Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton has been in talks to hold her own speech at Liberty University, the religious school that is quickly becoming the place for both Republican and Democratic candidates to visit.
In an interview with the Washington Examiner, Liberty University President Jerry Falwell Jr. said the school had been in discussions with the campaign as recently as this week. “The door has always been open,” Falwell said.
Falwell welcomes the idea of Clinton addressing his students and says the invitation has been on the table since her failed 2008 run. A spokesperson for the Clinton campaign did not respond to request for comment on any future plans to speak at Liberty University.
The school is widely seen as one that GOP candidates like to use as a backdrop for their campaigns. But on Monday, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., addressed nearly 12,000 of the students at the conservative evangelical university.
The self-avowed socialist’s claim that America was founded on racist principles drew much attention and ire from conservative commentators. One comment in particular struck a nerve: His claim that America has a deeply racist past.
“I would also say that as a nation, the truth is, that a nation which in many ways was created, and I’m sorry to have to say this, from way back on racist principles, that’s a fact,” Sanders said to students Monday.
In response, Falwell acknowledged in the interview that slavery did exist for 80 years in America, but countered that many of the nation’s founders actively sought to end the practice.
Falwell stressed that even as Democrats are considering the venue, the school itself is trying to be seen as place where anyone can come to talk. He contrasted the warm reception Sanders received at Liberty to the protests former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was met with at Rutgers University, which eventually forced her to back out.
“Liberty is the exception going against the tide,” stated Falwell. The university allows students to skip one required convocation a semester. According to Falwell, only a dozen students chose to skip Sanders’ address. He added it speaks to the more tolerant nature of the school and its student body compared to more liberal campuses like Harvard or Yale.
While the school is often a magnet for prominent conservative figures, the son of the late Rev. Jerry Falwell noted the friendly relationships it has had with unlikely figures such as Hustler publisher Larry Flynt and the late Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass. A fact that is not widely known, Falwell shared, is that Kennedy wrote him a recommendation for the University of Virginia Law School. Kennedy also spoke at the school in the late 1980s.
