Multiple emails sent to students in the days after President Donald Trump’s inauguration show that a public university in Salem, Massachusetts, has shown support for a number of controversial issues that have been pushed back by executive orders from the Trump administration in recent weeks. These include protecting illegal immigrant students and gender identity.
Christopher Macdonald-Dennis, Vice President of Diversity and Inclusion at Salem State University (SSU), sent an email to all of the students two days after Trump took office about “Moving Forward Together” in light of the changes in Washington, D.C., according to a story in Campus Reform.
“While the unknown can be quite unsettling, please know that we remain there for each of our community members regardless of their identity,” he wrote. “Whatever is happening outside of our campus, we remain committed to the principles of inclusion and belonging here at Salem State.”
It was also said by Macdonald-Dennis that Salem State would “partner with our state university sister schools” and keep an eye on how the new executive orders from the Trump administration would affect the school.
Campus Reform got another email from SSU General Counsel Rita Colucci to students on January 29. In it, she talked about school rules related to law enforcement and immigration law.
“Salem State University (SSU) is committed to ensuring a safe and welcoming environment for our students, faculty and staff,” she said. “We know that the recent news and chatter on social media about the law that President Trump signed has made people wonder how SSU defends our community. This is especially true when it comes to privacy and dealing with outside officials like police or immigration offices.
In his message, Colucci told students what to do if they are approached by “unfamiliar law enforcement personnel on campus.” He said they should say no to any questions the officers might ask.
“University police do not have the authority to enforce civil immigration law,” she told them again. She also said that they would not stop or detain people to enforce civil immigration laws like documentation status, ask about someone’s immigration status unless it was related to a crime, arrest or detain someone, or hold or transfer people to federal immigration agents without a warrant for arrest.
You can find “helpful” immigration tools like the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition, the National Immigration Law Center, United We Dream, and Greater Boston Legal Services in the message.
Corey Cronin, a spokesperson for Salem State University, said that the school is still committed to its purpose and core values and wants to serve all of its students.
“We will follow Federal and Massachusetts laws as they apply to our campus,” Cronin told us. “We are collaborating with our sister state universities and are awaiting further guidance from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.”
Campus Reform also got official “Know Your Rights” rules for dealing with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and gave them to SSU students. They also got other “Immigration Resources” and “Gender, Sexuality, and Reproductive Health Resources.”
We got a “LGBTQIAP+ Awareness & Authentic Allyship” PowerPoint from Campus Reform that talks about different sexual orientations, including lesbian, gay, bisexual/biromatic, transgender, queer, and questioning. It also talks about words like “allosexism,” “androgyne,” “biphobia,” “cisnormativity,” and “heteronormitivity.”
The “neutrois,” “polyamorous,” “pony,” “twink,” “two-spirit,” and “ally” flags are just a few of the LGBT flags shown in the slideshow.
The slideshow also talks about some of the problems that the LGBTQ+ community faces, such as violence and discrimination, as well as heteronormativity, which is defined as “oversaturation of heteronormative perspectives in the media, education, medical field, and policies.”
“Transphobia, homophobia, and biphobia can be more pronounced in certain regions and against specific subgroups within the LGBTQ+ community,” the slideshow says. “Many intentionally move away from using terms like ‘transphobic,’ ‘homophobic,’ and ‘biphobic’ because they inaccurately describe systems of oppression as irrational fears.”
In his first few hours in office, Trump signed a number of executive orders that targeted federal diversity and transgender programs. One of these orders made it clear that the government only recognizes two sexes, male and female.
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