Florida Tech President Admits ‘Tweaking the Language’ of ‘DEI Courses’ to Bypass DeSantis-Backed Ban and Secure $7 Million in Taxpayer Funding

[Excerpt]

UNKNOWN MALE: “I’m with the O’Keefe Media Group and we’re doing a story and we have someone who secretly recorded a meeting in your office talking about DEI and exposed that you were changing the words.”
[Clip starts]
NICKLOW: “We’re seeing specific projects being pulled, because they have the words in executive summary, ‘climate change’ and ‘environmental. ‘I mean this got to me personally, this is kind of my research. If you go to the federal government right now, and seek funding for this work, and they talk a lot about climate change impacts on manatees et cetera, it won’t be funded. If you word it as surveillance or defense, you’ll probably get money.”
[Clip ends]
O’KEEFE: “One of the individuals who worked here had a meeting with the president in his office with all of his senior staff and recorded the president a man named John Nicklow talking about changing the wording to get around the presidential executive order in order not to lose funding.”
[Clip starts]
O’KEEFE: “Can I show you that clip real quick? Just —”
NICKLOW: “That’s not true. No, no, that’s not true at all.”
O’KEEFE: “It’s not true?”
NICKLOW: “No.”
[Clip ends]
O’KEEFE: “In the meeting that was covertly recorded, Nicklow discussed a meeting that appeared to be with Governor Ron DeSantis or some high up state official in Tallahassee. Nicklow describes in that meeting that he obtained $7 million in funding.”
[Clip starts]
NICKLOW: “But how this really came up to me, is I was in Tallahassee, so I had a seven million dollar ask. We talked about the project, we literally sat at his desk and turned two screens around and said, ‘Why are you so woke?’ And he pulled out two examples, and, uh, one was ICCM. And I called Rich on the way home, kind of tweaked the language. And said, ‘These people are just looking for words, OK.’“
[Clip ends]
O’KEEFE: “Where sources say the duplicity came in is an after that meeting the president of the university went against the deal and then said he was going to fight back with the $7 million.”
[Clip starts]
NICKLOW: “Part of me on the drive back thinking about this, ‘Why Don’t We fight back?’ It’s $7 million. It’s a lot of money if I lose $7 million. We can live with it, we can live it. And if we have to change some words so they’re not being scraped, and — and so we’re not targeted, it allows us to do our work.”
[Clip ends]
O’KEEFE: “And I was walking in the president’s office and trying to make an appointment, and then the president was walking out, while I was walking in about to leave, I caught up with him and he said, ‘This is illegal. I’m going to contact my attorney.’ It’s not illegal to record. There’s nothing illegal about recording.”
[Clip starts]
O’KEEFE: “I have it on video. I have it on video on my iPad.”
NICKLOW: “Why was it illegally recorded? Nobody told me this.”
O’KEEFE: “I don’t think it’s illegal.”
NICKLOW: “Ummm —”
O’KEEFE: “There’s a — there’s a — there’s a First Amendment issue here.”
NICKLOW: “I’m going to have you talk to my attorney.”
O’KEEFE: “Your attorney?”
NICKLOW: “Yeah, yeah.”
O’KEEFE: “Is he here?”
NICKLOW: “Absolutely.”
[Clip ends]
O’KEEFE: “On the eve of publishing this recording we were sent a cease and desist letter by this law firm. We’ve called the lawyer and are waiting to hear back.”