Everyone’s least-favourite anti-gay gun activist receives the university welcome she deserves
Hundreds of Ohio University students had flocked to see Kaitlin Bennett, raising their iPhones up high and scrambling in the crowds to get a clear look of her.
But this was not quite the reaction that Bennett, a pro-gun, Trump-supporting, right-wing activist, had pictured.
Throngs of teens packed the college in Athens, Ohio, Monday to hurl insults, cups of water, toilet paper and obscene gestures in a protest against her.
Bennett branded the protest a “riot”, a claim countered by campus police.
The NRA poster girl, 24, catapulted into the public eye after open-carrying an AR-10 rifle after graduating from Kent State University. A totally normal thing to do.
Bennet, regularly armed with a microphone and video camera, often swings by universities to film her video series Liberty Hangout. She interrogates students on issues she seems to have no idea what they are, such as trans rights.
What happened with Kaitlin Bennett?
Kaitlin Bennett, joined by pro-Trump activist Joel Patrick, stirred controversy at the campus as countless students protested against her presence, footage uploaded by the activist and students showed.
The pair drove into the university grounds only to be greeted by hundreds of protesters.
https://twitter.com/KaitMarieox/status/1229629343179182082
Animosity towards the conservative pundit radiated across the campus, as hundreds packed the walkways to allegedly throw hot and cold beverages in her direction and rolls of toilet paper.
Some footage showed students screaming “no one f***ing likes you” as well as chanting “where’s your diaper?”, a reference to the time the anti-abortion activist reportedly “pooped her pants”.
Thoroughfares were so clogged by the demonstrators that Bennett can be seen unable to move around as the students rally: “Go home!” Her security is forced, at one point, to pick her up to get her out of the bellowing crowds.
https://twitter.com/romanoffangel/status/1229560215865085953?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fd-14611956892005257939.ampproject.net%2F2002112037430%2Fframe.html
In one of the university buildings, she plastically waved at protesters as many proudly yelled: “F*** you, get out!”
when gungirl comes to OU lolol (warning: I’m loud af) pic.twitter.com/lubcpT5Puk
— Sarah Squance (@sarahsquance) February 17, 2020
It was not a ‘riot’, university police say.
Back inside the truck, in one clip, Patrick, drenched in pro-Trump clothing, shouts “You don’t understand her!”
A student then appeared to splash their water thermos onto the car, prompting Patrick to honk the truck horn and book it off the premises.
In an online statement released by Ohio University Police, they said that there was strong language and “allegations that some unknown person(s) in the crowd splashed with water”. No injuries were recorded by police, neither was anyone arrested.
Please see the attached statement regarding a protest incident today on the @ohiou Athens campus. pic.twitter.com/NigbKBf077— OhioUniversityPolice (@oupolice) February 17, 2020
Yet, the university sought to tamp down outrage by establishing that there was no riot, assuring that officers were present throughout the incident.
Moreover, the statement continued, no officers asked any demonstrators to leave the campus.
A statement that Bennett accused them of lying about.