University of Colorado at Boulder officials have asked embattled professor Ward Churchill to respond in writing to questions of plagiarism and ethnicity within two weeks, Churchill said.
"My response was, 'I had hoped you'd have the integrity to drop the ethnic thing, but since you haven't, I will provide you with information that's already public record,"' said Churchill, who has asked for an extension of the deadline.
"I don't know what these guys who are supposed to be faculty members do for a living, but I teach," he said. "I can't put a response together and grade papers for 200 students in the middle of finals. Nice timing, guys."
Officials couldn't be reached at CU late Tuesday for comment.
Churchill said he was asked to respond to a report issued in March by a three-person committee that looked into his comments about Sept. 11. While the committee determined he could not be punished for his speech, they asked a faculty panel to investigate Churchill on charges of plagiarism and whether he falsely represented himself to be American Indian.
Churchill briefly spoke about the inquiry at a rally held at the CU campus Tuesday night.
The event, modeled after the Four Directions All Nations march that takes place in Denver to protest Columbus Day, gathered a vocal crowd of about 300 who sported signs such as, "Bush's actions are more outrageous than Churchill's words."
Those who gathered at the rally said they did so to support faculty of color, to protest racism and to affirm free speech.
In response, a CU spokesman handed out a statement that read in part, "The University of Colorado at Boulder has no evidence of a connection between racist incidents occurring on or near campus in recent months and the allegations against professor Ward Churchill."
Several speakers appeared, but it was Churchill the crowd was clearly there to see.
"Welcome to ground zero," Churchill said to loud cheers. "I do not back up an inch. My fight is your fight and vice versa. ... We go forward with this (expletive) committee and its process, and we defeat that."
Meanwhile, Churchill's attorney, David Lane, spoke on a panel before the Boulder chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union. He told the group that CU's investigation is a retaliation for Churchill's essay written shortly after Sept. 11 that compared some of the World Trade Center victims to Nazis.
"The Ward Churchill case is a microcosm of First Amendment analysis in America today," Lane said. "If nothing else, the Ward Churchill case is probably one of the best opportunities to teach people about the First Amendment that I have seen in my entire life."
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