LBCC’s Associated Student Body (ASB) President Priince Bass accused The Viking of being anti-student and misrepresenting Black students when confronted about a text message sent to a reporter where he labeled most petitioners on campus as “panhandlers,” and said “we have raised it (petitioners) as a safety threat with student affairs,” on Tuesday night, in response to an article about a signature gatherer getting assaulted in front of the LAC library.
Bass told The Viking he did not want his initial texts to the reporter published, but The Viking made no assurances to him that they would not run when he sent the initial texts or when he later said he did not want them to run.
Screenshots of the initial set of texts sent to a reporter by LBCC ASB President Priince Bass, in response to story published about a signature gatherer getting pushed and having his belongings taken, on Tuesday.
“Okay, first I’d like to say there’s been a gross misrepresentation of Black students in the school media, in the newspaper and just media in general, right? It’s the culture. It’s not the school’s culture, it’s the media’s culture, but our school is so diverse, and as I go through this newspaper and look through the newspaper, each page is not many, it’s not any Black students,” Bass said in an over-the-phone interview, intended to clarify his text messages.
Bass called attention to page five of the fall semester’s second print issue, which included a story about LBCC’s HBCU Caravan event, claiming that due to other stories in the print issue, they did not leave enough space for Black students.
“And then you get to the page where the Black college recruit fair for transfer, which was the biggest event for our Black students who are trying to feel belong, they’re trying to close these equity gaps. There’s no pictures of that beautiful encouraging event. I mean, we have an airplane landing that didn’t land on campus, but we have pictures of that and the police officers, right? But those take up so much room that there’s no room for any Black students, any Black schools or anything on this page. So, I know that our staff at the newspaper is so diverse and intellectual and so quick when it comes to putting up news, but we’re just assuming that there is a blind spot when it comes to Black students, as if they are invisible, and we want the newspaper’s help to become more visible at the school. Because part of the culture, that’s part of the Viking culture, that was part, that was voted in 1927 when the school had zero diversity. No, it was only white students, no Blacks were allowed, no Asians, no Hispanics. This is the culture we need to change, right? Because so when I receive pushback and resistance to saying, hey, why is, why do you care about an inclusive mascot?,” Bass said.
Bass is currently spearheading the movement to change the LBCC mascot from Ole the Viking to a dolphin named “D.A.N.I.E.,” an acronym for “diversity, accessibility, neutrality, inclusion, equity,” according to its Instagram page.
Bass denied knowledge of the Instagram page before Nov. 18 in an interview with a reporter.
On Wednesday, the account was seen passionately responding to comments made on an Instagram post by news outlet Long Beach Post about the want of mascot change.
The account has Bass’ online survey for the mascot change linked to its bio, as well as multiple posts that repeatedly advocate for the change.
Bass claimed that he did not create the account himself.
“All my information is public record and I’ve sent all my information to dozens of people, but no, that’s cool. This is my survey like this is the information,” Bass said.
During the initial phone call, The Viking tried to redirect Bass to clarify his texts that said, “Most of them are panhandlers, they always say it. ‘Why are you bothering me I’m just getting these signatures to get paid?’ I don’t have anywhere to live. Someone gave me a job and sent me here,’” and “I have to make sure we are not enabling the threats we have on campus,” reporters were told not to interrupt him.
Bass abruptly ended the 30-minute call where he did not leave room for reporters to speak or ask follow-up questions, and called back about an hour later.
In the later call, Bass said that his original statement wasn’t intended to infringe on anyone’s rights.
“That wasn’t the basis off of it and it wasn’t my idea because, you know guys, I’m supportive of civil rights and supporting the petitions or whatever person wants to do, just, free rights, right? We are highly, highly in support of that. Nobody would ever infringe on anybody’s right to petition,” Bass said.
When asked to clarify what the threat was, he shared that students have voiced concerns about the signature gatherers being aggressive and said that “some students say, ‘I didn’t know that I could turn it down. I thought they were at the school and I had to help.’”
Within Bass’ original text message, he stated that he told a petitioner, but did not clarify who, that “it’s my responsibility to look and protect my students however I can and if you’re getting paid $3 per signature and your making student sign 5, 6 times and misleading them while they give you all of there personal information, name, address birthday email I wanted to know the purpose.”
He then stated in the call, “There’s no crime in being aggressive and getting petitions signed and actually, I found out there’s no crime in lying to get petitions signed, right? So once again, these are all civil rights. We don’t care, I support it.”
Bass’ first of three follow up texts sent on Tuesday, before the call, claimed his belief that signature gatherers, or petitioners, were casing LBCC students.
“There have been a string of crimes directly associated with these petitions: we have raised it as a safety threat with student affairs because the are exploiting our students ; taking there information and casing them. If you read any of the petitions they are not valid and they as misleading students to sign it . I should have told you all about this last month but was told that they are under investigation,” Bass said in the message.
His verbal response regarding the text, in its entirety, was that it was not towards petitioners as a whole, but claimed it was specific towards an isolated incident that involved a Black student getting his diamond chain stolen, which Bass did not witness.
Bass said the man who stole the chain was recognized by another student as someone who was collecting signatures earlier that day, and the petitioner was under investigation.
“Towards the evening, when it got darker outside, around 5:30, 6 o’clock, one of the guys that was with the group of petitioners, they saw, one of, there was a, a student standing. His name was Oscar. He used to be a president of Umoja. His name is Oscar and Brian Burten was out there. And while they were standing there talking, one of the guys that was a petitioner that they remembered from earlier, grabbed Oscar’s diamond necklace off his neck and took it from him and ran away. Right? Oscar tried to chase him. A couple other people tried to chase the guy, couldn’t get a hold of him. Now, when they confronted the other petitioners, ‘hey, that guy, that guy that you guys are with, took this dude’s chain,’ They all instantly said, ‘we don’t know him, we don’t know who he is. He’s not our guy, dot, dot, dot. We have nothing to do with him.’ Right? That’s one incident,” Bass said.
Bass shared that the student did not file the report, but that an officer filed for the student.
Campus police officer Kevin Stinson, who did not file the report, confirmed that there was an open investigation for the specific suspect, but “we (the police) had no knowledge of hearing that he (the suspect) was a petitioner.”
Bass said he would not be able to pick the man who stole Oscar’s necklace out of a lineup because he was not there when the incident happened.
“I don’t know any of these people personally, and I don’t know who was affiliated with who, right? So I don’t, I just, when the dude’s chain got snatched that night, the only witnesses were like the officers and the students that were there. I was not there that night. Right? But when they saw it, but when these people saw these specific students, again, they said, ‘oh, those are the guys.’ Once again, I didn’t take pictures of them. I didn’t get their names or emails. I couldn’t pick them out of a lineup. … I don’t want to infringe on the investigation that’s going on with the police officers by saying that they are affiliated or not when I literally would be lying. If I do, like I can only be honest with you. So I have no idea if these people are affiliated or not affiliated,” Bass said.
LBCC’s head of PR Stacey Toda sent an emailed statement, after denying requests for live interviews on the subject, regarding Bass’s initial text messages and if there was an ongoing investigation regarding all the petitioners on campus, due to how Bass worded his initial message.
“Long Beach City College allows members of the public, including petition gatherers, to be on campus in designated areas as permitted by law. At this time, Long Beach City College has no active investigations concerning petition gatherers. Statements made by individual students or student leaders do not represent the official position of Long Beach City College. LBCC remains committed to maintaining a respectful and inclusive environment for everyone on our campuses,” the statement read.
The Viking reached out to LBCC President Mike Munoz directly, before receiving the emailed LBCC statement, requesting an interview with the context of Bass’ initial messages, but was unable to talk due to a busy schedule.
“I’m sorry but I am scheduled through the day with meetings and hosting our employee holiday party this afternoon. Since this is a matter involving the ASB President you may want to connect with Dr. Corral Vice President of Student Services since ASB is under his purview. If not please continue to work with Stacey to see if we can find time tomorrow,” Munoz said in his text message.
A voicemail requesting an interview with Corral was left for Toda, but The Viking only received the written statement as the official response from LBCC.
The Viking gave the administration a second chance to comment on Thursday, but did not hear back from Toda.
Bass said he does not feel responsible for the students’ lack of knowledge when it came to signing petitions, saying “absolutely not” when asked.
When asked why he advocated that students deserved to know what they were signing, he responded with, “No, I’m saying we’re college students. These are college students, we’re educated students. This is higher education. This is education, right? This is an educational place. This is a school, right? Right. So, there’s nothing wrong with a person having more knowledge. Are you anti, is this an anti-education question or anti-knowledge, or is this one of those things where like turn the other cheek, right? You know how back in the day when stuff would happen at homes and if everybody was to speak about it, then we just ignore it for generations. Is it one of those things where even if we know what they’re doing, we might not, they might not be doing the thing, let’s justify it. Is that the way you’re trying to ask? Because I can give you that angle and support you on that angle in a way that justifies the petitioners being rude and belligerent, and one of them assaulting and stealing something from a student, if you’re on their side, but I thought you were in support of the students.
He later said, “If y’all gonna just, you aren’t gonna communicate, at least represent us. It represents students, the students concerned, the people, like, don’t seem like y’all, like, sometimes the paper seems anti-student. I’m like, dang, like, I thought this was our school. I thought it was our school.”
Bass’ original message to the reporter on Tuesday said, “Internally there have been discussions to put signage around campus warning them not to give out all of their personal information to people if there are unaware of the source or what they are signing. It could lead to extreme liability, if one of our students gets seriously hurt or exploited.”
Bass told The Viking that the Dean of Student Affairs Deborah Miller-Calvert approved putting up signage around the school warning students to be aware of what they’re signing, stating he knew wasn’t supposed to share the information.
When asked about Bass wanting petitioners to not be allowed on campus due to student safety concerns and included the mention of the First Amendment right that allows freedom to petition, especially on a public campus, Bass responded, “Once again, I love that we know our rights, right? But once again, don’t our students have a right to feel safe on campus? Once again, I don’t feel like I’m — y’all are anti-student. Y’all are so anti-student. I don’t even know who I’m talking to sometimes. I feel like I’m talking to like one of the uppers at the school because y’all sound anti-student right now. Y’all sound very anti-student, as if you aren’t a student, as if you are not.”
He then repeated that he was supportive of civil rights and was asked what his preferred plan of action was, regarding the isolated incident of necklace theft, and responded “I don’t have any preference on what to happen, like I’m not a judger or an executioner. I just highlighted the concern and I just exposed it and put spotlight on it. However, the school wants to go about doing, finding the most safe way to do things with students, it’s completely up to them, but it’s very far in between me because I’m super pro-speech and pro-protest and pro-petition.”
Bass referred to the initial messages sent to the reporter as “passionate, but misguided.”
“It’s not my responsibility and honestly, the message I said was just might have been passionate, but it was misguided. It was misguided. It was just a little too passionate, right? It was just a little too passionate. It was actually just a reaction to the fake news or the misinformation that was put out on The Viking engagement,” Bass said, who claimed in the text messages that the signature gatherer in front of the library was not pushed, despite what the police told The Viking.
After the over-the-phone interview with The Viking, Bass, an elected government official, sent multiple text messages saying he did not consent to The Viking publishing his messages sent to the reporter.
“I don’t want the text messages to be posted , my phone autocorrected a lot of works (words) and it’s out of context . It started filling its own words as I read it back . The clarification of my statements shall justify. I don’t give my consent to use the text messages,” the first post-call text message read. “The text messages don’t fully express or accurately express my concerns.”
The post-call text messages are shown below.
Screenshots of the text messages sent to reporters after two over-the-phone interviews by on Wednesday.
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