(“Conservative affirmative action” tries to live down John Eastman — Promoted by Colorado Pols)
Prof. Todd Zywicki teaches Conservative Thought & Policy at CU Boulder’s Benson Center, a position previously held by John Eastman.
Last month law professor Todd Zywicki spoke at the Steamboat Institute’s Freedom Conference, an annual gathering of conservative pundits and professionals that has veered further right in recent years. David O. Williams previewed the event for the Colorado Times Recorder.
Before launching into his speech criticizing America’s higher education system as overly woke, Zywicki listed two universities for which his critiques did not apply, both of which pay him. The first is George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia Law School where he typically teaches. The other, CU Boulder, is where he is currently employed by the Benson Center as its Visiting Professor of Conservative Thought & Policy, a position best known for previously being held by indicted Trump attorney John Eastman, aka “co-conspirator #2.”
“I only can talk about for 20 minutes and in that time I’m going to diagnose and solve all the problems of higher education,” said Zywicki. “So I’m going to oversimplify and paint with a broad brush to point out the general trajectories. I want to specifically make two exceptions: first my home institution: the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason. I’ve dedicated my career to them because they don’t fit a lot of the trends that I’m going to talk about here. “I also want to talk about the reception up at CU, how gracious that has been, in particular the support that the chancellor of the university has shown for the Benson Center, and his enthusiasm for when I met with him.”
On July 11, just a month after taking the Benson Center job, Zywicki defended Eastman’s “alternate elector” plan for Georgia as “reasonable, proper and lawful” in an “expert declaration” that lawyers presented to prosecutor Fani Willis on behalf of one such Georgia “elector” and co-conspirator, David Shafer.
The day after the Jan. 6 insurrection, which began in part with Eastman’s speech to the crowd, CU Chancellor Phil DiStefano decried Eastman’s involvement and values, but declined to fire him.
“[Eastman’s] continued advocacy of conspiracy theories is repugnant, and he will bear the shame of his role in undermining confidence in the rule of law,” DiStefano wrote. “He has embarrassed our institution. CU Boulder is committed to the free exchange of ideas and the pursuit of knowledge, and Professor Eastman has contributed nothing of value to support the ideals of either the Benson Center or CU Boulder.”
