UWF Watch
Workgroup Report: UWF Public Policy Office May Be Violating Florida Statute on Viewpoint Diversity
Seventy-one percent of this year’s speakers have conservative affiliations. One-third are tied to Hillsdale College. Every single speaker has been a man.
An internal review circulated this week by a workgroup of University of West Florida faculty and staff concludes that UWF’s Office of Public Policy Events (OPPE) may be violating the Florida statute that created it—as well as the university’s own recently adopted statement on institutional neutrality.
The report, dated April 13, 2026, examines the full 2025–26 slate of OPPE events and finds a speaker lineup dominated by a single ideological perspective, a single out-of-state institution, and a single gender. See OPPE Report 2025-2026.
The bottom line: Florida law requires each state university’s OPPE to host debates featuring “speakers who represent widely held views on opposing sides” of public policy issues. The workgroup found that 75% of UWF’s OPPE events this year featured only speakers with conservative affiliations. Each OPPE must file an annual report with the state by September 1.
What the statute requires
Florida Statute 1001.93 established an Office of Public Policy Events at every State University System institution. The law sets specific requirements:
- A minimum of four debates or group forums each year
- Speakers representing “widely held views on opposing sides” of the most discussed public policy issues of the day
- A “wide diversity of perspectives from within and outside of the state university community”
- A preference for in-house or SUS speakers, with outside speakers invited and paid only when no qualified internal speaker is available
- An annual report to the state by September 1 detailing events, speakers, attendance, and speaker expenditures
The workgroup’s conclusion: UWF will meet the numerical threshold, but the substantive content of the events raises serious compliance questions.
The numbers
The review examined 15 total speaker appearances across seven completed events and two scheduled for this month. Individuals serving only as moderators were excluded. Speakers were classified not by personal political beliefs but by the identifiable political orientation of their affiliated organizations.
Ideological breakdown of speaker affiliations:
- Conservative/Right: 10 speakers (71%)
- Nonpartisan/Unknown: 3 speakers (21%)
- Liberal/Left: 1 speaker (7%)
Other findings:
- Ten of fifteen events (67%) featured only speakers with conservative institutional affiliations.
- Roughly one-third of all speakers—five in total—have current or past ties to Hillsdale College, a private Christian institution with a politically engaged mission.
- Only 40% of speakers had a direct local or Florida-based affiliation, despite the statute’s fiscal preference for in-state expertise.
- 100% of the scheduled and previously featured speakers this academic year have been men.
“The concentration of viewpoints and limited scope of debate in OPPE programming raise substantial questions regarding adherence to Florida statute.”
The Hillsdale connection
The workgroup singled out the recurring presence of Hillsdale College affiliates as a particular concern. The director of UWF’s OPPE, Dr. Clifford Humphrey, holds a Ph.D. in politics from Hillsdale and participated as a speaker in two of the events during the review period. Humphrey was named Vice President for Strategic Initiatives and Chief of Staff to Interim President Manny Diaz Jr. in August 2025. Note: Diaz removed Humphery as his chief of staff earlier this month.
- Other Hillsdale-affiliated speakers this year include Dr. Ronald J. Pestritto, Dr. Bill McClay, and Dr. Carl E. “Tripp” Young III, who formerly taught at Hillsdale and now leads the Davenant Institute.
A tale of two events
The report offered a side-by-side comparison to illustrate the pattern. The November 2025 event “What Caused the Change in the Youth Vote? A Bipartisan Dialogue,” organized by then-Interim President Manny Diaz, paired a former Obama administration official with a former DeSantis administration official to address a current, broadly relevant question about the 2024 election.
- By contrast, the January 2026 event titled “Debate: Church, State and the First Amendment” featured two speakers who both held conservative affiliations and had previously debated each other on a narrow legal question. The workgroup characterized this as functioning “primarily as a technical exchange within a narrow ideological context” rather than a broad public policy debate.
The footnotes in the report indicate the lone “liberal” speaker this year was invited through Diaz’s office rather than through regular OPPE staff.
Why it matters
Legal exposure. The workgroup warns that continued programming of this kind could expose UWF to legal challenges from students, faculty, or Florida taxpayers who could reasonably ask whether a publicly funded institution is serving the full public interest or a narrow set of political viewpoints.
Chilling effect. The report argues that programming heavily weighted toward one perspective creates a chilling effect on speech and inquiry for faculty and students whose views fall outside that frame—contrary to the Board of Trustees’ own training materials on institutional neutrality.
Unanswered funding questions. The workgroup did not review OPPE budget records but flagged open questions:
- Are outside speakers being reimbursed?
- What other compensation do they receive?
- From which fund is the money drawn?
With 60% of speakers invited from outside Florida, these questions take on added weight given the statute’s explicit preference for fiscal efficiency and in-state expertise.
What’s next: UWF’s statutory deadline to file its annual OPPE report with the state is September 1. The 2025–26 academic year ends with two lectures this month, including “America’s 250 Lecture” on April 16, featuring Hillsdale faculty member Dr. Bill McClay. A second April event on Spanish colonial governor Bernardo de Gálvez has been postponed.
The full workgroup report was circulated to UWF President Manny Diaz Jr. and the UWF Board of Trustees before today’s board meeting.
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