(LifeSiteNews) — An Ohio State University assistant professor has been suspended after assaulting a filmmaker who attempted to question former university vice president E. Gordon Gee.
On his Substack The Rooster, DJ Byrnes reports that he had been on campus February 10 to question Gee about his recent comments that calls to remove Ohio billionaire Les Wexner’s name from university buildings and question him under oath regarding his past relationship with dead predator Jeffrey Epstein constituted “cancel culture.”
Gee agreed to speak with Byrnes, but tensions escalated when local filmmaker “code-named Johann Geistmeister” (whom the New York Post identifies as Michael Neuman) arrived independently, camera in hand, to question Gee about student loan debt.
Bystander Luke Perez of OSU’s Salmon P. Chase Center for Civics, Culture, and Society (who had started at OSU the month before) demanded not to be filmed. When Neuman approached Gee to question him, Perez blocked his path, grabbed him and then grappled him to the ground, as captured in now-viral footage uploaded to Instagram.
Luke Perez works at the Chase Center for Civics, Culture, and Society, which was literally mandated to promote intellectual freedom and civil discourse on campus.
— IredcapI (@IredcapI) February 13, 2026
“I told you not to put that in my face,” Perez yelled before Neuman protested, “I didn’t!”
“Yes, you did! Now I’m not gonna ask you again. Don’t touch me,” Perez shot back.
“I didn’t touch you, motherf***er. Who the f*** are you?” Neuman answered. “That’s a lawsuit for sure.”
The journalists later reported the incident to OSU’s Department of Public Safety, where officers told them that the “man in the red puffer jacket,” later identified as Perez, wasn’t even present. Byrnes took this to mean that Chase Center Professor Christopher Green and founder Lee Strang had misrepresented what happened to campus police. However, both journalists had captured the altercation on video.
“That assistance apparently didn’t go far with campus police, considering that, according to the Columbus Campus Crime Log, unnamed parties are currently under investigation for disorderly conduct (insulting, taunting), criminal trespassing in a restricted area, and assault,” Byrnes writes. “Given that Johann and I were the only two parties not currently employed by Ohio State, I’ll assume that it’s not Dr. Gee, Professor Green, or Assistant Professor Perez under investigation for a bevy of charges, including criminal trespassing in a restricted area.”
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Following The Rooster’s publication of the journalists’ side of the story, OSU spokesperson Ben Johnson issued a statement.
“We are aware of the incident, and it is very concerning,” he said. “The faculty member involved has been placed on administrative leave pending a full OSUPD investigation and thorough review of the facts.”
“My client wants Perez prosecuted and terminated,” says attorney Rocky Ratliff, who is representing Neuman. “This is not the actions of an admirable professor or someone who’s professional. If the roles were reversed, he definitely would already be in jail.”
An American Association of University Professors chapter has also weighed in, saying that according to “what we know now, this incident is a vivid illustration of a larger problem – the way the Chase Center and other so-called ‘intellectual diversity’ centers have been forcibly and unnecessarily imposed on Ohio’s universities. Unfortunately, this assault – and the embarrassing actions around it – make it clear these centers aren’t really about encouraging civil discourse and intellectual diversity. AAUP-OSU is in favor of free speech for everyone on campus, not just for the ideas that politicians want to promote.”
The incident casts a troubling light on an initiative originally billed as fostering intellectual diversity over left-wing groupthink. The Chase Center was one of five “intellectual diversity” centers funded by legislation signed in 2023 by Republican Gov. Mike DeWine. Upon his selection to lead the center the following year, Strang was hailed by many as a conservative constitutional scholar.
Last year, OSU shut down its Office of Diversity and Inclusion and Center for Belonging and Social Change in response to the Trump administration’s executive order making federal education dollars contingent on not partaking in Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives.
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