Lansing — Gov. Gretchen Whitmer will speak Sunday during a Women’s March rally at Michigan State University, where student organizers decided to proceed with the…
Lansing — Gov. Gretchen Whitmer will speak Sunday during a Women’s March rally at Michigan State University, where student organizers decided to proceed with the event despite concerns over allegations of anti-Semitism by leaders in the national movement.
Sexual assault awareness will be a key theme of the MSU event in the wake of the Larry Nassar scandal “and the treatment of sexual assault survivors by now former-President John Engler,” said Debbie Miszak, a 19-year-old sophomore and lead organizer for the march.
Engler resigned as the university interim president late Wednesday after a series of controversies, including the former governor’s comment to The Detroit News editorial board that Nassar victims were “enjoying” the spotlight.
Whitmer will headline a roster of speakers that includes state Reps. Leslie Love and Sherry Gay-Dagnogo of Detroit, as well as a Nassar victim and a representative from MSU’s Jewish Student Union.
Student organizers are inviting residents from across the Lansing region after a statewide rally held at the Michigan Capitol the past two years was moved to Detroit. That event is scheduled for Saturday at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History.
„Disgusting” anti-Semitic claims by national Women’s March leaders and their ties to Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan have roiled activists in the larger movement that began in 2017 following President Donald Trump’s election, Miszak acknowledged.
