In this opinion piece, I will explain why a gay wedding is not like Steve Bannon, and how making money off an event featuring Bannon imparts responsibility for spreading his messages – which have historically included disinformation and threats of violence.
But first, a little background.
In our March 28 edition, we ran an article about a Colorado GOP gala featuring Steve Bannon as keynote speaker. Our article came out ahead of the event itself and covered how the event was first moved from a venue in Denver to the Antlers hotel in Colorado Springs due to objections from community members against Bannon. For the same reason, the Antlers opted to cancel the event; it then moved to the Phil Long Music Hall.
Protestors organized to demonstrate opposition to Bannon outside the event; online, they posted their opinions about the Bannon event on various forums, some vowing to never support Phil Long Dealership or any of the various companies owned by JW Roth whose public Facebook page intro reads, “JW Roth is CEO/Chairman of Venu Holding Corporation (Ford and Sunset Amphitheaters), Chairman of Roth Industries, co-founder of PPMC, the CS Independent and CS Business Journal. JW is a YMCA Board Member and a Titan on the Colorado Springs EDC Council.”
But others supported the event and attendees purchased tickets costing a minimum of $150.
When someone advocates for political violence … they don’t get a space on our platform.
In our article, we noted that the Phil Long Music Hall was owned by Roth, as is the Colorado Springs Independent, a bi-weekly publication sometimes called the Indy. We reported that we had reached out for comment from staff on the owner’s decision to host Bannon but either had not gotten a response or the staff member had declined to comment.
The Independent ran a story on the Bannon event titled “Phil Long Music Hall owner defends renting venue to Colorado GOP for event featuring far-right firebrand” with the byline “staff report” (an interesting choice, as that is typically done when running a press release from an official source, like city government, involving no original reporting – or when a reporter doesn’t want their name on a story).
Here is an excerpt from that article:
I’m also not going to be pressured by the far left not to rent my venue to a legitimate far-right cause that’s holding a private event,” [Roth] said. “I will not participate in cancel culture.”
Roth explained he will rent the venue to anyone with $10,000, including conservatives, liberals, Christians, communists, atheists and everyone in between. He said the hall was previously rented out to Colorado Governor Jared Polis for his State of the State address in 2021, as well as for a same-sex marriage ceremony. Some conservatives at the time, Roth claims, weren’t happy with that and let him know about it.
“I had people calling me going, J.W., why are you hosting a gay wedding? And my point was this: I’m not hosting a gay wedding. [Just like] I’m not hosting Steve Bannon. The GOP is hosting Steve Bannon,” he said.
I wish this didn’t need to be said, but apparently it does: a gay wedding is not in any way like a Steve Bannon event. The legal and spiritual joining of two consenting adults is not equivalent to an event featuring a man who has explicitly called for political violence; Bannon was booted off of YouTube, Twitter and Spotify because he called for the beheading of Dr. Anthony Fauci, former director of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and Christopher Wray, former head of the Federal Bureau of Investigation – though a new account for Bannon’s WarRoom show was created after Elon Musk bought Twitter and re-branded it as X.
As noted in our March 28 article, Bannon has his own page on the Anti-Defamation League website. I encourage you to look there if you want to know why Steve Bannon is so controversial and considered dangerous by many. (ADL.org/resources/article/steve-bannon-five-things-know).
I do not believe you can pocket a five-figure sum to host an event but refuse any responsibility along with it, and I’m talking morally if not legally here. If you know a person advocates for political violence (or should know, because this information is widely available and easy to find) and you accept thousands of dollars from an organization that is giving that person a big, legitimizing platform – you are a part of spreading that person’s message, and to pretend otherwise is disingenuous.
There is always a gray area to navigate when it comes to free speech, and this is true for owners of event venues and of media outlets – of which Roth is notably both. I don’t own an amphitheater or a music hall or a media company like Roth does, but as someone with experience being both an editor and a publisher, I’m well acquainted with the dilemmas that can arise in giving a platform to a wide range of opinions. I cherish free speech and I want a diversity of thought in our pages – and I realize this diversity will include ideas and assertions with which I disagree deeply. I know well the challenge of welcoming alternative viewpoints while keeping out “alternative facts.”
But when someone advocates for political violence, when someone advocates for murder, it’s an easy call. They don’t get a space on our platform. We don’t take their money or money from their promoters. And we shine a light on those that do.
Bulletin removed from Independent racks
After our March 28 Bannon story ran, the Bulletin received a phone call from the Independent informing us that we would no longer be allowed to share the approximately 20 distribution racks, which had been an outlet for the Bulletin for years, and any Bulletin newspapers found on them would be thrown away by the Independent. The staff member cited the article as a reason for terminating the rack-sharing arrangement.
We have since acquired more distribution racks to distribute the Bulletin without using the Independent’s racks.
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