Students mocked Texas Gov. Rick Perry during an appearance Sunday at Dartmouth College.
The Republican discussed border security, energy policy, and foreign policy in prepared remarks to about 100 students before opening the event up for questions, reported The Dartmouth.
Emily Sellers, a senior, asked the failed GOP presidential candidate if he would have anal sex in exchange for $102 million in campaign contributions.
Perry deflected the question without answering, students told The Daily Caller.
First-year student Timothy Messen then confronted Perry over his remarks comparing homosexuality to alcoholism.
“They were phrased in incredibly insulting ways, and I’m horrified,” said Michelle Knesbach, president of the College Republicans. “We allow people to ask policy-driven questions, but when they’re phrased in an insulting manner, we try to avoid that, because it just detracts from the overall political discourse we can have on campus.”
Ben Packer, a sophomore who wrote and distributed the list of explicit questions, told the student newspaper that Perry’s views were more insulting than the questions.
“People that are opposed to this act are opposed to it because they think that it hurts their political discussion,” said Packer, who claims he is neither a Democrat nor Republican. “I think the desired effect was to point out that their political discussion is not meaningful.”
During the event, Perry said the recent midterm elections offered an opportunity for Republicans to regain the trust of Americans.
“I think that may have been what the message was Tuesday to the Republican Party (was), ‘Lord, if you’ll just give us one more opportunity to govern, we won’t fritter it away this time,’” Perry said.
The head of the College Democrats said the questions were “disappointing” and said he did not condone the students’ behavior.
Event organizers discovered the list of questions as they were distributed, and Packer said they dampened the reception by insisting students act politely during the question-and-answer session.
“The questions - they’re funny, right? I think they’re funny,” he said. “I think a lot of people think that they’re funny, but since the event had control over the framing of the questions, nobody in the audience laughed. They booed.”
November 15, 2014 7:56 AM
