwhile pride flags are allowed to stay hanging. pic.twitter.com/AG892oaRyv
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) October 31, 2022
When the roommates asked why she was taking the flags down, Hill said the Dean’s office ordered their removal, and stated, “You are directed to take it down.”
McCole noted, “The two women basically showed up at our door and said, ‘we have official orders by the dean to remove [the flags].’ So we asked for clarification. We said, what’s the rule? … there’s flags all over campus.” Hill was angry the students were recording her, exclaiming, “Put your phone away.”
“Absolutely not,” Turco said. “I have every right to record. This is America we have the First Amendment right of freedom of speech, freedom of expression.”
Hills told another college staffer, Susan Salisbury, to call campus security. Salisbury is seen near the end of the video recording the encounter.
Meanwhile, students were allowed to keep up transgender flags and pride flags celebrating LGBTQIA rights.
Once the flags had been taken down, Hill tried to leave with the flags despite both roommates asking for them back. At first, Hills declined to give the flags back, saying “They’re going to go to the dean’s office.” But she eventually relented and gave them back after Turco accused her of stealing his property.
Additional photos show the university sent out an email four days later to students requesting all flags to be taken down.
In response- Trinity reportedly sent out this email today telling students they can’t hang things outside their windows. However, the student involved sent me this photo today- transgender flags are still allowed to hang proudly. pic.twitter.com/fu1hsNZ5o7
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) November 1, 2022
The Philadelphia-based Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) sent a demand letter to the college on Nov. 1 in response to the email. While FIRE acknowledged that Trinity is a private institution and thus “not bound by the First Amendment,” it said the college’s viewpoint-discriminatory flag removals “is a clear violation of students’ expressive rights” under their contracts with the college.
“The removal of some flags but not other similarly sized and positioned flags is viewpoint-based,” FIRE argued. “When authorities target’“not subject matter but particular views taken by speakers on a subject, the violation [of expressive rights] is all the more blatant.’” FIRE asked Trinity to “clarify” to students and staff that the university will not create policies that discriminate based on viewpoint and not “resort to institutional censorship.”
FIRE later said, “By choosing to only remove conservative flags from dorm room windows while other flags remained up, Trinity appears to be selectively enforcing its policies to censor certain views. This is not acceptable at a college that promises students broad expressive rights, as Trinity does.”
