By Jackson Hare, Education and Enrichment Coordinator

After allegations of appearing in several gay adult films surfaced last week, Corey DeAngelis will no longer be the luncheon keynote speaker at Xavier’s Stephen S. Smith Center’s Education in Crisis Symposium on Oct. 16.

The only speaker for the event not located in the Greater Cincinnati area, DeAngelis was originally the keynote speaker at the luncheon. He was expected to engage in a discussion about education with President of the Cincinnati Federation of Teachers Julie Sellers.

Hosted by the Smith Center and Smith Scholars Program, the symposium aims to foster critical dialogue around the pressing challenges facing education today, such as public versus private education, school choice and the role of morality in education.

The event consists of two panel discussions, each hosting several leaders and advocates in the field of education in the Greater Cincinnati area.

“We wanted a diverse set of viewpoints represented, and since we had a lot of voices on the anti-school choice, anti-voucher side, we thought it was important to balance this discussion out. He’s a nationally known voice on this topic and he just published a book on this topic,” economics professor and Associate Director for Thought Leadership and Research at the Smith Center Dr. Rachel LaRose said.

DeAngelis is a prominent school choice activist and conservative online personality. This year, he published a new book titled The Parent Revolution: Rescuing Your Kids from the Radicals Ruining Our Schools, and he has received praise from presidential candidate Donald Trump.

After allegations that DeAngelis appeared in at least three gay adult films dating back to 2014 surfaced and was placed on leave by the American Federation for Children, he withdrew from speaking at the Education in Crisis Symposium and organizers of the Smith Center event mutually decided that they no longer wanted him to attend.

“These reports were going to take over, so the controversy wasn’t going to be focused on a debate over education anymore,” philosophy professor and Executive Director of the Smith Center Dr. Steven Frankel said. “It was not the controversy we wanted. This is not a discussion of LGBT rights or anything like that. It’s a discussion about education, so that distraction was not something we wanted to be part of the discussion.”

DeAngelis did not respond to Newswire’s request for comment.

According to DeAngelis’ booking agency All American Speakers Bureau, his booking fee ranges between $10,000 to $20,000. The Smith Center was refunded their deposit fee.

 “I think the general rationale for it is that you have to bring in somebody with name recognition if you want to get the numbers that they want, which is like 250 to 300 people at the luncheon,” Frankel said when asked about why DeAngelis was initially invited to speak at the event.

“I thought it was a weirder choice that he was coming before anything that happened,” junior Montessori early childhood education and special education double major Levi Davidson said. “I think so much of his opinions about public school and school choice and everything hinged on his anti-LGBT takes.”

Davidson, who is also the Xavier LGBTQ+ Alliance Administrative Coordinator, also mentioned that faculty in the education department raised concern about their lack of involvement in the event.

In lieu of DeAngelis’s keynote, the Education in Crisis Symposium will include a luncheon fireside chat with The Ohio State University political science professor Dr. Vladimir Kogan and Julie Sellers on the topic “Ohio Students and Teachers in a Post-Covid Environment.”