The Trent Central Student Association (TCSA) are calling for strong reprisals in response to a March 19th incident in which Peterborough mayor Jeff Leal employed a racist, anti-Black slur during a guest lecture in a Trent University Business class.

Media and the public were first made aware of the incident on the morning of Tuesday, April 8th, when the mayor’s office posted a public apology for “quot[ing] a historical remark attributed to former U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson from his time as a congressman in the 1930s” which “included a racial slur that is deeply offensive and hurtful.”

An audio subsequently obtained by Arthur on Wednesday, April 9th not only revealed the specific epithet the mayor had employed—which had been the source of much speculation on social media to that point—but also showed that the mayor’s use of the extreme anti-Black word was not, in fact, a direct quotation from Lyndon B. Johnson.

In the recording of the mayor’s guest lecture in ADMN-2010H, Leal can be heard saying, during the middle of a lengthy digression, that “[Johnson] used this language that you would never use today, and he talked about poor n****rs and Mexicans that he taught Sunday school to.”

Neither the mayor or his office has publicly commented on the incident since the April 8th apology, which was issued before the audio surfaced. 

“The Trent Central Student Association is deeply saddened by the actions of Peterborough Mayor Jeff Leal when visiting our campus,” an April 9th statement from the Association reads. The union representing Trent University’s undergraduate student body is calling for more direct and actionable response from both the university and the City of Peterborough.

In the Association’s statement, the student union’s Executive team call on Trent to guarantee the mayor will not be invited back to campus, mandate anti-racism/equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) training to be conducted for guest speakers by a BIPOC member of university staff, and to screen all future guest speakers who are invited to speak on campus.

In an April 8th statement from Trent University—issued the same day as the mayor’s apology—Trent had promised to “extend our equity, diversity, inclusion, and anti-Black racism training to invited speakers,” but made no indication that such training would be mandatory.

Additionally, the Student Association is calling on the city to conduct an integrity commissioner review of Leal’s conduct, and to amend the city’s Strategic Plan to more prominently include anti-racism and race relations as a strategic priority of the plan’s Community and Wellbeing pillar.

TCSA President, Iyiola Alade, added that the Association had already filed a complaint with the city’s integrity commissioner on April 7th, as previously reported by the Peterborough Examiner. 

This would be Leal’s second integrity commissioner investigation, in addition to the still-outstanding complaint about his comments directed to councilor Alex Bierk that he would “carve [Bierk] like a Thanksgiving turkey.”

In an email, Alade told Arthur “I'm pleased to let you know that the TCSA was the one who brought this concern to the university administration's attention on March 23rd and has since been in close conversations with the university to find an equitable path forward.”

In the April 9th statement, the Student Association announced that they would be holding a sit-in on Monday, April 28th, at 5:00 PM outside of Peterborough City Hall in protest of the mayor’s conduct.

“[W]e invite Trent students and Peterborough community members to join us,” the statement reads. “We urge Peterborough residents to consider the values of the people representing them.”

While the revelation of the mayor’s behaviour has drawn outrage from Trent University students, and while many have lauded the Association’s initiative in organizing the sit-in response, some students raised concerns about the lateness of the Association’s response effort.

In reply to a comment on the Association’s Instagram post promoting the sit-in which asks “why is the sit-in so late??” the official TCSA Instagram account (@thetcsa) claimed that “the next city council meeting isn’t until then. [April 28th]”

Another commonly cited concern is the sit-in’s coincidence with the federal election date. Multiple comment threads on the TCSA’s raise the issue, to which the Association’s account replied with the claim that April 28th was the date of the next scheduled council meeting.

In response to one student expressing concern about the overlap between the sit-in and the election date, TCSA VP Health & Wellness, Kyra Myderwyk, encouraged students concerned about the timing to make use of advanced polls on campus, which were made available between April 13th and 16th as part of Elections Canada’s Vote on Campus program.

In response to a request for comment from Arthur regarding student’s concerns about the overlap between the sit-in and the election, Alade reiterated Myderwyk’s comments, saying “The TCSA is hosting its sit-in at City Hall to coincide with the next City Council meeting. While it is not ideal that this is the same day as election day, students are encouraged to vote at our advanced polls on campus from April 13th to 16th, which are open to all students (on and off campus) or after the sit-in as polls are open until 8:30 pm.”

Peterborough City Council met in General Committee last week, on Tuesday, April 22nd, for the first time since the public revelation of Leal’s remarks. No mention was made of either Leal’s comments or the subsequent apology.

Roy Brady, the sole delegate in the Council Meeting immediately following General Committee, impugned council’s decision to meet in closed session beforehand to discuss land acquisitions, and did not mention Leal’s comments.

No members of the Trent Central Student Association were present to post a delegation to council.

The delay between the Association’s formal complaint to Trent on March 23rd and the public apology from the mayor’s office (and subsequently Trent) on April 8th leaves a number of questions unanswered about the seriousness of both party’s response—much to the frustration of students in the class.

While correspondence from ADMN-2010H students indicates that university staff besides the course’s instructor may have known about the incident as early as March 20th, it is unclear why it took the university so long to issue a statement on the matter.

In response to a request for comment from the mayor’s office on April 9th as to why the mayor had not issued a response sooner, Leal’s Executive Assistant, Jeremy Istead, said that “The Mayor previously provided an apology to the class, about two weeks ago, through the instructor,” but provided no other indication why it took until April 8th for a public statement to be made.

Arthur has submitted a Freedom of Information request to Trent University for correspondence relating to the mayor’s use of the racial slur and the university’s subsequent public statement, but has not heard back from the university’s Secretariat at this time.

While the response from students and alumni has been overwhelmingly critical of Leal’s actions, and supportive of the Association’s initiative, a few students have seized the opportunity to defend his use of the word in seemingly bad faith.

“I stand with mayor jeff,” one comment from an Instagram user named “jake G” reads. “What a bunch of fucking snowflakes.”

Another commenter named “sebbydiggs” claimed to know Leal personally, and called him a “Great family man” who “Cares for the neighbour.”

“Sad to see people trying to crucify a good man for using a word in context to describing history,” user @sebbydiggs continued.

In response to another user commenting that “a ‘good man’ should not be saying the N word in any context,” sebbydiggs said “tell that to Samuel L. Jackson, a black [sic] man who directed Django Unchained.”

Django Unchained was directed by Quentin Tarantino, who is caucasian. 

While Jackson does star in the film, he is fourth billed beneath two other Black actors. The film’s titular leading role is played by Jamie Foxx.

The Trent Central Student Association’s sit-in starts at 5:00 PM tonight outside of Peterborough City Hall.

Peterborough City Council will meet tonight at 4:30 in closed session before a 6:00 PM public meeting, the full agenda for which can be found here.

No members of the Trent Central Student Association are registered to speak to council.