Ann Coulter drops plans to visit Berkeley: Report

Conservative columnist Ann Coulter won’t be going to UC Berkeley Thursday after all.

In an email to the Reuters newswire Wednesday, the conservative firebrand said she was canceling her planned trip because “I looked over my shoulder and my allies had joined the other team.”

Ms. Coulter made the promise to appear on campus last week in an April 19 tweet, promising “I WILL BE SPEAKING NEXT THURSDAY.”

On Monday, Reuters reported that both the Young America’s Foundation and the Berkeley College Republicans were taking the school to court for having canceled Ms. Coulter’s planned speech.

Campus officials had offered to reschedule the talk to May 2, a request that was turned down by Ms. Coulter, who is on the record complaining that she met the institution’s various demands before scheduling the originally planned speech, only to essentially call their bluff when they canceled the event.

Ms. Coulter’s complaint about a lack of support appears to be directed at the Young America’s Foundation (YAF).

In an April 25 statement posted to its website, YAF lamented that “Berkeley made it impossible to hold a lecture due to the lack of assurances for protections from foreseeable violence from unrestrained leftist agitators.”

As such, the group said, while it was “pressing forward with its lawsuit” it could not “jeopardize the safety of its staff or students” by joining Ms. Coulter in her planned appearance.

Ms. Coulter told The Hollywood Reporter Wednesday that YAF was “basically allying with the administration to keep me off Berkeley” and that it would be “nuts” to show up with “no one on the ground … no lawyer, no insurance, no security” backing her up.

Ms. Coulter suggested YAF was too timid in its legal response and that it should have filed a motion in court to effectively order the state’s liberal Democratic governor to call in the National Guard to secure the campus.

“Why hasn’t Gov. Jerry Brown ordered the national guard in?” Ms. Coulter said, THR reported. “He might have — if there had been a court order. The way we vindicate constitutional right in this country is by going to court and forcing state actors violating our rights as American citizens to stop. But YAF wouldn’t file for a court order, just damages — which Berkeley doesn’t care about. It’s on the California taxpayers.”