Dartmouth College | Hanover, NH USA

Video: Dartmouth Student Body President-elect Taunts #blacklivesmatter Protesters

Dartmouth College saw two powerful and peaceful protests this past weekend. On Friday, May 1st, nearly 200 students, faculty and staff members marched through the streets of Hanover protesting an end to racial injustice, gender inequality, and police brutality. On Saturday, the protests continued, with a much smaller group continuing the efforts by protesting at two major parties at Greek Houses on campus. The place where the student protesters were most uncomfortable was at an invite-only, all-day-drinking, celebration of the Kentucky Derby at Kappa Delta Epsilon sorority.

What is perhaps the most disturbing part of the footage is the reaction of the incoming Dartmouth Student Body President—Frank Cunningham '16—who taunts, mocks, screams, and forces his way into the face of a female Dartmouth student protestor. The taunting of his peers heightened during a chant memorializing the last words of Eric Garner: “I CAN’T BREATHE!” 

Despite ones' views of the protesters or their message, surely such embarrassing behavior by the president-elect of Student Assembly is uncouth, unjustified, and counter to the values of mutual respect encouraged and protected by Dartmouth’s mission statement.

For these reasons, we, the undersigned, call for the resignation of Frank Cunningham as Student Assembly President for the 2015-2016 academic year.