To All Members of the Campus Community:
Education, and specifically higher education, is dedicated to preserving democracy. Storming the United States Capitol is not an act of free speech. It is not a protest – it is an attack. The participants are not protestors. They are not “special.” They are domestic terrorists. Live on television, on our cell phones, on our computers, we are witnessing terrorists trying to destroy the very foundations of our country. I strongly believe that we must condemn this attack and condemn those who are participating in it, along with those who encouraged it with their dangerous rhetoric.
President-elect Joe Biden referred to today’s events as an “unprecedented assault on the citadel of liberty.” He said, “The words of a president matter. … At best, the words can inspire. At worst, a president’s words can incite.” Biden’s words ring absolutely true. As I write this message to the Hornet Family, I fear that this situation has the potential to get worse before it gets better, especially if we do not speak for democracy and against what is happening in our nation’s capital. We do not know how today will end, but we do know that our country must and will move forward, move past this most ugly day.
Today’s work may have been interrupted by chaos, but Sacramento State’s work, and the work of all of us in higher education, will persist. We will endure; we will prevail. But we must do so with love, not with hate.
