Ted Cruz, Ramaswamy call out debate coaches who ban students from saying 'illegal immigrants': 'Disturbing'

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas., presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy and others are speaking out for students after a former high school debater exposed left wing coaches for openly identifying as Marxists and telling high schoolers that they cannot use the term "illegal immigrants."

James Fishback, the founder of Incubate Debate, told Fox News Digital in an interview that the largest debate group in the country — the National Speech & Debate Association (NSDA) — has been overtaken by a woke ideology.

"Left-wing professors, institutions can’t accept our arguments, can’t reject them on the facts — so they’re rejecting the presence of them entirely," Fishback said.

While the effects on free speech are "chilling," Fishback added, it’s actually the students who suffer most from being forced to make ideologically biased arguments in debate.

"You’re actually punishing kids and you’re saying, ‘Look, not only are you not going to win the debate, but you’re not going to get the scholarships or the college acceptances that come with winning.’"

Fishback shared his essay about high school debate on Twitter, saying that the practice changed his life but has been "hijacked by left-wing politics."

"It's no longer a competition of ideas, but an echo chamber that silences and punishes students," Fishback added.

He shared public profiles of debate judges for the NSDA, some of whom openly tell students that they will not accept certain arguments that they deem inappropriate. The NSDA did not respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital.

In 2019, national debate champion Lila Lavender’s profile described herself as "a Marxist-Leninist-Maoist" who "cannot check the revolutionary proletarian science at the door when" when judging students.

Lavender listed arguments that she will never accept from students: "fascism good, capitalism good, imperialist war good, neoliberalism good, defenses of US or otherwise bourgeois nationalism, Zionism or normalizing Israel, colonialism good, US white fascist policing good, etc."... (Read more)

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