ken starr

Former Baylor University president and chancellor Ken Starr sat down for an interview with the Texas Tribune Saturday morning, and it seems Starr learned nothing from his forced resignation earlier this year following an investigation into the school’s mishandling of sexual assault allegations.

Starr is no stranger to tone-deaf interviews, and Saturday’s talk about the Baylor sexual assault scandal was no different.

Starr most notably admonished the firing of former Head Coach Art Briles, the man whose coaching staff allegedly covered-up sexual assault claims against Baylor football players.

The Briles apology tour is already underway. It began with a sit-down interview with ESPN on Sept. 7, and now Starr is publicly throwing his support behind Briles’ redemption campaign. Of course, Starr did not help his coach by shouldering more of the blame for the school’s failings, quite the opposite really. According to Starr, the Baylor administration was not at fault.

Starr continued to reference the fact that the incidents at the heart of scandal occurred off Baylor’s campus, which to Starr lessens the school’s responsibility. It would not truly be a tone-deaf interview without a little victim blaming thrown in for good measure.

And just for good measure, Starr continued to assert his disagreement with the findings of Pepper Hamilton’s independent report on Baylor’s institutional failings.

Starr’s failure to grasp reality is not surprising but still disheartening. A man that was once in charge of a major American university still fails to recognize just how badly Baylor’s female students were failed by the school, even after being confronted with a mountain of evidence.

Starr’s non-answer to the question is really the only the answer you need.

About Ben Sieck

Ben is a recent graduate of Butler University where he served as Managing Editor and Co-Editor-in-Chief for the Butler Collegian. He currently resides in Indianapolis.