Sometimes a standing ovation speaks louder than words. A Bosnian immigrant found this to be true when, at the end of his impassioned speech about liberty and tyranny, the crowd at a School Board meeting stood and clapped as several School Board members tried to exit the room.
The father shared his comments at a CUSD Unit 10 School Board meeting on Monday evening. The Board meeting followed a Saturday decision by School District Officials to continue mask mandates in defiance of an Illinois Circuit Court issuing a temporary restraining order prohibiting the practice.
The Daily Wire reports that Gov. JB Pritzker and the Illinois Teachers Union strongly endorse mask mandates in schools.
The restraining order comes as multiple studies show that masks are ineffective, medically harmful, and impede learning.
The unnamed speaker is a concerned parent and immigrant from Bosnia. According to Daily Wire reporter Virginia Kruta, as the father spoke about liberty and freedom, two school board members attempted to leave, halt the discussion and continue the meeting in a closed session.
Kruta reported: “This gentleman immigrated from Bosnia under threat of genocide when he was in 5th grade. The CUSD unit 10 school board attempted to gavel out the meeting while he was speaking.”
According to KMOV4 News, “Thirty minutes into the meeting, where public comment was on the agenda, board members tried to go into closed session. Board members even tried walking out of the meeting until the board president told them to sit down.”
“After parents realized the board was trying to go into a closed session, they argued back and forth for several minutes, some even yelling.”
During the open comment segment of the meeting, the gentlemen recounted his experiences in Bosnia and drew parallels between dictators who slowly began removing civil liberties in Bosnia and what is happening in America.”
It “started with simple things, like taking away your right to speak and to say the things that you want to say,” he said.
“It was the simple small things, because you couldn’t walk down the street and tell your neighbor how you really felt, because your neighbor might rat out on you. And that’s where we’re at right now, we’re starting to see that.”
The man also mentioned how Bosnia’s dictatorial government “forced every one of us to register our guns. I was very young,” he continued, “but I have vivid memories of the Serbs coming in and beating my parents, beating my mother, doing many other things to many other women.”
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“So, I came over here and started out in 5th grade,” the father said. “I was always the person to stand up for my principles, so I’m starting to teach my child to do the same thing.”
As the father continued speaking, the video shows two female school board members rising to leave. One parent can be heard saying, ‘Shame!’ and another shouts, “Hey, where are you going?'”
The father, who was still within his allotted time, continued by reading portions from the U.S. Constitution. He said, “I fell in love with this country.”
“There is no land of opportunity like there is here…There are 60,000 of us [Bosnian refugees] in St. Louis, [and we came] here for a reason—not because we want to live the way we lived in the 90s [in Bosnia], in fear of what’s next,” he said. “This is becoming way too political and way too tyrannical. There’s absolutely no reason for this. None.”
He concluded: “I have to say one more thing, and it’s simple: We all want to be civil, and we all want to do this the right way, but I’m telling you, if you do not stop complying, you will lose everything that you have. Stop complying,” he said through a standing ovation. “Stop complying.”
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Like many before him, Superintendent Mark Skertich claims he’s merely following orders. The Governor ordered the mask mandate, and the pro-mask attorneys hired by the district, at tax payer’s expense, advocate continuing mask protocols.
“We spoke to our legal counsel and got their advice,” Skertich said. “In their opinion, the TRO [temporary restraining order] only applied to the five families named as plaintiffs, so that is what we had honored that TRO based on the circuit court.”
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