Report: Baccalaureate Speaker Uninvited From Morehouse College Because He Criticized Obama

Photo Credit: NatalieMaynorThe Rev. Kevin Johnson, senior pastor of Bright Hope Baptist Church in North Philadelphia, was disinvited from speaking at Morehouse College because he wrote a newspaper column critical of President Obama’s administration, according to a group of alumni.

The college denied that Friday. Efforts to reach Johnson were unsuccessful.

The controversy erupted Friday afternoon when a group called Citizens for Change issued a news release that gave the following account:

Johnson, a Morehouse alumnus, had been chosen as this year’s baccalaureate speaker, to address the college community a day before Obama’s graduation visit and commencement speech May 19.

On April 15, it said, Morehouse president John Silvanus Wilson Jr. phoned Johnson to rescind the invitation, saying he was concerned about Johnson’s recent column in the Philadelphia Tribune that said there was a scarcity of African American appointees in Obama’s cabinet and a lack of policies to reduce poverty.

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