The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) wants to know if Tarleton State University is attempting to cover up Professor Michael Landis' alleged inappropriate behavior toward female students. The Texan News Service, an independent student newspaper, reported the allegations.
"Tarleton gave the student editors a choice: Lose the articles or lose the paper's university funding," reports FIRE attorney Gabe Walters. "Tarleton then wrested editorial control from the students, and now it falsely claims that the Texan News Service was never independent."
Walters asserts the student reporting was accurate and truthful, but the school kept pressuring students to take down the articles.
"Tarleton covered up Landis' inappropriate behavior by demanding that the student newspaper remove stories reporting on it," the attorney reiterates. "And now, by withholding public records about that, it's covering up the cover-up."
The problematic professor was paid more than $61,000 in 2018 to leave to avoid an embarrassing scandal for the university.
Tarleton University is a member of the Texas A&M University System.
