Updated as of 6/7/24 at 1:15 p.m. ET
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Turns out there was a reason why a white Wisconsin dad disrupted his daughter’s graduation to shove the Black district superintendent...and it apparently wasn’t racism.
According to a police report obtained by TMZ, Baraboo High School parent Matthew Eddy told the Baraboo Police Department he had past issues with School District Superintendent Rainey Briggs. Because of the beef, Eddy said he didn’t want Rainey to have the “satisfaction” of shaking his daughter’s hand as she obtained her diploma.
Officers noted in the report Eddy was planning ahead of time to make a scene.
Briggs, on the other hand, was granted a restraining order against Eddy who is now ordered to have no contact with the superintendent. In his petition, Briggs claimed Eddy said, “you are not going to touch my f****** daughter.” Briggs then said in the filing that he distanced himself from Eddy but the dad allegedly continued to “push and pry” at him, per NBC News.
Eddy’s next hearing is set for June 14.
A Wisconsin high school graduation got hectic after a white student’s father disrupted the ceremony in a Karen-ish ambush against the Black superintendent. Now, folks are wondering if there was any motive behind the attack besides good ol’ racism.
The viral video of the incident shows the girl, donned in her cap and gown, walking across the stage with her diploma in hand approaching the line of administrators who stood there awkwardly waiting to shake the graduate’s hand. While she was about three administrators away from Baraboo School District Superintendent Rainey Briggs, a Black man, the student’s father enters the video’s frame from stage right and shoves the superintendent out of the way.
“That’s my daughter. I don’t want her touching him,” the father is heard saying.
In response, Briggs is heard off-camera ordering the father to get his hands off him. The rest of the debacle is out of frame but whatever happened was enough to temporarily pause the graduation, leaving the student frozen in shock and visibly embarrassed on the stage. Now, what reason would this white man have to physically attempt to separate his daughter from a Black school official?
State Rep. Francesca Hong told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel it was just plain racist.
“Unless there was another deliberate reason to why he would do that, there was nobody else he pushed out of the way,” said Hong. She also made a statement on X (Twitter) calling the incident a display of “gross and racist” conduct.
Unlike most Karens, this one definitely faced some consequences to his actions.
Here’s the district’s response to the incident via WKOW:
According to a statement from the district, the parent involved had a graduating senior at Baraboo High School. Law enforcement referred a disorderly conduct charge against them to the Sauk County District Attorney’s Office.
A district spokesperson said the Baraboo School Resource Officer (SRO) as well as two off-duty officers at the graduation ceremony “promptly assisted in managing the situation.” Police escorted the parent off stage and out of the venue.
“We would like to emphasize that the safety and well-being of our students, staff, and community members is a top priority... The School District of Baraboo is taking this incident very seriously.”
Eddy must appear in the Sauk County Circuit Court in August, according to the Journal Sentinel. His next hearing is set for June 14.
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