Flordia Tech, DEI and Rick Addante’s Fight | S.O.S. #239

A university president tells faculty to “keep doing what you’re doing” on DEI and critical race theory—just don’t get caught. That’s the moment Dr. Rick Adante, a cognitive neuroscientist and NASA analog mission lead, decided to blow the whistle. What follows is a rare, unvarnished look at how policy theatre and word swaps can allegedly shield millions in federal and state funds while undermining the very laws and standards meant to protect students, researchers, and the public.

We walk through Rick’s path from a turbulent childhood to leading-edge work with NASA’s HERA and NEEMO missions, where merit and team performance are non-negotiable. He explains how DEI shifted from stopping discrimination to empowering it, why “diversity of what?” is the only honest starting point, and how institutions can weaponize language—changing course titles and catalogs—while preserving the same outcomes in practice. With Supreme Court rulings narrowing race-based admissions and executive orders tying compliance to funding, the stakes are no longer theoretical. They are legal, operational, and ethical.

You’ll hear the mechanics of an alleged “comply in secret” plan, the risks of decoupling selection from merit, and the downstream impact on defense research, GI Bill dollars, and military training. Rick describes refusing hush money, losing his tenured position, and gaining momentum as donors, journalists, and policymakers take notice. His message is blunt and hopeful: enforce the law, audit for real compliance, define diversity in terms that improve performance, and reward excellence with transparency. Courage is a muscle; use it daily so it’s strong when it counts.

If this conversation challenged you—or clarified the stakes—share it with a colleague, leave a review, and subscribe for more candid, evidence-driven episodes. Your voice helps bring sunlight to the places that need it most.

The stories and opinions shared on Stories of Service are told in each guest’s own words. They reflect personal experiences, memories, and perspectives. While every effort is made to present these stories respectfully and authentically, Stories of Service does not verify the accuracy or completeness of every statement. The views expressed do not necessarily represent those of the host, p

Chapters

• 0:00 Opening And DEI Framing
• 1:55 Guest Intro And Credentials
• 3:36 Early Life, Trauma, And Resilience
• 10:30 Wrestling, Academia, And Purpose
• 14:20 NASA Missions And Space Psychology
• 21:30 Transition To Florida Tech
• 24:55 What Changed In DEI Over Time
• 31:20 Equity vs Equality And Merit
• 36:40 Classroom Anecdote And Speech Boundaries
• 41:30 Inclusive Of What? The Semantics Trap
• 47:20 Policy Shifts And Supreme Court Context
• 54:10 The April 4 Meeting: “Don’t Get Caught”
• 1:00:40 Playing The Tape And Reaction
• 1:05:30 Why Academic Leadership Failed
• 1:11:00 Whistleblowing Path And O’Keefe
• 1:16:45 Retaliation, Tenure, And Firing
• 1:23:00 Hush Money Offer And Refusal
• 1:28:30 Momentum, Mar-a-Lago, And Next Steps
• 1:34:20 DEI In The Military And Compliance Gaps
• 1:40:00 Calls To Action And Closing Reflections

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:01

DEI, what is it? Well, that is the million-dollar question. It depends on who you talk to, because unfortunately, this issue has become politicized. And it should have never been politicized because who doesn't want us to be diverse? But unfortunately, it has become an issue that the people who are left of aisle, left of the aisle, seem to support. And then the people on the right have decided to speak out against. But what does it really do in the professional community? What does it do to the military? What does it do in academia? And today we're going to talk about what it did to Rick Adente. Rick, how are you doing today?

SPEAKER_09: 0:41

Doing great. Thanks for having me on the show.

SPEAKER_01: 0:43

Well, thank you so much for agreeing to come on the show. I watched your broadcast with James O'Keefe, who is a very well-known whistleblower and someone who celebrates whistleblowers. And I was so impressed by your interview that I knew I wanted to have you on. And I also knew that I wanted to bring the DEI issue to the Stories of Service podcast. We've had a lot of discussions on LinkedIn about DEI, and now we're really going to get into why I have evolved to think that the DEI mindset or policies are actually harmful. And not only harmful to the military, but harmful in any democracy. So with that, welcome to the Stories of Service Podcast. Ordinary people do extraordinary work. And I'm the host of Stories of Service, Teresa Carpenter. And as we always do to get these shows started, you will hear an introduction from my father, Charlie Pickard.

SPEAKER_00: 1:35

From the moment we're born and lock eyes with our parents, we are inspiring others. By showing up as a vessel of service, we not only help others, we help ourselves. Welcome to SOS Stories of Service, hosted by Teresa Carpenter, here from ordinary people from all walks of life who have transformed their communities by performing extraordinary work.

SPEAKER_01: 2:00

And Dr. Adante has earned a PhD in neuroscience at UC Davis as a pre-doctoral fellow of the American Psychological Association, then completed a postdoctoral fellowship in neuroimaging with the University of Texas at Dallas. He was a recipient of the National Research Service Award from NIH and a fellow of the Psychonomics Society, in addition to serving as an associate editor of several academic journals and an aircrew pilot in the United States Air Force Auxiliary. As a cognitive neuroscience, his research work discovered a new kind of human memory and found that memory is predicted by prior brain activity. He has also been a mission specialist at the NASA HERA mission and a principal investigator of NASA missions investigating astronaut cognition. He's been recognized with the Young Alum Award of UC Davis, Faculty Mentor Award from Cal State University, and featured on major news networks such as NPR, in addition to being honored with the Citizen Journalism Foundation's Award for Courage at Mar-Lago. And this is what we're going to talk about tonight after revealing 60, I'm sorry,$76 million in fraud upon the federal government by universities. And after 25 years in academia and serving as a tenured professor at the psychology at Florida Tech. He now serves on the Board of Advisors for STARS, which is a wonderful organization, uh Stand Together Against Racism and Radicalism in the services, and is a founder and CEO of Space Psychology, LLC, and Neurocog Analytics. How are you doing again, Rick?

SPEAKER_09: 3:31

I'm doing great. Thanks for the kind introduction.

SPEAKER_01: 3:34

Absolutely. So I always start off these podcasts with everyone with where were you born and raised, and what got you down the path of your first career?

SPEAKER_09: 3:46

Sure. So uh first I uh I'll apologize if my screen is slow. I see it's slow on my side. So uh if there's any sort of technical glitches, just let me know.

SPEAKER_01: 3:57

I will, I will. We can hear you just fine. And and it is a little bit of slow from from the motion standpoint, but I think I think we can see you and we can hear you, and I think that's what's most important.

SPEAKER_09: 4:06

All right, terrific. So I grew up, uh I was born in outside of Chicago, Illinois, in a small in a suburb out there, and raised there for about 16 years. Um, had kind of a pretty tumultuous childhood, uh handful of different uh challenges growing up, and uh it got to the point to where when I was 16, I basically left home and effectively had to run away to uh basically escape a pretty abusive home at the time um from my dad. My mom had left six about six years earlier. I hadn't been allowed to see or talk to her at that time. And uh we had been raised at that up until that point by her as a single mom in in Chicago areas public housing, and then uh she decided to start a new family and uh dropped us off at our our dad's business and uh went to a different state. And so uh at 16 I left my dad's, uh, which wasn't the best place for uh us at that time, and and basically set out and found her in New Jersey and started over again. Um within about a year or two, uh I was uh captain of the wrestling team, um Dean's list, was a recruit at Princeton University for their wrestling team. Uh ended up wrestling for four years at the College of New Jersey, about 15 minutes down the road from Princeton. Uh was a four-year letterman, ended up winning the award for the top psychology student in the university, won the John Andition Award for um truth, courage, integrity that they give to one student in the college. Uh and um yeah, went to graduate school, was a head coach of a high school wrestling team in between, and uh yeah, so a little bit of New Jersey, uh Chicago kind of blend.

SPEAKER_01: 6:07

But how did you find all this success when everything was so tumultuous? And and you didn't even mention it. You mentioned it on the James O'Keefe show. I mean, you also went to court and had to testify and did all you basically were a whistleblower at the age of 12. And I I'm fascinated how you went down such a good path early on.

SPEAKER_09: 6:32

Well, I wasn't on such a good path early on. I was getting in some trouble too, but you know, because that was really difficult. But I was the oldest of what it turns out to be seven kids. I didn't know about all of them at the time, and some of them came a little bit later, but I was always kind of very at a very early age, I was thrust in sort of into a role of a parental child. So I had a lot of responsibilities that were either put on me or that I kind of chose to take in looking out for my younger siblings and protecting them from some of the abuses that we were subjected to for you know, basically going back to about seven years old. And so, you know, that was something that you know, I I alluded it to it on the O'Keeffe show and then again on on Dave Rutherford's show. But like when when you learn right and wrong at such a young age, the hard way by which I mean you learn what's right and wrong because you're the one who's suffering because other people are doing the wrong thing while you're begging them to do the right thing. And I mean, you know, people all throughout systems, judges, guardians at Lightham, child reps, attorneys, parents. I mean, I I learned when you see when you see what happens when good men do nothing, or when bad men do something, and good men, um it's a crystallizing experience, or at least it was for me. And so that you know, that dovetailed with you know a lot of traumatic events, I would say that that was happening during that period. Um as I switched between you know different parents' houses, uh, different years in my life, neither of whom were particularly uh great for us at the time. But you know, I I've I I try to look back now as a father myself, you know, almost twice the age as they were when they had me. So I I I try to give a little bit of grace in retrospect, but it really wasn't um a very good situation. And so I think that prepared me to understand a clearer compass for ambiguity than many people get to kind of clarify at during their youth. And you know, um, my mom had done a great job in kind of helping me to see in development what's right and wrong and the importance of doing it and developing and kind of coaching that courage at different times. Um to where, yeah, at later later points in life, I had I had to testify to to help my younger siblings in court from having the same kind of situations imposed on them that was you know pretty negatively imposed on me. And that was gratifying, but uh it wasn't an intentional pathway. That was something that I actually kind of built my career to avoid. You know, I I could have gone down the road of being a lawyer or you know, a law enforcement or or something along those lines. I I was a psychologist, a neuroscientist instead, something that I thought would have no real overlap towards that application. But the way it ended up shaking out was, you know, God's hand in Providence, you know, has you kind of operate as as the instrument of his will. And it brought me back to to that situation where I was able to actually help uh by virtue of simply telling the truth.

SPEAKER_01: 10:02

Right. Right. So you are, um, just so you know, we talked about it earlier from a technical standpoint. You are a little bit, you can see kind of like you're skipping a little bit. I don't know if that's the connection on your end or if there's anything you can do. If you can't, there's don't worry about it. One thing that some of my guests do, and we we always work these issues out in on live, and my audience is very patient with me about it, is you can try calling back on a phone, or um, if not, we can just we can just power through it. I can hear you just fine, which tells me my audience can hear you just fine, but there is just a slight delay, like you said.

SPEAKER_09: 10:38

Um, um, I'm happy to try calling back in in a second. Maybe that'll reset it, but um okay.

SPEAKER_01: 10:46

Why don't we just try that and then I'll go full screen and uh we'll we'll just pick this up in here in just one second.

SPEAKER_09: 10:52

Yeah, let's do it. I'll I'll be I'll be right back.

SPEAKER_01: 10:55

Awesome. And thanks guys for your patience. Sometimes that does happen. We have people who come in, they come in really, really clear at the beginning of the call, and then as we go through the call on the live chat, we'll see that they uh they they need to just reset and we go ahead and and and uh have give them a chance to do that, which I've always appreciated that the ability to do that. So let's try this again. Here we go. Uh let me see if I can get them back in. Give me one second, everyone. All right. You there, Rick?

SPEAKER_09: 11:31

Uh that yes, I am.

SPEAKER_01: 11:33

All right. I think you're kind of still the same, which is fine. Like I said, uh, the audience can hear you just fine. I can hear you. We already have a few people who are joining us live, so let's just continue on. So we we we were picking up to where you were in college, and you wrestled, you went to Princeton, and then where do you go next?

SPEAKER_09: 11:56

Uh well, I I ended up being the head coach of a high school wrestling team for a year. I founded that basically um I am fifth year in college. I thought I was gonna take a redshirt year uh from an injury, but I ended up wrestling through and then uh had no coaching open opportunity open locally there, whereby uh I didn't think I would actually be good at it. Like I was I was a very mediocre walk-on division three wrestler, and so I didn't think I'd have much to offer in terms of coaching. And uh when it was offered to me, it happened to be the day that one of my coaches from high school had died and in a really tragic um, you know, uh case of suicide. And you know, it kind of shook a lot of us in that community um a lot. And I kind of felt like the job being offered to me was an opportunity for me to continue his legacy and and kind of keep coaching and passing that knowledge on in a good way amid that tragedy and and almost sort of providential um because I wasn't really suited for the coaching thing. I hadn't thought about it too well, and I didn't think I was good for it. So ended up doing it. It was ended up being amazing. Our kids would win tournaments and and had a blast and do really, really good. And and um, so yeah, did that for a little bit and then got a full ride to graduate school at UC Davis and uh decided to to pursue that for neuroscience and started doing that, went out there and got on the triathlon team, started rehabbing some injuries, and uh kind of went went that pathway, which I'm happy to unpack more. There's a whole you know stories about graduate school and whatnot, but long story short, it worked out and uh they didn't kick me out. I didn't have to leave. I made some really cool discoveries and got my pilot's license, learned how to do some really cool scientific diving and uh really built the professional tools for public speaking, for scientific analysis, critical thinking, teaching, grant writing that you know paved the way as as you hope it would from graduate training for a uh successful career.

SPEAKER_01: 14:14

So I have some images here. So this image here I'll show it to the screen. Was this while you were there, or is this later on in your career? Is this more of the NASA stuff that we'll talk about?

SPEAKER_09: 14:23

That was a little bit later in the career. So that's the NASA NEMO mission, which stands for NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations. Uh and so that was about 10 years after I graduated. It I had an opportunity to be the principal investigator of these astronauts living and working underwater in that capacity for uh saturation diving for a simulation of space travel. Um, actually, the world's closest simulation for uh uh spaceflight because it includes real active danger, risk, and pressure, um, such as you know, living in diving in dangerous environments and living in confined environments as well inside the capsule. Uh, and that was a real honor and a blessing to have been a part of, uh absolutely fantastic team. And um, yeah, but it drew upon the training and diving that I had been able to learn while while in graduate school at UC Davis and integrated that with the the crew operations perspective that I had from working on the human exploration research analog or the Hera mission, where I was a crew mission, uh crew crew member at a John NASA Johnson Space Center. We lived in a capsule for a 45-day isolation and confinement study to understand the psychological elements of getting to Mars, coming home, how are we going to um optimize team dynamics, minimize threats to crew cohesion, teamwork, um psychology, all that kind of stuff. And and fast forward about another five or six years after that, when I was here at Florida Tech, one of the real honors in my academic career was having my students end up getting selected for that mission, too. Uh, so that was very special. Anderson Wilder did did a fantastic job, and and that was a real, real special thing because I think we're the only uh professor and student combination to have ever been selected.

SPEAKER_01: 16:21

Uh is this part of that where you did some of that kind of work here?

SPEAKER_09: 16:25

Yeah, that's at the that's at the NASA Human Exploration Research Analog. That's actually building nine at NASA Johnson Space Center. What you're looking at there on the uh the photos left is the a mock-up, a real-life mock-up of the International Space Station and all the patches of the different missions that have been on there. Uh, that was my my team of researchers that I had brought there from my laboratory to test the astronauts um going into the NEMHO mission. And so that was uh uh again, one of the highlights in my my career as a teacher was training my students up to where they do exactly what you hope to do as a teacher, which is to walk away and let them drive the car or fly the airplane. And I trained them up, we worked real hard for about a year, and then I brought them there, and it was their job to test the astronauts. And I just sat back a little bit prayerfully, just like any parent when you give them the keys of the car or the keys to the airplane, right? You you know, you're still kind of like paying pretty close attention. But you know, I I really had a lot of confidence and trust in them, or I wouldn't have allowed them to do that in in in such you know delicate situations where we were testing several astronauts, both from the European Space Agency, Chris Samantha Christoffaretti, who's a famous astronaut. She actually has a Barbie doll of herself that's out there. Uh uh, Jessica, of course, Watkins, and uh a handful of other crew members. This is a pretty special opportunity. I was really proud, really proud of the team there. That's Constance, Alana, and Rachel. Uh they did absolutely fantastic.

SPEAKER_01: 17:52

That's amazing. Absolutely amazing. And that's what's so neat about your career is that you started off in academia, then you went to NASA, then you went to Florida Tech. So you had this very uh, I would say, eclectic, and people say that about me too, because I went from fixing airplanes to being a surface warfare officer to being a PAO. So you've got you've done sort of the same thing. You sort of jumped around in in different positions. Why did you leave NASA to go to Florida Tech?

SPEAKER_09: 18:23

Well, that's a good question. So as it is, or as it were, uh, I don't know that I would say that I actually left NASA for that, but my my time at NASA was kind of passing. So they actually took me from academia uh uh in order to serve on the mission for the HARA mission. And then once that mission completed, it was actually uh able to go back to my job at the university. And when I did the NEMO mission, I was actually still working at the university by virtue of basically getting to deploy our research into the NASA mission. So, in some respects, I never really left academia until they fired me not too long ago this past summer. Uh, but uh I'm sure we'll get to that in a little bit. But um it was a really nice symbiotic relationship that NASA has with the university system, and that was one of the features when when I went to go do that isolation and confinement study, it worked out really well because it it matched with the academic calendar. So I didn't have to leave the university at all. Um, that stemmed basically from originally I was uh interviewing for the space program for the astronaut job. I was uh I think the first group of 10 in the 2017 class that interviewed out of 18,350, uh came close, no cigar, that kind of parlayed into the HARA mission. Uh the HARA mission kind of parlayed into the Nemo mission, but ultimately it was all kind of like piggybacking onto the position that I was holding at the time uh in academia working in the universities. And that kind of led to Florida Tech because after I did the the HARA mission and the Nemo mission, that was through Cal State San Bernardino. Uh, you know, I obviously I was pretty passionate about aerospace and psychology and neuroscience and the ways to integrate them. And I had a lot of really good ideas of technology integrations and research that can be done. And Cal State San Bernardino just wasn't well suited for that. Whereas Florida Tech at the time had a f had a flight school, had a psychology department, um, engineering departments. I ended up becoming an affiliate in the biomedical engineering department there. So like it was just a better suited way that was also nestled right down the road here from Kennedy Space Center. So uh it just made a lot of sense to kind of like grow in that direction and kind of you know bridge out from really what wasn't going to be available in San Bernardino. Um if you've if you've ever been there, it's a it's a beautiful area, but it's also kind of like the murder capital of California. So uh not the best place for like aerospace integrations with operational neuroscience and psychology to kind of thrive.

SPEAKER_01: 21:01

So you're in this scientific world, and I think James asked a similar question, but this is what's really so fascinating to me, where merit is is everything. And did you know early on in your academic career that this whole DEI thing was becoming what it was? Like, did you understand the Marxism roots of it? Did you because you're a researcher and you're a scientist, so I would think that you probably knew something about it, but what what was your experience with it leading up to what happened at Florida Tech?

SPEAKER_09: 21:36

Uh that's a great question. I mean, I think at times I've probably noticed, and other times I didn't, you know, there was I would I would note probably a couple like salient shifts that kind of happened. So DEI was kind of a modern manifestation of what became known as diversity, which kind of followed on the heels of affirmative action. And so they they they kind of meant different things at different times. And so I think there was a gradual morphing, and then as the saying goes, is like slowly and then all at once. And so what I observed over time was that there seemed to be this mission creep, as they say, where something that went primarily towards like what I thought was a pretty positive goal of like you know, ensuring that people aren't discriminated against became the tool by which discrimination was actually happening. And and that's a really different thing. You know, when when you're trying to protect all people from being discriminated against, I think that's a noble cause, but when you're kind of using a policy to advocate for some groups of people and not for others, you know, you get in some troubling waters that, you know, we've been informed by places like the Supreme Court, the Department of Justice's Office of Civil Rights, you know, that that's not just illegal, but it's immoral, it's unjust, and it's un-American because, you know, we need to be treating American citizens as our brothers and sisters, our community members, and that means not discriminating against anyone based on any protected class and and making sure that we put the best people in the best places so that our culture thrives and that that decision of you know selecting people or opportunities or grants or projects or however that manifests, that that's being done in a way that's not discriminatory, that's not um illegal effectively. And so I was a diversity fellow, as it turned out.

SPEAKER_04: 23:40

Uh yeah, during my during my predoctoral training.

SPEAKER_09: 23:44

I was a diversity fellow of the American Psychological Association while I was at UTC Davis, uh, won a National Research Service Award in that capacity from the National Institute of Mental Health. Um, but like I think it's a it's confused at times by a lot of people who who may mistake that you know diversity is not DEI. DEI is three different words abbreviated into three different letters. Diversity is only one of those, but when you start talking about the equity and making sure that you know you push any particular group of people forward while holding another set of people back, which is oftentimes the stated intent of such policies, um, if not the incidental uh consequence and outcome of it, of it's how it's implemented, then I think it really transitions from trying to help and protect people to having the effect of actually hurting people. And it hurts all people involved. So if like I said, I was a diversity fellow, and so one of the things that you know people don't always think about, but like you never know if are you getting a particular opportunity or a job because they they they wanted to hold it out for me because I was a diversity fellow or something like that. And and and and that doesn't always have the best psychological impact on a person who really ought to feel comfortable that they earned a position on merit rather than were given it uh a position or an opportunity for a reason other than they're deserving merit. Um you know, you end up things with imposter syndrome, you end up things with, you know, inferiority complexes or other things that's not fair to all the people involved. It's not fair to you know make people wonder why was it that I was selected for X, Y, or Z. The answer should always be it's because you're uh excellent for the position and a great fit. And no other reason but you're the best fit for the job.

SPEAKER_01: 25:51

Absolutely. And I think that what has happened in what I see in the landscape is that there are a lot of well-intentioned people who believe in DEI because they believe that it still is what we thought diversity was. Like you, I was a part of any diversity committee I could get on at any workplace I was on. I was like, this is great, this is inclusive as someone who doesn't always fit in in every group. I loved the idea that there'd be these committees that were uh committed to including everyone. And that's what I thought DEI was for the longest time. But it wasn't until I saw that it, like you said, started to lead to we're only choosing these people because of a particular protected class. And like you said, it doesn't just hurt the people that didn't get the job or didn't get the opportunity because they weren't in that class, it hurts the other people too, because then they have to, like you say, have to wonder if they got it because of the fact that they were a member of that group. So take me back. I don't know why I'm blinking a little bit here. Hold on a second. I'm just gonna put you on full screen while my camera decides to to have a little bit of a little bit of a misstep, but take me back a little bit to what happened initially uh at Florida Tech. Like what was sort of the backdrop that happened as you got into that position and started seeing the impacts of DEI.

SPEAKER_09: 27:32

Yeah, I mean, I guess, you know, we talked about how, you know, my intention in moving there and growing my career was because of the obvious integration in aerospace and biomedical engineering with the space program and my work in psychology and neuroscience. I think within the uh by about the first year there, I was asked to build the the world's first college degree program in space psychology, and I was excited to start building that. And then the you know the wheel started coming off because I found out that they had lied to me about a handful of things. It turns out they when they recruited me, they told me that they would be uh connecting me up with Buzz Aldrin, they have an Aldrin Space Institute there that we'd be collaborating on these programs. I'm like, I get there, I'm like, yeah, okay, let's get to work. And they're like, Well, actually, don't call him, he's suing us. Well, okay, well, why is he suing you? Well, it turns out we're using his name and he doesn't want us to, and he's got so like there was a big game switch, and then they tried to, you know, there were some, as it turns out, the dean who hired me was the dean who called the meeting that the O'Keefe meeting uh famously uh ended up having an expose of in trying to hide this DEI to cover up their defrauding of the federal and state governments on on these new DEI executive orders. Um and you know as time moved on, you know, uh trying to answer your question in terms of what happened there, but also in respect to the development of DEI sort of over time in academia, you know, like I saw it becoming something that people were using as a cudgel not to help people, but to hurt people too, to to advocate and push one group over another in ways that then, you know, as you as you fast forward it now, we've seen actually the findings from the Supreme Court. They said you can't do that. We've seen the rulings from the Office of You know, Civil Rights, from the Department of Justice. They say that's illegal, that's discriminatory, because it is. Now, I wasn't always thinking about it in that way because, you know, like you said, I think a lot of people grew up, you know, just wanting to make sure that we treat everybody fairly. And and who I hope everybody still wants to do that. I certainly do. And if you look at my track record, Record. It's like I said, I was a diversity fellow myself. I grew up in public housing in Chicago and earned my PhD as a diversity fellow. And then I I worked for like four or five years at like San Bernardino as a Hispanic serving institution. Everyone I trained and completely committed my efforts to were what people would think about was as say, you know, diversity students or whatever, but it's not how I thought about it. That's not how for a long time we didn't really think about these things. We just you treat people like human beings, and I didn't really have to see the world through the lens of the way that those policies kind of forced people to see the world through, which was the lens of race or other protected classes and this and that. And you started to see this development of you know, this Marxist ideology, this critical race theory, this intersectionality theories that is really pretty harmful. It's pretty anti-American because it really juxtaposes some sort of imaginary power structure uh in in perpetuity, uh holding some people back that then has to be theoretically overcome by an intentional um handicapping of uh other people so that other people can in theory catch up to achieve this equity, sort of that the the word alludes to. And so, you know, it's it's a really interesting sort of academic exercise to think about that equity facet because it was a very new development in culture, law, society that hadn't been around for a while. And you know, I'm a neuroscientist, so I don't I haven't always thought about those things, but like you know, equality in nature is very rarely like something that's good, you know. Um, you can't have equal sun and equal moon all day. Like the plants need sunlight, and other times it they need um moonlight or or or water, right? Like you don't have equal balances when you think of um like cellular bases of like an action potential, of uh you know, resting membrane potential, ionic balances, like very basic fundamental life-sustaining things are critically dependent upon non-equality, like non-equity of certain things that allow our cells to fire and keep us alive. So, like there's this, I think, a flawed fundamental premise that there's something inherently good about everybody having equity of outcome. Because I mean, you can't I'm I don't run as fast as Hussain Bolt, and I can't dunk a basketball as high as Michael Jordan can, and that's okay. Like, so what?

SPEAKER_01: 32:48

So, you know, I think that that became kind of like hijacked by, you know, unfortunately for political reasons, and it was used as a cudgel to to hold other people back and advance other people, and and and culture suffers from that when that I agree, and I also think that it's now in place in order to control the masses, and I think that that has shown itself to be clear because if you think that you're oppressed and you think that you are needing uh, there's that camera again. Here we go. If you think that you are needing some sort of protection from the government or protection, I mean not protection from from the government, like you need to go to them and say, I'm a protected class, people discriminated against me because I'm X, Y, and Z. Well, then now you're in this situation where you're not being dependent on your own. I I guess what I'm trying to say is it's it's not coming from you to try to fix your own problems. And I don't think I understood that in fully until I looked at it from the lens of oppressor and oppressed, and then who benefits by you feeling oppressed. Because if you feel oppressed, then you're a victim and you're not able to rise above that circumstance.

SPEAKER_09: 34:04

Yeah, although I would add, you know, from my point of view, maybe some nuance of like, I think, you know, almost one of the sole reasons of the existence of government is to make sure we are protected from becoming victims or compensated if we are. That that kind of keeps us away from like might is right and just the biggest, more power, most powerful mafia leaders like bullying us, right? Like we should make sure that we have protections in place uh from uh our rights being you know violated or taken away. But you know, I mentioned that in the respect of you know, like what happens when these things go awry as policies, even if intended from a good place. I'll give you an example. So I was teaching classes and I was teaching the Tuskegee Institute's um horrifying story of uh the 1930s, the National Institute of Health's predecessor uh secretly injected a bunch of uh sharecropper black men in Alabama with syphilis on purpose and didn't tell them that it was syphilis they were injecting them with. They lied to them and uh uh they just wanted to see, you know, essentially an experiment of what would happen to them. And they even continued the experiment, even though uh the men were horribly afflicted, and there was uh over time, longitudinally, a cure uh developed penicillin. They didn't tell them that they didn't and they let these men be victims uh for decades without even telling them about it. It was an absolute so I mentioned that because if you're if people aren't familiar with that study, it's an extraordinarily famous one. It's in every textbook, it's in every ethics training. It was it helped form the basis for things like informed consent and all these standard ethical frameworks that we have in science, biomedical science, um, medicine, all these kind of things. And so, anyways, so I'm teaching a class on research methods, and I'm teaching that story. It's in every because it's literally in the book. I'm teaching it. And I get comments from students aghast that I was teaching that, and and and a student asked a question of uh essentially about that experiment, like uh of why didn't they get treatment? Why didn't they just go get like treatment? I said, well, this was before treatment existed, but even when it did, like they lacked they weren't as privileged as you guys are in your college classes. Like these are they they you know these don't they don't have the privileges that you guys enjoy uh by virtue of that time and culture and society where they were. And the student was aghast because apparently they said the student wrote a comment that said she was a black lesbian and she was offended that I would question her privilege, which is like demonstrable. She she's at a sixty thousand dollar technical school in Florida with a free health clinic on campus, demonstrably different than like poor black sharecroppers in 1930s with no health funding, like fundamentally, like definitionally different in what you would think of as today as privilege. But the interesting part to what you asked about is what they said is they said the comment was like, Hare I say that as a straight white man, and that gets to the core point of the problem here, which is that we start defining different rules in culture and society of who can say what, and therein lies the control. Because if if I could have said it, if only for my gender and color and orientation, yeah, that's the problem. That's the only some categories or intersections of categories are able to say those things and teach those things, then you're right back into the state of nature where might is right, and it's not principle that rules the day, it's not truth that governs us and guides us.

SPEAKER_01: 38:30

We're in trouble. I mean, we're in trouble when when someone can do that, and if everybody can do that, well, then where does the truth even lie?

SPEAKER_09: 38:40

And well, there is no that's all it does is lie. It all it does is lie because there's no truth at that point. That's that's literally the heart of the matter, which is that they can that's where it's your thoughts and your words that are controlled because of the intention of really what they want to do is control you, your behavior. And and it's by controlling your thoughts and words by saying who's allowed to say what. Well, no, that doesn't work like that. Not in this country. I mean, that's why that's why we separated from England, that now we get to see how terrible England is in their speech laws, where you're literally you are truly not allowed to say certain things. You're you well while other people are, and and that's not that's not what we've had servicemen and women for for hundreds of years fight and die to protect us from having to be subjected to. They called that tyranny back in the day, and that is where it ends, is when some people can tell you what you can and can't say, can and can't think, can and can't do. That that is a core level of a problem of of the the contrast between liberty and tyranny. And you can't have categories that some people can say things in and other people's can't. Um because we don't look at people that way. That's a dehumanization of us as brothers and sisters in a community of citizens of the same nation. And you know, we there is no value in diversity of color. What we want is diversity of of ideas, of experiences, of things you've lived and bring to the table. But like, you know, diversity of melanin, diversity of of a gene that you didn't control before you were born, like that's not gonna be a determining factor of any good or bad outcome of a team, of a program, of of anything, because it's what you do in your life, it's what you do that makes the difference, the choices you make and the actions that you perform, that's not gonna be governed by the melanin that you inherited. And so that certainly shouldn't be governing what you're allowed to say and think or what job you can do or can't do. Like we need to be protecting people from that discrimination. That's what the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was all about was protecting people from the discrimination upon race and and subsequently, you know, gender and all the other protected classes. And it's really gone full circle and and and kind of eaten itself.

SPEAKER_01: 41:17

Um Yeah, it has. How do you think we and I apologize? I'm still trying to get my cameras to come back on and and hopefully uh I will have to keep you on full screen the whole time, but I might. Um but definitely want to unpack this because I think that it's so important that people understand the backstory of how we got here and why it's wrong, and then how you were able to take this philosophy and go, wait a minute, now the new administration is in place, they have instituted a policy at Florida Tech and all these other universities where this type of training and this type of indoctrination for critical race theory and other DEI-focused content isn't going to be permitted. But that's not how your college reacted, correct?

SPEAKER_09: 42:08

Yeah, exactly. Um, so okay, that's there's a lot packed in there. I'll try to unpack a little bit, but um uh let's see here. Yeah, so so just to kind of end note or end cap that last part, you know, the the element of you know, you know, your screen is off, but if my memory serves me right, and and and it may not, uh it's late and I have a one-year-old that's kind of stole my memory from me. But uh, you know, you have red hair. Is that right? I do.

SPEAKER_01: 42:35

Yeah, reddish brown, yes.

SPEAKER_09: 42:37

So like do you think you and I are gonna make better or worse teammates because I have brown hair and you have red hair?

SPEAKER_01: 42:44

Like it's not gonna make it's not gonna make one iota of difference.

SPEAKER_09: 42:48

So like do what if but what if we have a rule that says you know we need diversity, right? So you're you're you're you have red hair, so that will make my team a diverse cornucopia of a melting pot, and we'll do better because we'll have there and what I'm getting at, right, is like the false premise that there's no reason to think that you and I would have different perspectives, thoughts, skills, um team contributions because you're redhead and I'm not.

SPEAKER_06: 43:19

That's such a good point.

SPEAKER_09: 43:21

And so, you know, it could be the case, but it doesn't have to be. So that factor alone doesn't really matter. Um, and you could have a whole team of redheads or a team of blonde brunettes, black hair, red hair, and that could be an awful team too, because the things that govern what make us good and work together and effective and successful, it's not the color of your hair. Well, you know, the genes for governing your hair, your skin, like they're effectively the same. So, like, like when we say diversity, it's kind of being a semantic nerd here as an academic, but like it's half a sentence that's incomplete. What we what we need culturally, politically, legally is to say diversity of what? And that's not often provided in our semantic sentence. We just say diversity and we leave it open-ended, right? So that it can be used as a cudgel to to push any thing you want to push, redheads. Okay, like diversity, if it's an open-ended question, what we need to say is diversity of what? And then it gives us something to work with in having that conversation social culturally. Um, but like, you know, if if it's just you know, used as this wink and an odd word for like, you know, race or anything like that, like that's that's not helpful. And it's and and as we're flying finding out social culturally, it's actually had a boomerang effect and really has you know undermined the effort um that that that uh people might have wanted to pursue with with good intentions. So, you know, I would just add that part to like the diversity conversation, being a diversity fellow myself, which is that it really is very problematically anti-defined. That is, it's it doesn't allow the sentence to complete of what it is that's supposed to be different, right?

SPEAKER_01: 45:16

Well, and I think that that's also what the problem is with it altogether, is the fact that it is deceptively advertised as being inclusive, but then when it's being based on something, like you said, that has absolutely nothing to do with what's going to make a good teammate or what's gonna make a person the most qualified, it works against the very thing that it pretends to be advertising. But that's why I think a lot of people can't see through it.

SPEAKER_09: 45:46

And when you mentioned the inclusive part, I mean, this is a completely new construct for society. And in my recollection, over the last maybe 10 years or so, that that whole part of inclusivity has seemed to really um been added to our our you know, vernacular, the definitions, the the boilerplate policy. Um, and so again, I kind of look at that and it's worth thinking about. Well, inclusive of what? Like, what is it that's being inclusive? If you're being excluded from something, we already have there's already anti-discrimination laws on the books. Like, there's uh like if so, what I'm saying is people say this night all the time, right? Now that the cat the buzzwords they'll switch around is belongingness or inclusivity. And I'm like, well, why would you want to go to a place that doesn't make you feel like you belong? But also if you don't feel like what they're saying is like, so let's say Florida Tech, for instance, I had colleagues that say, Well, we need a belongingness committee. I'm like, well, then you're just saying that nobody makes you feel like you belong already. Well, why is that? Are they engaging in discrimination? If so, use the extremely powerful discrimination laws that are have been on the books and codified for since 1964, 1965, whenever this that Civil Rights Act was was put in place. So, like, like what is it that you're trying to do that's not already achievable? And why are we using these coded language and and euphemisms um you know as constructs? Like, so inclusivity, like I I mean, I don't know. Like, do I need to be included in my wife's sewing circle? Not really, right? Like, I don't know, like if they the like there's why does everyone have to be included into everything all the time? I don't know. Like, there's some spaces that you probably don't want me to be in. Correct. Like, like, like you have your private spaces that I don't have a right to be included in.

SPEAKER_01: 47:36

Like, like I wouldn't go and try to storm a men's Bible study, like and I wouldn't say, Oh, I I have a right to be at the men's Bible study. No, I I don't. If as citizens or as parishioners or whatever you want to call them, I want to start a women's Bible study, that's perfectly fine. But I don't get the right to just go into a men's Bible study and say, oh, well, it's only open to men, so I should have a right to get in there. And and that's where I feel like this whole thing has just morphed into something that it should have never been.

SPEAKER_09: 48:10

I would tell you to come on in, I'd be like, sure, like come to come to our meeting. I don't think you're gonna like it. Like, I think it's gonna be boring. I think it's I think you're gonna be I think you're gonna roll your eyes and you're gonna think it's lame, or it you know, like there's times it might really connect and you might really enjoy it. And I don't know, like, but like there's a part where like, you know, if you don't want me to come to your women's bible meeting, like I I I don't think I'd probably want to go, but if like you wanted to exclude me, okay, I guess like you know, but anyways, I think we're kind of getting off track a little bit. Um, but like, you know, what what ended up happening at Florida Tech that kind of intersected no pun intended with this DI stuff uh was that you know the American people have had an election for president and a new administration came in. And since time immemorial, this administration happened to have done what every administration did before them, which is change a few things.

SPEAKER_01: 49:14

Sure.

SPEAKER_09: 49:16

Sometimes we agree with it, sometimes we don't agree with it, sometimes we're happy, sometimes we're mad. Most of the time, people don't pay attention. This particular case, they issued some executive orders. These executive orders made it clear that anybody receiving federal funds is not supposed to be engaging in these kinds of activities that call DEI or critical race theory, precisely for the reason that it's been, you know, pretty demonstrably clear that they've been used as tools of discrimination against American citizens. And that is, you know, illegal. Um, all citizens are entitled to the government's duty to protect them from being discriminated against in any capacity, in education, in the workplace, hiring, all sorts of facets. And so they issue these these executive orders, and it was a real culture socket. And what I would say is it really kind of want to make sure I'm not sure I have my timeline exactly correct here, but um, I know it was very closely related to similar uh rulings that happened uh from the Supreme Court, where they overturned um longstanding uh findings uh from the court on affirmative action.

SPEAKER_01: 50:35

So, you know, I think that there was kind of like a cultural and psychological shockwave that was sent through the system because both I do know what you're talking about in academia, especially academia admissions. Didn't they have a Supreme Court ruling that happened last year? And I don't remember when it was, but it basically said that academia could no longer maybe it's only for pub ones that are receiving federal funds. I don't know how which is all of them, which is all of them, which you can't say, okay, we are only we're gonna give more preference to this protected class, we're gonna give more preference to this protected class. And my understanding was you could still do that at the military academies, but you couldn't do it on the college campuses that are civilian run, was was my understanding.

SPEAKER_09: 51:25

Broadly, you know, and and you know, uh, if my memory serves me right, it was a I think it was Students for Fair Admission, was one of the parties against Harvard or um one of the Harvard's um conglomerate schools, and so it it effectively fell uh as you described it, which was saying that Harvard was found to be using race uh as a determining factor for admission, which is illegal and prohibited. Um, they tried saying that it was justified by virtue of stereodicisis or the legal rulings of the past uh establishing that they could do it under the framework of affirmative action, but the court basically overruled affirmative action and effectively got rid of it, um, maybe through that case and maybe a few others. But the point being that in raising it here is that you know, I think it was a shockwave through the country in respect to their collective psychology and culture, which is that this is something that is affirmative action that like most people were raised to think was both legally uh correct, morally correct, and justified and proper. And they lived their life that way, they ran their businesses, they governed their universities that way because it was essentially the law of the land, and they also felt that it coincided with just moral principles, too. And I think that a little bit of salutary neglect had been happening where it got away from the intended purpose, like we've spent some time discussing today, and started being used in this wrong way, and now there's this new ruling that turns that upside down. So a lot of people sort of like psychologically didn't know how to handle that. I think you're right, you know, because if you think about it, just in all fairness, you know, it's like there's something that you think is morally right and legally right that you've been doing forever, and now you find out it's actually morally wrong and legally wrong. So what does that mean you've been doing forever?

SPEAKER_01: 53:39

Like well, and there's a lot of people that simplified it and said, Well, it's just giving somebody a leg up that would have never had it otherwise. Like there's a lot of people who would say to me, because I used to not believe in affirmative action either, and I was on the other side where I thought it was unfair. And I remember a lot of people would say to me, Well, Teresa, what about the person that didn't get all the opportunities that you got growing up and this and that, and that they had to start at a different point than you? And I say, Well, okay, but then what happens when that person gets to a particular position or they get into an institution, and now they're at such a disadvantage that, yes, they could probably keep up or they could probably catch where the other people are, but it didn't fundamentally solve the problem to begin with, which was okay, let's we have to go back further into our neighborhoods, we have to go back further into economic instability. We we can't we can't just fix the problem by giving somebody an advantage, it doesn't fix the root issue, and it just causes more issues. But what you're saying, Rick, is that it really fundamentally shook people to their core because there's a lot of people who still believe in it. And even today, I can tell you, I I got in hot water two or three years ago by suggesting that the White House press secretary was a diversity hire. I I think that it's I think based on this is the previous one under Biden, and I and I still believe that it's possible that she got her an advantage because of diversity. I don't know for sure, but I made that suggestion and I got attacked, attacked to the point where people were contacting my chain of command and really trying to get me in trouble for that. So it wasn't even a conversation that I could have.

SPEAKER_09: 55:33

I don't know much about the hiring of Korean Jean Pierre, but yeah, I think he just picked the wrong person because if you would have just said that Kamala was a vice was a diversity hire, you would have been right, because that's literally what the president of the United States described as the reason why he picked her was for the categories of protected class that she enjoyed of her race and gender. So by definition, she was picked essentially as what people refer to as a diversity hire. Like that was just I don't know, as the from their their words, that's just what they told us. But like in this kind of what I guess what I was getting to, right, is that is that fair to the vice president? I I I I don't think so, right? Like he never should have said that because now she could be the most qualified person in the world. I don't happen to think that she was, but she could have been, right? And instead, you've got half of the country completely, you know, you know, uh talking smack on her for a completely unnecessary reason and series of assumptions because the president who hired her said that's why he hired her. Right. So like that's it's a good illustration of that of that the problem to everyone involved. It's it's not a fair approach, and it's literally just picking winners and losers. And that's that's a dangerous that's a dangerous game to be playing of Russian roulette because sooner or later that Russian roulette is going to come back and we're gonna lose that game. If we're picking winners or losers, one of the days we're gonna be those who are picked to be the losers. And you don't want it's not it's not a just way to have a society, and ultimately that's that's really what the Supreme Court's um ruling said. They basically said, as noble of a principle as what might want to be pursued, racism is not the the cure for racism. You there has to be a better pathway. It's not the court's job to find out and to come up with the idea of what the better pathway is. But if the pathway is um, you know, using race to select people or or to using race to not select people, you know, that that can't be a way that we build good bonds as a culture and community with the citizens that should be our friends and our neighbors and family members. Um, you know, and and it hasn't been, right? The we've seen that degrade as these discriminatory policies have been put in place for about the last 10 or 15 years. So, you know, that's one thing that started happening is at Florida Tech is you have these new policies come into place that juxtaposes on top of the new laws that are also put in place, uh, very much in line with the consistent executive orders, because executive orders kind of have to be in line with, you know, the laws and the Supreme Court. So those things are happening, and the university was like not wanting to comply. And that's kind of where it came to me is like we had meetings with the president and the entire school of psychology that you know I was at. And I had been out of the so it was so weird for me because I was I I had been on family medical leave uh for the birth of uh a baby during the election. I wasn't around at all on campus during this like hot political season. I wasn't very much like aware of it. I was like I had a special needs child and a postpartum wife. Like I that was just not on my radar. And so we go to these meetings and and people are flipping out about it. Faculty members are crying because they're they they've built research programs based upon critical race theory or all these other like actual pseudoscience garbage research applications or teachings that are just not. Valid constructs that they've built their garbage classes on in psychology at Florida Tech. And they're crying in class, or excuse me, in the in the meeting. And the president comes to our meeting and basically says, Listen, we we need to look like we're going to comply.

SPEAKER_01: 1:00:20

Right. And I want to at this point go to the clip because I think that even shows more of what we can see than what you're showing me.

SPEAKER_09: 1:00:30

So I think the TLDR version is they said, We're not going to comply, but we're going to lie and we're going to do it. We're going to make it look like we're complying, but I want you to keep and so in there.

SPEAKER_01: 1:00:42

So I'm going to play this. Tell me if you can hear it. Um, I'm going to go ahead and play just a little bit of this, okay? Can you can you see the screen?

SPEAKER_09: 1:00:48

Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's the uh well, I can I can see my uh team at Johnson Space Center.

SPEAKER_01: 1:00:55

Okay, so let me see. Let me make sure I'm I'm showing you. Okay, so let me see if I can go to the actual. Let me get rid of this then. Go me one second. Get rid of that, add this.

SPEAKER_09: 1:01:08

Uh and it was shocking as you're saying this. Like, ready? Like, I'm just sitting there coming in off of like family leave, and I'm just and this that's that's really the the core answer. Your point, what happened to me is like, forget about DEI, forget about critical race theory, social politics, all of that stuff. I go to a meeting and and all I hear uh is like there's a new sheriff in town, there's a new policy from the federal government to maintain our grants. We're not gonna follow it. And I'm like, It's crazy. Like, I want to make sure I keep my grants, but I also just like at a level of principle, like I don't want to be involved in a conspiracy to defraud, no matter the topic.

SPEAKER_01: 1:01:46

Right. All right, can you see you looking at the screen right now? Yeah, we're gonna listening audience, we're just gonna play a little bit of this clip. So this is basically the president explaining to his staff how they're gonna continue to teach these programs, even though they've been prohibited from teaching these programs. Is that correct?

SPEAKER_09: 1:02:09

Effectively, yeah. I mean, you he'll he'll hear it from his own words, but uh yeah, he's pretty pretty sneaky, man. And he just lied and lied and lied. All right, here we go.

SPEAKER_08: 1:02:19

Says they received 69 million dollars in Title IV funding for students. Um, and so that's way more than$7 million. That's why he can afford to lose$7 million. He's came to our meeting to tell us go under the radar, keep doing what you're doing, keep doing these values of DEI. He goes, He says, I believe critical race theory is important to teach, it's a valuable class. Keep teaching it, but don't get caught. Don't get caught, don't get caught because this is what he was wanting. It was a$69 million fraud, not just a$7 million fraud. But it's not just$7 million fraud, it's east grants on the state level.

SPEAKER_05: 1:03:00

That's a federal policy changes. Our students have tremendous amounts of dollars supporting them.

SPEAKER_07: 1:03:09

Oh, here we go. Brian Elric, the vice president, said the bulk of the Title IV funds went to direct loans. Losing Title IV funding would mean closing the doors.

SPEAKER_02: 1:03:18

It's uh certainly one of the things that the president wanted stricken right away from contracts or from grants from the Department of Education.

SPEAKER_06: 1:03:29

A man named John talking about changing the wording to get around the presidential executive order in order not to listen to the clip real quick. It's not true.

SPEAKER_05: 1:03:47

So we're not targeting.

unknown: 1:03:52

Just don't do that.

SPEAKER_06: 1:03:53

So this guy denying that he changed the words, that's what he did.

SPEAKER_08: 1:03:57

He never said change your deeds, change your actions. Right.

SPEAKER_07: 1:04:01

Because he acknowledges what he's doing is wrong.

SPEAKER_01: 1:04:04

Alright, I'm gonna stop there for a second. Could you hear all that?

SPEAKER_09: 1:04:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 1:04:09

That's just crazy. Absolutely crazy.

SPEAKER_09: 1:04:13

Yeah, and I was kind of like like wondering, like, my ears hearing this the right way. And I get, you know, this this happened originally. That meeting was April 4th, and so there's been a lot of comments I've gotten from people, and one of the most common ones is like, why is the president of a university so stupid? Like, why would he come and just admit it all and say it all? And you know, outside of cheekiness and easy, like, you know, fun comments in that respect, like my very serious kind of response back to people are is that they're really holding academia in far too high of esteem, particularly under the dimension of intelligence. And the people that have been in academia are effectively, in my observation, broadly speaking, middle to bottom dwellers. And the reason I say that is because there's been a brain drain in academia for the last 15 years, and that's not me telling you that. You can find all sorts of articles and other commentaries and things that people have written in academia about the brain drain and for lots of different reasons, but the industry has become so corrupted and problematic, uh, in part because of like similar conversations like we were having. We weren't advancing and selecting people based on skill and merit, but on unrelated factors and variables. Um, and it drove out our best performers. People were either tired of the system, tired of the corruption in academia, um, and it doesn't always pay very well. People weren't always treated very well, tenure is grossly abused and and problematic, uh, which I had, by the way. I was I was a tenured professor at this point, hard-earned. And what that means is so you have kind of a selection bias such that if all your best people are leaving, and they are, and they have a long time ago, already driven out, then when you need a position filled in the higher to middle to lower management, your options are by definition only able to select from the middle to the bottom of the people who are left who weren't good enough to leave or whatever. Now, I say that right with proper acknowledgement, there's exceptions to this. There are still wonderful exceptional people uh who are very smart in academia, they tend to be the minority of people. They're again, they're the exception to the rule. Um, and that and that tracks on the dimension of ethics, too. You know, there's some people who are extremely ethical, uh, have great integrity. Um they're few and far between, though. I've been blessed to know them. I I I count them as as dear friends, some of whom don't even, you know, naturally, right? We we don't agree on everything, whatever. Uh, but I love them dearly that because because we actually can respect each other and and and they're good people. So uh but again, few and far between. And and that's how you end up in a situation with this. How can he be so dumb? Well, we're he's already pretty dumb. He's he literally not even in that clip, but later on, he's like, So, guys, really like keep doing this, but I don't want to put a bullseye on it. Like, we're gonna it's gonna put a target on us, so just stay under the radar. And he says, So, really, be mindful of who you say things to and be careful. Should I play that?

SPEAKER_01: 1:07:36

Should we can we play that? Is that on that same clip? I I might want to go to that.

SPEAKER_09: 1:07:40

I don't know that that that might be the one little clip that's not in there, but uh I'll see what I can do. I'll I'll see if I can send you send you a link to it. But it's a very small little segment, but it's it's fun, it's it's ironic because um universities are not the bastions of intelligence that people think they are if they're not from the university world. Um, you know, and if you're from the military background too, like I have a lot of respect for the military, but you know, in the same way that you know academia has cultivated uh sort of this brand of being the intelligentsia, and the military has cultivated the brand of of being you know nothing but upstanding honored intelligents.

SPEAKER_01: 1:08:18

Warriors and war fighters, but we're in the same boat, Rick. We're going through the same things that you're going through in academia.

SPEAKER_09: 1:08:24

Yeah, and so like it's not to say that there's not people with courage and integrity and honor and heroism. There are, but you also had General Mark Milley say that it was an absolutely valid strike on that innocent family in Afghanistan after the Abbey Gate tragedy when it turns out they absolutely just droned an innocent family and nobody was held accountable. So, like I I and I only say that just to provide the examples of like you know, things are not always as they're branded, and things have kind of gotten away from what gave that branding through hard-earned uh sacrifice.

SPEAKER_01: 1:09:08

Absolutely. I mean, we we are not immune, and that was the whole reason I wanted to have you on, Rick, is because we also in the military saw the way the best and the brightest got fed up with the system and got fed up with a lot of the same politics that you experienced in academia, and we said, no, we we're not gonna serve in an organization that doesn't prize impact and doesn't prize results, but instead is prizing all these other intangibles that aren't really contributing to making us better or making us more lethal.

SPEAKER_09: 1:09:43

And yeah, so you're basically selecting against heroism and courage because you're having the courage to say that and and and having the courage to actually uphold the integrity of the standard of excellence where versus the people left standing for them to select from are those who opted not. And so what we see in academia on the same dimension is that in respect to like tenure or upper administration, what it ends up doing, people think tenure confers this ability to like speak freely, and it does in some respects, but I got fired for speaking freely, so take that to the bank on tenure. Um, but really the thing to think about is that you got to think about it in terms of evolution and these selection factors. Um, whether you're in the military or in the civilian worlds of academia, you're selecting people in this case for tenure who've learned to tuck their courage in a box and tie it to an anchor and send it over the ship to the bottom of the sea in order to go along and get along so that they can get that promotion, so they can get tenure. And then even when they have tenure, then it's only six more years until they make full professor, where there's a little bit better money. So I should don't rock the boat, don't speak the truth, you know, don't maintain the standard, don't maintain integrity, excellence, um, do your job. Um, and instead, those people are disincentivized and actually they make their own decision, if not are driven out to leak to leave. And what you're left with standing on the inside of those organizations are people who are actually selected against the factor of courage or integrity or you know, um, those things. And here's the thing: once you get to those levels, whether you're a general, a colonel, uh, an admiral, uh a tenured professor, a dean, a president, whatever that is, that you reach your career, at some point you're then gonna have to have these instances of physical or moral or civic courage, and you're not gonna have the muscles trained, the moral muscle.

SPEAKER_01: 1:11:50

Oh, Rick, that's such a good point.

SPEAKER_09: 1:11:52

To be able to lift the weight necessary. And and and and and and I all I used to sit on the ROTC boards that we would do mock candidate uh officer candidate boards uh before students were commissioned. And and I always extolled to them. I'm like, everybody talks about physical courage in the military, but the majority of your career, even if you're an infantryman, by definition, statistically, cannot be in combat. You will be on base in the states or on base overseas. You will have so many opportunities to do right and to do wrong, to have courage or cowardice in every piece of paper you sign and every decision you make, like in ways that you don't necessarily think about as a 21-year-old, you know, officer candidate. But you need those courage that you you need those instances of courage to make if you're a general, an admiral, a captain, whatever your thing is, there will be times that you will have to make a very difficult decision and you will have to make the right decision that might be the toughest thing to decide. Like the right thing is not always the easy thing, but it is the right thing. And if you're not used to exercising that muscle and emotionally knowing how to be a leader when people might hate you for doing the right thing, or you might draw heat upon yourself or stepping out and fire from pseudo-enemies or whatever. If you don't know how to do that, you haven't built that moral muscle, as you might call it, then when the time comes, you're just not gonna do it. Well, you can't, yeah, and you won't know how to. Like, you don't get to choose your battles in these instances, they're generally brought to your door, especially if you're an officer. Generally, people bring you a bunch of problems that you need to solve, or you they need your decision as the general or the admiral or whatever the thing is, you gotta make the call. And if you're not used to doing that in a courageous way that follows and honors the truth with integrity to what's right and proper and just, then that time on when you've missed it for all the little things and you don't expect it to come, but you're just lost the game of musical chairs and it's at your desk now, you're not gonna know how to do it, even if you want to do it.

SPEAKER_01: 1:14:13

That's true. You know what you're gonna do in the military is you're just gonna say, talk to my Jag. That's what you're gonna say. You're gonna say, talk to my lawyer, or you're going to avoid any kind of confrontation with the person that you wronged, and you're just going to gaff it off to somebody else and try to pass away the problem. And the fact that you stood up in this most recent instance is no surprising, it's not a surprise to me once I understood your past. And once I understood, and we won't really have time to get into what happened in your first university. Uh, but you can go to James O'Keefe's show and you talk a little bit about that, and then of course, what happened in your childhood. Those two instances I think primed you to take this on, but you took this to a whole new level. You recorded it. Well, they recorded it.

SPEAKER_09: 1:15:04

Let me just say that first. They recorded too. The university records, so they keep me, they keep minutes of that meeting and they they take their own recordings. Everyone in that room had a recorder. Sure.

SPEAKER_01: 1:15:16

And anyone could have recorded it, right?

SPEAKER_09: 1:15:18

And they did, they did, and you know how I know that is because they've released minutes of those meetings every single month for five years, and once they were caught red-handed with their hand in the cookie jar, it's the only time in five years that I've been there that they said we're not giving you out the minutes now that we've been caught red-handed. He looked right into a big orange tripod you can see on my sub stack. I have a picture of it. He has someone's phone right in front of him, uh, right in front of him. They they record those. I promise you. And it's been and they literally have their recording.

SPEAKER_01: 1:15:55

You you showed us in some of the in the James O'Keefe video, I I think I saw, or it might have been on your on your Twitter, but I or your ex, I did see too, that they had previous meeting minutes. So of course we we know that those meeting minutes were there. But I think my my larger point is is what gave you the thought to say, okay, I'm going, what do I do with this? I have this recording of this very explosive thing that is completely illegal. Now, what did what the heck do I do with it? Like, tell walk us through a little bit about what your thought process was.

SPEAKER_09: 1:16:32

Uh well. You wrestle with a little bit because sometimes it's not easy to know what the right way is, although I knew what the right thing was.

SPEAKER_01: 1:16:49

Sure.

SPEAKER_09: 1:16:50

You can do the right thing through many different ways. And I knew that that they were committing fraud because they said so. Sure. I mean, like, this is they said it, don't get caught. It said we we could we don't want to find ourselves in court. Uh they said they didn't even want to write it down. That's why he came to tell us in person. People are like, why is this guy so dumb? Because they said we don't want to get caught, we don't want to have it used, have it used as evidence against us. That was their writing. I'm quoting their words. So, like they and he said that it's going to be problematic if they're caught. So we should be careful on what we say. Now, he didn't say to change your deeds, he didn't say to change your actions. It's like I feel like I'm like this is what I'd have to talk to my four-year-old about, like, you know, like, and so like when I say they commit fraud, like they said so that's effectively. Like, they were telling me that. And so, what do you do when like I just got done saying a moment ago in our conversation, you don't get to pick in life sometimes the times when that knock comes on the door where you know God's giving you a scenario where like you have to do the right thing. Um, well, what does the rules require at the university? Like, well, it requires us reporting, doing the right, doing the right thing. Like, if we find fraud, we have to report it. The year beforehand, the head of the school of psychology, Julie Castopoulos, and the chair of the psychology undergraduate program, Travis Conrad, both of them are like effectively cognitive peasants in the respective like professional psychology. Like, they're they're very low-caliber uh scientists and psychologists, and they were so dumb and demonstrating that that they wrote us an email in the same way saying we're gonna misappropriate these funds from the university, but don't tell our colleagues because we don't want to get in trouble. So I had already had to report that and I reported it to the president. I know John Nicklow, old Johnny Nicklow and I, we like he was I he asked to be my reference for the astronaut program. And John and I, I know John, he's written me several letters, you know, congratulating me for all the positive impacts I made on the university and helped him out. And so they he knows the rules that and that I have already had to report misappropriation of funds internally, but now you know you catch the president defrauding. So, like, where are you gonna go? Report it to the people underneath him who work for him. Yeah, and by the way, that's not an option, nope. No, and so you know, like this isn't a cartoon we're we're in here, Teresa. As you know well, right, in real life, in these organizations and and systems, there are real pragmatics and in social politics that govern this. And so, as it was, that misappropriation of funds that I had caught of Julie Casopoulos and Travis Conrad, um, I'd reported that to the director of HR and the vice president of HR and to the president himself. And not only did they cover it up, they had not yet even given a full um response to that for six to twelve months at the time of that meeting that came out through O'Keefe. And so I knew they were sitting on it, I knew that they had a history of covering it up, and I had already experienced instances where I knew that they were liars, and I knew that they lie, and I know that they don't follow policy or tell the truth. And here I have the president admitting that he lied to the face of the governor's office of the state of Florida, Ron DeSantis, to get a seven million dollar grant. And he said he's he drove home and said, and he comes to our meeting and says, I want to fight we're I want to fight back. Why don't we fight back against Ron DeSantis and the Trump administration? So, like, what do you do? That's kind of like that's a good ethical point for your people. What do you do when your boss comes in and tells you that on record that's being recorded? And like, how do you avoid not going to jail or or or uh getting caught yourself for being a co-conspirator to that? And so, you know what we decided to do in that respect is I went to James because I knew that James could get it to the governor, and the first place we reported it before it was published is we took it to the chief chief law enforcement uh officer of the state of Florida, which is uh a guy named Ronald DeSantis. He's the governor, he's the chief chief law enforcement officer of the state of Florida. So uh we took it to him and we asked for uh comment. His office responded and they gave official statement that day, and then the story broke. So the you know, with the knowledge that it was the governor himself who was being defrauded on behalf of us as taxpayers and citizens of the state and government of Florida by the sitting president of the Florida Institute of Technology for a$7 million grant, I went right to the guy who was defrauded and who has the capability of actually um taking legal action as the chief ex chief legal officer. Uh and and you know, I knew that you know, by by way of the media, he would pay attention rather than having it get lost in emails and non-responsive, and that's exactly what happened. Uh, he responded that day.

SPEAKER_01: 1:22:29

Rick, could if he had responded with this is an outrage, we will take care of this immediately. Would you have would you and James have taken it further?

SPEAKER_09: 1:22:42

Um, we will we we wouldn't have had to for one.

SPEAKER_01: 1:22:46

That's my point.

SPEAKER_09: 1:22:47

So it's what's kind of funny here is that like so the governor responded. He said, Yeah, this meeting happened. Like, we did tell them not to be woke, and we did tell them essentially that their students are gonna be worse off with a better educ with a worse education.

SPEAKER_01: 1:23:00

I saw I saw the statement, but that doesn't answer like we're gonna take care of it.

SPEAKER_09: 1:23:05

Well, and that's what's really interesting. So he dodged it entirely, and I I I like him. I was voted for him. Like he I I as it happens, I feel like I owe my wife's life to him because she dyed my arms during COVID, giving late uh birth to our first son, and I was able to save her life by virtue of being um in the delivery room with her, and I was able to see what doctors had missed. Um uh that and she ended up living um miraculously. And so that was because Florida was one of the few states that allowed husbands to be present in delivery rooms during COVID. So I have a deep appreciation for for for the governor in that respect at a very personal level, but I was definitely very disappointed because he dodged it and he said, Well, but this is a private university, and so we can't do anything about it, which Ron is such a smart guy. He is I know that he knows that's not true because they it was literally the state funds that he could have taken back that he was thought being defrauded of. So, like there's lots of things that could be done for whatever reason. Um, you know, their staffer issued that statement or or you know, whatever, but but we are suing the university, and and if I have to, I'll depose him and we'll find out what really happened and and and and what the rationale and reasoning was behind that. But um, you know, he could have really stayed on brand and taken a stronger stand, but um, you know, God God works in in in the way that God works, and I'm just I'm just a dumb cog in the wheel. Um, you know, so because of the way that things played out, you know, that matter was allowed to kind of like hang out there. And so James and I really had an opportunity to continue, and that's kind of what's happened here since April. Um, we were able to actually then file uh complaints to the federal level at the Office of Uh Civil Rights for the Department of Justice, the Office of Civil Rights for the Department of Education, um, the National Science Foundation, the Attorney General of the State of Florida. Um, we were able to then kind of like, you know, make sure that we were able to report the truth of these things out. And then and as we did that, then it turned out then that Florida Tech convened a secret meeting to try to strip me of tenure and fire me, then called me and asked me to resign as a settlement. And I said, settlement to what? And then they offered me all a year's salary,$96,000, if I would sign a non-disclosure agreement and promise never to sue them and not talk about it. And I already wasn't even talking about it. I like we weren't, I wasn't in the media, I didn't even have a social media profile, like I didn't have an account. I was silent, I was taking care of my sick wife and kid at home and and writing neuroscience papers like a nerd. And like, because that's what I was doing. I had students at my house working for free in the summer, coming to visit and working on papers and discoveries on the NASA project and everything, like doing my job even when I wasn't being paid in the summer, like because we're passionate about teaching and science and research. And then they're like, shut up, and I'm like, I'm already shut up. What are you talking about? And they're like, We'll pay you to shut up. And I'm like, but I'm already shut up. What are you talking about? And uh, and when we read that, it was so insulting to think that you that to think that they thought my integrity could be bought at any price at all, and that you could put a price on the truth, that we said absolutely not. We turned that off or down, and I was fired with nothing just a few days later. Um, that's right. We have a give send go account for any listeners that might be inclined, motivated to.

SPEAKER_01: 1:26:46

I will link, I will show the audience that and and link to it. Um, I did link to it in the show notes. But the one thing I also want to point out about this is that obviously this strategy usually works, or they wouldn't have done it, and which is sad. So, number one, and then number two, what um grounds did they give you for firing your tenured professor? And so I'm curious what they put as their explanation as they fired you.

SPEAKER_09: 1:27:18

Yeah, so great. So, two questions. Good, great, great points on across all boards. Um the what was the first thing you asked before the the so the grounds they said was insubordination, which wasn't true because I wasn't insubordinate. There was never something that they told me to do that I had to do that I didn't do. Um never happened, even if that's yeah, even if it did, they never told me about that, never gave me a chance to explain myself. Maybe there was context. Like there was no hearing, no due process. It was a secret star chamber. Like, I seriously, I have no idea. Like, they didn't say, and the only thing it can be is retaliation for having blown the whistle on their$76 million of fraud. Because three days before that meeting in April 4th, I got a letter from the provost offering me an updated, renewed contract as a tenured professor for an indefinite period of time. That means forever. And so anything that I could have done to break that contract would have happened after that contract. Um, the only thing that happened that they wouldn't have been happy about was reporting the truth of their sneaky lies to defraud the state and federal governments. And here's why I say that. Because the meeting happened April 4th, the news broke April 10th, and then that was like a Thursday or Friday or whatever it was, but basically I was on family medical leave every day after that story broke until the end of that academic year's contract, basically, like May 5th or May 10th. And then we're not paid, we don't we're not employed to do work in the summer when I'm terminated. So, like there was not even a physical day I could have worked by federal law in order to have been in subordinate doing something, other than telling the truth and blowing the blowing the whistle on on federally protected activity of a$76 million fraud in the lease, probably more than that, which is absolutely federally protected. Um, so they said it was insubordination, they won't say why because they're cowards. And and and I'm on unemployment. When I had to file for Florida Ford unemployment, I had to list that as the reason. And the way that it works is if you were terminated for cause, you don't get unemployment.

SPEAKER_01: 1:29:53

And I and so I guys, I'm showing the screen here of his give said. Go. So if you go here and it just says the truth is not for sale and it's got the explanation of everything we've been talking about. And then what I also like about your website, Rick, is that you've also got updates, which is nice. So as people are following the journey, they can kind of see the progression of where this is going and how this has progressed through there. And you knew about James O'Keefe because you were a fan, right? He was just some did you cold call him? Like, did you just reach out to him one day and say, hey, I've got this recording?

SPEAKER_09: 1:30:36

Yeah. So it turns out I I just sent a thing on his tip line because I was concerned about this fraud. And one of my best friends is uh and mentors is a UFC fighter and Olympic Hall of Famer, uh, Matt Lindland. And I I was asking him for for advice. I'm I'm like, you know, I what do I do about this? Like, how do I how do I get how do I properly report the truth of this out in a way that'll actually reach the people that can take proper action to do the right thing? And Matt suggested reaching out to James. And so I just called, I sent a tip line in and he gets hundreds. And so I've had a chance to make, you know, get to know James over the the past six months or so. We've become pretty close friends. And and so like I know he gets thousands of messages. The guy does so much, he's he's really does an incredible job. That I I mean, like I said, it was God's hand in how it all shook out, um, and it ended up working out in that respect. But I mean, yeah, uh, I guess I I guess I wrote it up in a way that caught his eye, and he saw the data, he saw the evidence, and it speaks for itself, you know. Um, as a scientist, that's what I'm used to doing is is selling the data story to an editor, to reviewers for the scrutiny of you know, the fire of peer review. And so you learn how to package your information and the evidence in in a way that um is distilled to to being understandable in a in a message, and then it builds upon that in a conversation. So that's kind of how that worked. Um, I feel like you you asked me a question earlier before that that I I skipped and I forget what it was, but um, but in short, I mean the the journey has been pretty incredible, and it hasn't been possible without the support of people on that give send go. I mean, people have been very generous, um, to the level of five or ten dollars, if that's all they've been able to donate and support, but it's it's allowed my family to survive on short notice of termination. We lost our health insurance, you know, with a sick baby and and postpartum wife on no notice while having tenure, which is supposed to protect you from these things. Um and how do they do that? I mean, like I said, we don't know. We're gonna find out in in litigation how how they concocted that secret star state chamber and and the lies that they must have put forth to do it. But, you know, it's funny. I had a mentor of mine in uh in undergraduate who who I still collaborate and and and consider a friend and a mentor, he laughed about it at the suggestion of insubordination insubordination. He said, the entire point of tenure is to be insubordinate.

SPEAKER_01: 1:33:22

And it's just it smacks in the face. It's it reminds me of the military. Like in the military, we say that we want people to be brave and we want them to have courage, but then when you are brave and you have courage and you do speak up, then you get smacked down. And I feel like the it's a very similar phenomenon is what happened to you. You you spoke up, and it really also disappoints me that the governor's office didn't take more action. Like, I I'm still trying to understand that they clearly were violating the administration's policies on DUI and DEI. You had proof of it, and they still to this day, as far as I know, haven't owned the fact that they are taking action against Florida Tech because of it.

SPEAKER_09: 1:34:16

It's very off-brand for the DeSantis administration.

SPEAKER_01: 1:34:20

And that's the thing, Rick. Like, that's why this story needs to be blown wide open. And I realize I'm just one small podcaster in a sea of many, many shows and many other kinds of media out there. But I wanted to do my part to support you and to bring your story to my audience because it just shocks me that something like this that's so obviously wrong, so obviously immoral, so obviously against the policy, could have gone so unnoticed, not only unnoticed, but punishing you and then just continuing on the as though it never even happened. That that just it blows my mind. It really does. And I think that unfortunately, it'll probably take the court system to unravel this through months and and and sadly maybe perhaps years, but I I really do hope that in the end you are vindicated on a larger level. And thank God that James took your story. And I mean, he not only took your story, as we'll see here, he awarded you this award right here just recently, correct?

SPEAKER_09: 1:35:32

Yeah, absolutely. And that's one of the things I like to keep the people updated with on the on the Gives and Go account is is just the last couple weeks, we had a very special opportunity to be awarded at uh Trump's Mar-a-Lago Resort and a Black Tie Gala. And again, that was due in large part due to the the help and and contributions of everybody chipping in and helping out. Um it's helped this helped us to stay sustained and and survived. And and the the great part about Gifts and Go is you can also offer prayers too, um, you know, uh uh, which is one of the unique facets of that platform. Um, and and so we've really been sustained by prayer, but also by people's donations, and and we try to share that back and keep them involved because I consider everybody kind of big, you know, team members uh uh of this journey because we we we can't do it alone. We're doing it together. And and James is very gracious, he had had my wife and I down there, and it was quite the honor. And so, you know, kind of weaving together your earlier questions about like if this would have been hap handled properly in the beginning, first by Florida Tech, all they had to do is follow the law, right?

SPEAKER_01: 1:36:44

Then you wouldn't even be here, yeah.

SPEAKER_09: 1:36:46

Yeah, then then all they had to do was not like create a Barbara Streisand effect by insulting me with a hush money against my integrity, and then firing me for absolute, which is illegal in its own right, so follow the law there too. Um, but if if the the DeSantis administration might have jumped on it earlier, we wouldn't have continued to take it so far forward where we'd end up at Trump's Mar-a-Lago. And uh it was truly, truly humbling to see the collection of other heroes and whistleblowers that they were honoring and journalists there, um, and being able to give a speech to a room full of millionaires and billionaires and people supporting truth and courage in a world which is so often mired in in lies and cowardice, was so inspiring um and humbling that it was just surreal and it and it made me feel very, very small as as a as a bit in God's larger plan, uh, such that like at that event, I mean, I had the chance and I I met a couple different times that night with the Secretary of Education, Linda McMahon.

SPEAKER_01: 1:37:56

Is this her right here? Oh, hold on, hold on. Let me get this one down. This this is her, correct?

SPEAKER_09: 1:38:01

That that is. She she she was stunning that night, was very elegant and very gracious with her time. And James had a had a video segment describing uh this fraud and 69 million dollars of it shown to from the stage at Mar-a-Lago to this esteemed group of uh donors and supporters and guests, uh, including the Secretary of Education, Linda McMahon. And we had an you might imagine we had a wonderful conversation.

SPEAKER_01: 1:38:35

Oh, I bet you did.

SPEAKER_09: 1:38:38

And you know, I said, you know, the person who was defrauded by that was actually you.

SPEAKER_01: 1:38:43

And what did she say to that?

SPEAKER_09: 1:38:46

She said, Really? And I ex and I said, Yeah, the exact everything that happened in that video, the person that the president of the university was scared of losing funds from was you. And uh we had a very nice conversation, she was very interested, and uh she asked uh how she can get back in touch with me and and make sure we we put an end to this, and that's exactly what we're gonna do. And so, you know, that wouldn't have happened without the pathway that took us there. That pathway was not an easy one, it was not one that went straight uphill or downhill. It zigzagged left, right, up, down. It's you know that was one that that we had to really learn to truly have faith and trust that that that we were following God's plan. And that's how we ended up deciding to do the right things that we decided to do with the courage that we had. And by we, I mean my wife and I, like she's an absolute stalwart champion, and without whom I I wouldn't have been able to do this. But we tried everything else up until that point. Like I said, I reported the misappropriation of funds to the president up until that point. They buried it, they covered it up, they lied about it. Um Jessica Vince and the vice president of HR, she lied, and then she told me the other people lied. Like it was so systemic that we knew that every time we tried to do it our way, God kept saying, No, do it my way, do it his way. And so, you know, that was the pathway that we were on because we had we we ended up trusting her like this. This is the only way that is now available to go. The court of public opinion. We we have to take it public. The public has to know, they have a right to know. It's their money, yeah, it's their money. We're stewards of it, we're not owners of it, we're stewards, and that's a great responsibility that comes with. And with that responsibility, I mean we have to speak the truth of what we're doing with their money.

SPEAKER_01: 1:40:55

If not, it's and it's bigger than just a administration decision. That's really what I also want to emphasize to my audience here. This isn't just uh Rick wanting to make sure they follow what President Trump wanted. This is a destructive ideology that has been seeped into people's minds that is tearing our nation apart, and they were trying to continue that. An initiative was put forth to try to stop this from happening, and people, like you said, were crying about it, people's entire identity has been wrapped up into this, and and in respect to research, like they were doing really bad research, like there's really bad quality research built around critical race theory and and these kind of like ideological constructs that are a waste of money.

SPEAKER_09: 1:41:48

But you know, the I've been in academia for 25 years, and there's been all sorts of policies that were right and wrong, moral, immoral, that administrations and governments imposed and required us to follow. But like I've never been told not to follow them by the president of a university and told to engage in a wider conspiracy to defraud against that. Even if we disagreed with it, we would you there's a right way to disagree and take that forward by questioning it in the courts to do other things.

SPEAKER_01: 1:42:27

You brought that out on James's show as well.

SPEAKER_09: 1:42:29

Yeah, like like I really want to make that point too, that it's you know, like there's layers to that, yes, there's there's definitely moral shortcomings to DEI that hurt people and discriminate against people. There's also just like it's the right thing to do irrespective of any policy. If if you're you know, if you tell your kids that a bunch of the other kid kids in school try to get you to sign on to doing something wrong, no matter what that wrong thing is, they shouldn't do the wrong thing. And so, you know, if that wrong thing happens to also be deeply problematic and and and immoral on top of that, that's that's a secondary wrong that they shouldn't do. But like, like you were alluding to, like this critical race, there's deeply based in Marxist ideology. It ends up, and I've seen this, the back, I've seen the back ends to it, like in the academic world, that is the embryonic womb where the and where the embryo is built as an ideology that's then shipped out into society and culture and and to the students who take it back to their places of work, to the Pentagon, to the armed services, and and use it as a Trojan horse that takes this anti-American Marxist ideology that teach people to hate their country. Yeah, how are you gonna fight and die for a country that you're taught to hate? That's not appropriate. It's not healthy for this, it's not even right for this for our nation. And we have a duty to that too. I I you know I'm I was a captain in the Air Force Auxiliary, and we we take an oath to defend this nation against all threats, foreign and domestic. Like that's not that's not something that we can look the other way on with honor and integrity, right?

SPEAKER_01: 1:44:14

And this is when you were with the auxiliary, right?

SPEAKER_09: 1:44:17

Yes, yeah, that was the um aerospace education officer of the year for the California wing, and I think that's actually a national commander's commendation award, potentially, too, uh back in 2019. Yeah. So it's like we do we take oaths, and people maybe don't often think about what that means when when we make a promise and give an oath, and we we should follow that if we you know, like the truth matters, and and society is a better place when when we honor the truth and and do that, and the truth isn't always easy to do. Um, sometimes it's really hard to do, but the way you get do it when it's really hard is practicing in the times when it's less hard, and sometimes when it's really easy, or just you know, like we have to grow into those times. And you know, when you look back, like I I'm an old man, I feel like now, middle-aged dad, like you know, you look back in life in all the hardships that certainly I've experienced at different points, I see in retrospect that they I only was able to get through them because of earlier hardships that I went through that got me ready to face that next challenge. Bingo, bingo, and so like God gives us those things again to build those moral muscles, uh physical muscles too, but like we do have to have the emotional strength and psychological capabilities to wrestle with those larger demons as they go. And it's like a video game, each level gets tougher and tougher as we go through life, but we get the tools as we go to grow and be stronger and stronger to beat those tougher and tougher levels, and so you know I've seen that happen in this situation and and and through life in that respect. Um because you have to speak up and say the truth. Uh, in this case, it was a combination, it was just legally uh fraud and and asked to do something like just legally structurally wrong, but like morally wrong, and then at that bigger level to our nation, uh teaching anti-American hate of discrimination, like actual discrimination. DEI discriminates. That's not me saying it's the Department of Justice Office of Civil Rights and the United States Supreme Court. Um, that's not appropriate. That that is not a way to build a country of people who love each other and are friends and neighbors and get along with each other. We cannot pitch people in that way. Like we have to find what unites us rather than hinge upon what divides us. And it it must be the things that unite us that we share, that you that we use as neighbors to overcome the things that we might differ upon. Um and and it must be the way, and and what they were trying to do was the opposite of that, and keep teaching the things that are so divisive that have made this country so divisive, made people hate each other, and and that's not appropriate.

SPEAKER_01: 1:47:27

Nope, it's not right, it's not you you took the right stand, Rick. You really did, and you did something that I admire, and I know my audience admires, and I can tell you that you're just gonna continue to grow no matter where you go, and no matter what happens from this point forward, you're just gonna continue, and another opportunity is gonna make itself available after this period and after you get through this fight. I don't know if it's gonna be, like I said, a book, a movie, um, another position where you're perfectly suited to be doing the kind of work that you've done. I don't know, but I just know that you've done something that I wish everyone had the courage to do, and I really admire you for it.

SPEAKER_09: 1:48:17

Well, thank you. I mean, I was inspired to be perfectly frank. When I was scared at times, like I was inspired by the people who did the same before me. You know, like I looked at other, you know, people who had spoken the truth or were whistleblowers and and paid the price. I was inspired by saints who are martyrs, and and in and this came out right around the time of of just about Easter. Like I said, it was about April 4th. There was a lot happening in that time. It was right around Easter time. So there's like like the the Lent season, and I really was you know reflecting a lot upon the the passion and the the martyrs and the people who've paid the price for telling the truth. And I laughed at times when I realized that because I was scared and didn't, you know, about telling the truth at times, and then I realized those people died, and they'd laugh at me with shame at how like silly they're like is this just a job or it's just a career, like like there is real strength and courage there. And I remember looking at you know other instances of podcasts on on James's show uh of whistleblowers who spoke the truth in such courageous and elegant ways that it helped me have the strength and encouragement to follow their footsteps. And I hope that me sharing uh this story will uh do likewise for others to uh to continue that because we we need the truth in society, we need it spoken, we need it shared, and we need people not intimidated or scared to say it and to do it. And it sounds like a simple thing, but it's not always an easy thing, but it's a necessary one, and we're all gonna be better for it. Because no matter, especially the dirtiest, ugliest truths, that's how you improve a country, that's how you improve a company, an organization, a family. Like medically, like you gotta cut the cancers out, you gotta cut the gangrene out, like clean out the wounds. Yep, I agree. With the truth, the truth is the antiseptic. No matter what the the pain is, tell the truth, and and it will set us free. And we can package it up and bandage it up and move on and heal and actually heal and and be good. And that's my my my what I would message to people because it it really does work that way. It's not always easy, it's not always hard, but like I'm really, really inspired, just like you said, the last few weeks, like you know, the courage that James has to support and tell our stories and and and people like you to share and tell our stories, that takes courage too. Because one of the things I told a lot of the donors and supporters at that event at Mar-a-Lago was that you know it takes courage for us to say the truth, but in one respect, like nobody cares what we say. Like, because we don't have all the voice that we have is to say it. But like somebody like James or somebody like you, the platforms by which to share it, like that takes courage to put it forward too. And that can't happen without the support of the team of donors and supporters and staffers and people. It's really one big team in pursuit of just sharing the truth, whatever that is, because the truth will always make us better, it'll always make us stronger, even if it's scary, even if it's ugly, but it will set us free and it will it will always be the bonds that build us with strength. You don't ever get better in the long term by a lie. Um, and something that I that that I always always end up having to be asked from people, and I always end up saying is they're like, Well, you really paid the price for telling the truth. Or that, like, you, you know, you and I'm like, well, you know, think about the price I would have paid. Yeah, I lost my job, I lost a lot of money, lost a lot of things. We've really had been struggling and and and and and really, really impacted with difficulty, substantively. But think of the price that you pay if you would have gone along with a lie. Think about the price you pay if you would have taken that$96,000 buyout, if you would have sold your integrity out, there is a price to pay for that, and we don't always think about that. There is a price to pay, and you may not even realize you're paying it, but it's a price that's paid with your soul. You may not realize you pay it in this life, but you'll find out later that you paid it in the next. And worst of all, what if your children find out that you paid that price, that you sold out your integrity and they learned that? What if they learned that you you chose a lie instead of the truth? That price to pay is is always going to be the higher price than the price you pay of suffering when you do the right thing and tell the truth.

SPEAKER_01: 1:53:26

I agree. I 100% agree with you, Rick, and that's really why I started my podcast. There wasn't an opportunity within my own community to talk about hard issues. They wouldn't open a window to really discuss the things that needed to be discussed. And so I said, All right, well, I've learned how to be a public affairs officer, I've learned how to do messaging, uh, I can do it myself. And and that's how how the how the show got started is that I just wanted to hear people's true and authentic stories. And yours is definitely one of those true and authentic stories. I I just I so admire you, and I'm so glad that you agreed to come on the show and share your story, especially on such short notice. But after I watched that show with James, I was like, oh my gosh, this is a whole nother level of truth telling that I knew our military audience would benefit from because there is a lot of things in the military, as I know you know, that we need to do to fix our house. And I'm gonna continue to do these shows and and to keep talking about them because I do believe, like you said, that when we share the truth, we fix problems. When we pretend like oh, go ahead.

SPEAKER_09: 1:54:38

No, I was gonna say, you know, thank you. I I I it's very humbling to hear you know such nice things, you know. I I uh I hope we can live up to that, but I mean I appreciate you having the courage to start your show in the face of everything that you've gone through and share everybody's stories and including mine. And but that like you know, like this is an active situation, like this is actively happening right now, and there's a lot of good that can still happen. And so there's there's things that listeners can do, like they can't they you know, you can contact the Department of Education, contact you know, Secretary McMahon. Like, so I I've like I said, I I was I met with her a couple weeks ago, you know, uh wonderful lady committed to doing the right things, committing to ending DEI, but and and and committed to working closely. Uh, I've heard from both Harmit Delon and her over the last few days, like the you know, Harmit Delan, the Office of Civil Rights at the Department of Justice, they work very closely together. They just got uh Northwestern University to settle for$75 million uh that they caught them um doing problematic things on at following Harvard and Columbia. But really, the message is like, you know, the people who put our administration presently into office, they're not at Harvard, they're not at Columbia, and they're not at Northwestern. They're at Everyday Joe University all over this country that now needs to be focused upon. And so, like, reach out to these people, let them know, take these cases up, take them to the end, and hold these institutions accountable. Contact Governor DeSantis, do a freedom of information request, see what else was said and who was at that meeting that they agreed to. Like, there are things that can be done, you know, help us support us on the on the give send go, but like let them know that we're paying attention and and do it in a nice way. Like, like do it in a respectful way and ask ask for them to to to take this on and see it through to the very end because we have a lot of momentum and we're doing great. Uh, we just came back from Mar-a-Lago and meeting with the Secretary of Education on a direct you know conversation and meeting to take action, and together with a with a you know, Office of Civil Rights, I mean, this is the time. This is not the time for Wilting Violets. This is the time to move forward and to move forward with vigor and and courage and truth, and to reach out and and and to join the team, help, help the effort, and you know, and to do it at the Pentagon. If you guys have a military group, we had a story come out in the Gateway Pundit through Jam Phelps and work with stars, where we pointed out that this is a Trojan horse laundering this anti-American ideology back into the Pentagon. You know, Florida Tech, for instance, they train Space Force Guardians on DoD facilities using DoD money. They have the the they can ask the the Pentagon why are we violating the presidential executive order by sending funds to an institution that's actively skirting it, undermining it, and subprovide subdivision it.

SPEAKER_01: 1:57:49

But I think also the problem, and and this is one of the reasons why I really love the first hour of our show, and I know that we've we've got to wrap this up in a little bit, but I want to just mention this is the fact that we spent a good half hour, 40 minutes just unpacking why DEI is bad. And the problem that I see with the DOW, and I'm looking at Pete Hageseth and the staff there, is that they have not done a good job of educating on the backstory of DEI. And they've not done a good job of holding seminars where people can openly talk about why DAEI is harmful and they can actually help educate people on this issue. That's the problem. They put a lot of time in some really very poor extremism training that was awful and that I got and said, this is terrible. I'm just gonna bring in my own hate crimes expert and some guy from NCIS and actually teach the class, but they won't spend the time to really unpack what's wrong with DEI. So that's something I would love to see the DOD or DOW do going forward is actually teach people that it's not just about diversity because people have the same impression of DEI that that I told you I used to have, where it's just it's inclusive, it's great, why not? It's it's it's making sure that every no one's discriminated against. But what they don't understand is that it does exact opposite of that. And so I think that that's something that the military needs to also examine as they move forward because they've got a lot of people right now on the inside who are what I think are malicious compliers who are working actively against the administration and unsurping any of the initiatives that they would have to try to right the ship, so to speak.

SPEAKER_09: 1:59:39

I mean, when you've got that's that's basically exactly what I caught on tape is people maliciously, literally wanting to comply. And so, and that's that's my message back. That was my message literally back to Secretary Heggseth uh with that Gateway Pundit article about that, which is that when you're giving your funds to Through DARPA or research or ROTC or GI Bill or anything to these universities, but to corporations like Lockheed or Boeing or any of them, what you're there is no accountability. All they do is ask them to self-certify that they are complying. And I blew the whistle, I blew the video out that behind those closed doors, they were literally laughing, laughing at the prospect that they're doing it anyways, and they know they're not going to get caught. So they they have to the leaders have to know that they're being lied to, they're not being complied with, and there has to be other mechanisms of accountability. I said, set up a tiger team, I'll lead it up, we'll be a DE like board. Because we have to have people to buy in and understanding that you know what DEI is manifested as is actual discrimination. It's actually a mechan uh a policy that has the manifestation of discriminating, which is not good. We want to protect people from discrimination. We want to absolutely make sure it doesn't happen. We want to protect people's rights and and respect people's rights and of all people, and that should be the gold standard. But it is it is a discriminatory thing that that that is why it's you know being dispensed with. And you can capture some people who may not have that understanding about but may be able to come to it like you said you did through a little bit of reach out outreach and education, but there will be the you know the cohort of borrowers and malicious non-compliers, but and that has to be dealt with uh quickly and forcefully because that's exactly what we caught. I proved it. This is not a theory. We literally caught it on tape, and you can roll the tape, show it to them. I mean, that's that's exactly what they said.

SPEAKER_01: 2:02:05

I mean, that's what's so amazing about your story. That was another reason I just wanted to do this story, was because it's the most blatant and obvious example of this issue, and I thought it would be the perfect way for me to introduce this topic to my audience, but I'm not gonna stop talking about it. I showed you those books that I ordered off of a stars webinar that I attended. So I'd like to hopefully, once I read them, maybe get the author of that those books uh on the show, and I I can will continue to do what I can and do my part to educate on this issue and to fight back against it because it is un-American and it is driving us apart. So I want to thank you so much for coming on the show. I know this was another long stories of service podcast. I've had three two-hour shows this week, but sometimes I believe that's what's needed to really dive deep into these topics. Before I go, do you have any other parting words for the audience, Rick?

SPEAKER_09: 2:03:09

Well, I just thank everyone for their interest and attention. Um, I humbly ask to you know if they can, you know, muster anything to throw into the Gives and Go. It certainly helps us and our family to sustain and survive if uh, you know, and in the prayers as well. But thank you guys. I hope I hope to inspire for truth and and also, you know, like connect, say hi. Like I'm out here, like connect with us. I'm on uh Twitter or X at Rickadante, and the Gives and Go is called The Truth Is Not For Sale, and that's linked to in my Twitter bio. But um, I'm very grateful, very grateful to James. Everybody asks how he is. He's he's just like you see him, he's an earnestly good person. He he helped us, he did that wonderful event at Mar-a-Lago that connected us with the Secretary of Education, and now we have some really good momentum. So join the team, help support us on the GifSeng Go. And uh, you know, I know you said you wanted to start on the video, maybe end on the video, gives them something to go out on it because there's some pretty good little little clips in there of them saying some pretty incriminating things.

SPEAKER_01: 2:04:09

Oh, absolutely. Let let's let's go back and let's visit a little bit more of that video as we as we close out the call. So this was uh a little bit of of what we saw, and uh it's it's the proof, it's the receipts. So can you see it? Uh oh yeah. All right, here we go.

SPEAKER_07: 2:04:26

By telling people we need to do this privately, that's also interesting. He he knows it's it's wrong. Align with Governor DeSantis directives and is taking all the necessary steps to demonstrate compliance. You underline that because it's false. It is false. Tell us why it's false.

SPEAKER_08: 2:04:45

Because you're just demonstrating something, you're not doing something. Um magicians demonstrate things. They demonstrate a car disappearing or a car showing up as magic because it's not true, it's an illusion. It's it's a facade, and that's what's happening at campus, and in many campuses. We've seen this in the news in lots of places. They're not doing the things I was there, I was a witness in that meeting, and many others where people describe their efforts to continue doing the things that they don't want to be caught doing and integrating these discriminatory teachings of team as a participant and a witness in that meeting. He was recruiting us as willing participants, most of the room, in that effort to be non-compliant. And it was many co-conspirators in that scheme and plot that we were first told about in the month beforehand, we were emailed those minutes out the night beforehand. He came here and told us the same thing. So there's intentionality to deceive and defraud, and with a many others as co-conspirators. This is a cover-up. This is a cover up. So when we say we need this instruction that we can continue teaching our DEI, we need that to come from the president's office. Write it down, send it to us, give us some cover so we don't lose our grant funding, so we don't lose um so we don't get in trouble. And we said that directive needs to come from the president. If we're gonna do if they're being tell telling us to fly under the radar verbally, orally, we said, Well, can you write that down? And they said, No, we won't do that because it could be used as future evidence. Oh, evidence of what?

SPEAKER_07: 2:06:33

Yeah, conspiracy to fraud? This is a cover-up. This is a cover up. So thank you for pointing that out. These are from the minute meet the meeting minutes. How do we do a workaround? How do we do a workaround on the research project? That's a it's a smoking gun right there.

SPEAKER_05: 2:06:51

It's just not not true. It's not true. People are just looking for words. They're simply you know searching whatever comes up on us, sometimes not even reading it right now.

SPEAKER_02: 2:07:04

President Trump has been so decisive about is making sure uh that DEI is stripped out of contracts.

SPEAKER_05: 2:07:14

So I had a seven million dollar ask. Literally sat at his desk and turned two strings around and said, Why are you so woke? It's a lot of money, but if I lose seven million dollars, we can live.

unknown: 2:07:29

We can live. There's a lot to lose, uh, but really does put a uh target on our back. That could be problematic. So I think the way I put it to the diversity cabinet was we're gonna do what we do. Let's not necessarily put target on our back.

SPEAKER_05: 2:07:49

Um we have a course, and it was called uh the EI-101. Right.

SPEAKER_04: 2:07:57

Um tech team teaches the EI-101.

SPEAKER_05: 2:08:06

Because that's no longer, you know, that course would not be a public university originally more.

unknown: 2:08:15

It was probably a very common course. Um diversity is a is important uh for a number of reasons.

SPEAKER_05: 2:08:24

I said, are you saying critical race theory? He said, yeah, yeah, how do you feel about that? I said, well, I know I believe in teaching politicians. Um good, the bad, the ugly, and um publicize all the notes so that anybody can access them by probably would not learn that.

unknown: 2:08:42

Um mindful of how you're teaching the course and sharing information.

SPEAKER_03: 2:08:49

I just want to make sure I'm hearing the recommendations we have a human sexuality class. We have culture in what's the name of the class? Sociality. Social multicultural psychotherapy DEI, and because that course catalog is public, it might be wise for us to request an exemption to get it changed past the catalog uh publication date. So maybe they're not gonna be fired because of the calls. They might be fired for teaching us.

SPEAKER_05: 2:09:22

But when it comes to uh really let's put a uh R on our back end, it would be problematic.

SPEAKER_02: 2:09:31

So I was pleased to hear in the segment just before I joined that DEI has really been stripped from so many of the programs that you have here in Florida in schools.

SPEAKER_05: 2:09:43

I think this is a valuable uh part of education, and if we have to change some words so they're not being scraped, and and so we're not targeted, allows us to do our work.

SPEAKER_02: 2:09:57

Uh and we're gonna focus on DEI. Let's don't teach indoctrination.

SPEAKER_07: 2:10:01

You just wanted to speak the truth, you just wanted to get the truth out there, and you didn't you objected to the lies. All of it is a big lie, it seems. Rick says there are certain times that we are all called. He has now been fired recently from Florida Tech for coming forward with video evidence showing what appears to be an alleged fraud and cover-up. They offered you$100,000 to shut up and you didn't take it.

SPEAKER_01: 2:10:26

Yeah, we felt wow. Wow, wow, and wow. That's just blows my mind. Blows my mind, Rick. But thank you so much for coming on the show. I'm disgusted. I'm I'm I'm just I'm at a loss when you could get something like that so clearly on tape. And they're not right, they're not very smart people, and I mean the people that are sitting in that meeting and still are they still continuing to teach these courses, by the way? Is this still like as far as you know, like it's still happening?

SPEAKER_09: 2:11:00

They're just well, I'm fired. So you have an idea. Yeah, well, well, but well, I no, I do have an idea because I know what the president said on tape. And he said keep teaching them to change the names. And she literally said she listed a rattle-off a list of classes, including a class called DEI. Right. They taught, and they said, Should we change them even though it's past the deadline to change them for the public? The it's already listed. The catalog.

SPEAKER_04: 2:11:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_09: 2:11:32

That means a student is using federal financial aid or the GI Bill to enroll in a class that's actually not the thing that it actually is. That's a different kind of false advertising and fraud in its own right. So the I yeah, it's not that I have no idea. I have a very good idea. I was there and then watched it.

SPEAKER_01: 2:11:51

They're like laughing about it. And that's because honestly, they're indoctrinated. They've been they've normalized, they're normalizing fraud. And and once it's normalized, that's just so dangerous. It just it just goes into so many other ethical and moral issues. But well, thank you so much for coming on the show. I will meet you backstage to say goodbye. I'm gonna go full screen and we're gonna be following your journey closely and uh updating our audience along the way of what happens.

SPEAKER_09: 2:12:21

Thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_01: 2:12:24

All right, guys, thanks so much for sticking with us. If you're still if you stuck with me this long, thank you so much for the show. Next week I will have at least two shows in the works. Can't wait to bring you those promos. And as I always end these calls, please take care of yourselves, please take care of each other. Go on Rick's give send go page and donate or support the cause, write the governor of Florida, do what you can and be a part of the solution. All right, guys, take care now. Bye bye.