Local College Students, Faculty Will Not Comply: ‘We Are Not Giving Up; We Will Fight This’

Her name is Michele Bailey. After 27 years as a professor of nutrition, health and wellness, and fitness at Ventura Col­lege, she will be forced from her position at the end of the fall semester because she will not take the COVID-19 experimen­tal gene therapy.

“I decided I was going to fight,” Bai­ley told the Conejo Guardian, “and what was I fighting for? Number one is free­dom of choice because what they [the college] are doing is unconstitutional, and number two, I want more research.”

Bailey is one of thousands of local workers, students and others determined to resist what they deem medical tyran­ny and clear government overreach. In a letter to the Ventura County Commu­nity College District (VCCCD), submit­ted prior to her official resignation from Ventura College, the former Air Force captain and NASA researcher stated her position: “I am vehemently opposed to this mandate on the grounds of it violat­ing the freedom to choose what is best for one’s body.”

She continued, “The mandate is un­constitutional, and I took an oath as a service member (a vow I hold dear to this day) to serve my country, to preserve and protect our freedoms, and to uphold the constitution. As such, I cannot in good conscience or faith condone such man­dates.”

Bailey, a wife and mother of three, contracted the coronavirus in August after her 20-year-old daughter became quite ill. The family’s longtime physician re­fused to prescribe ivermectin at Bailey’s re­quest, which she believes prolonged her illness for more than 17 days. She re­covered after seeking out another doc­tor and get­ting a partial prescription for ivermec­tin.

In her letter, Bailey calls for greater investigations into how the “vaccines” — which are actually a new type of gene therapy, not a traditional vaccine — function, including the role of mRNA technology, noting that “early indications on the CDC VAERS [Vaccine Ad­verse Effects Reporting System] and recent research show rea­son for concern of myocarditis, blood clots, neurological issues, autoimmune and cancer re­surgence, in­fertility, early death, etc.”

Bailey’s letter has circulated locally and beyond Cal­ifornia. She told the Cone­jo Guard­ian she has heard from numerous lo­cal students and instructors who are simi­larly refusing the experimental gene therapy and are frustrated at the injustice of the require­ment. Indeed, resistance to the district-wide mandate that ini­tially required students and staff to receive the shots by October 15 or face disenrollment and/or termination has been steadily increasing at several colleges in the greater Conejo Valley com­munity.

Devastation Before Graduation
Roughly 50,000 students and staff are impacted by the mandate, and rising opposi­tion has forced the elected, five-member board of Ventura County Community College District (VCCCD) to walk back its unanimously approved deci­sion to enforce the mandate and instead require students refus­ing the experimental treatment at Moorpark, Oxnard and Ven­tura Community Colleges to undergo twice-weekly COVID testing to finish the fall semes­ter.

“People are being forced into [taking the experimental gene therapy] because the stress is too much,” second-year nurs­ing student “Julie” (not her real name) at Moorpark College told the Conejo Guardian.

Julie explained that her husband and two children relo­cated from Moorpark to Reno to “have a better life” and that she stayed behind to finish the school program. Julie said she contracted the coronavirus last summer and has the antibodies to prove it, though Moorpark College has refused to accept a COVID antibody test as proof of immunity.

“Now there are nights when I don’t sleep because my 48-hour [COVID] test results hav­en’t come in, and I have to get that negative test so I can go into clinicals,” she explained.

In a statement released Oc­tober 4, the district confirmed that “for the Spring 2022 se­mester starting in January, all students coming to campus will be required to be vaccinated against COVID-19, or have an approved medical or religious exemption.”
VCCCD is directing stu­dents to register for online courses if they have not received the experimental gene therapy by the time the spring semester begins.

Exemptions are theoreti­cally possible, but those seeking an exemption are being made to provide reasons compelling enough to persuade a commit­tee led by other students and staff. This committee assesses the request and determines if, in their view, a person scores high enough on a point-based rubric system to exempt him or her from the experimental gene therapy requirement. The com­plex rubric requires a student to submit a personal statement detailing his or her specific re­ligious basis for an exemption, along with additional “doctrinal text citations” from a clergy’s supporting letter, which is also required. Low rubric scores are denied the exemption, while higher scores lead to “further discussion with team to reach a final conclusion.”

Those evaluating exemption eligibility also are allegedly privy to students’ private information.

“Personal information is not redacted from the forms,” said Julie, who is close to the process.

As of September 29, some in the nursing program at Moorpark College were still un­sure if their exemptions would be honored by the hospitals where they intern. Two students who spoke anonymously to the Conejo Guardian said, “They [the hospitals] can yank this op­portunity away from us…. They call us guests in their hospital, and they decide what we can and can’t do…. We should have the opportunity for an equal ed­ucation. If these hospitals aren’t accepting us, we need to find somewhere else where we can finish our program.”

The Guardian sought com­ment from Christina Lee, direc­tor of the nursing program at Moorpark College, but Lee did not make herself available.

Thrown Overboard
In September, Prof. Bailey attended a town hall meeting held by the VCCCD board, where members discussed the benefits of a “highly vaccinat­ed” campus, confirming what she already suspected: If she did not comply with the exper­imental gene therapy mandate by December 17, she would be fired, and a replacement teacher would be installed.

“After 27 years, because I wouldn’t get a vaccine, I am re­placeable,” she said with obvious sadness on the day the district told her she would have to take the shots or be fired. “I put in my resignation for December 17. I said, ‘I’m done, but I’m still going to fight this.’”

Bailey will teach until the end of December and will con­tinue to speak against the man­dates. She intends to start a group to support like-minded college-based patriots. Char­lie Kirk of Turning Point USA, who received a copy of Bailey’s letter, has offered to support students and staff fighting the forced gene therapies. He wrote to Bailey, “I encourage you to find locals in the area and gath­er them together. Make Ventura a national news story.”

“I am willing to lead and guide,” Bailey told the Guard­ian, “and there is strength in numbers. Talking to people ev­ery day helps us all say, yes, I can still stand. I can make it another day.”

As one nursing student told the Guardian, “We are not giv­ing up. We will fight this.”