Student Veteran Says He Was Told to Avoid 'Touchy Subject'…of Saying the Pledge of Allegiance

Corey Shroeder served in the Army for more than six years, with tours in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

When he was elected to the University of Wyoming's student government in May, he quickly noticed something missing — while the student government rules allow for the reciting of the Pledge of Allegiance at the beginning of meetings, the pledge wasn't being said.

Shroeder brought the issue to the attention of the student government vice president Ricardo Lind-Gonzales, who told him, Shroeder said, that saying the pledge was a sensitive issue that could offend UW's international students.

Image via jacdupree/Flickr

“Multiple senators sat me down and said it was a ‘very touchy subject’ and ‘we don’t want to offend anybody,’” Shroeder told Campus Reform.

Shroeder was instructed to draft a bill if he wants the option of reciting the pledge at the beginning of meetings — a "long process" prospect, he said, that would likely be delayed by the school's “liberal standing committee.”

After the original article was published Tuesday, Lind-Gonzales responded to Campus Reform, saying that "[t]he pledge was not left off the agenda due to being seen as offensive” and that “[Shroeder] was in no way banned from reciting the Pledge of Allegiance at meetings."

According to Lind-Gonzales, the pledge's absence from student government meetings is merely a function of "rules and procedures" — in other words, no one's bothered to put it on the agenda.

Shroeder did not respond to a request for comment from TheBlaze.

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