Over multiple nights last August, hundreds of protesters gathered outside the Phi Gamma Delta house in Lincoln, Nebraska, and demanded the university ban the fraternity following reports that a member allegedly raped a 17-year-old girl. “Kick them out!” and “No means no!” students chanted during demonstrations that attracted national media and brought protests to Phi Gamma Delta chapters elsewhere.
The fury prompted University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) administrators to shut down the Greek organization—more commonly known as Fiji—pending an investigation into the alleged sexual assault. UNL later suspended the frat’s operations through 2026 over violations stemming from alcohol use.
Now Fiji is fighting back in a bizarre lawsuit that accuses university officials of retaliating against them because of members’ support of former President Trump.
The federal complaint alleges the university has wrongfully targeted the frat since the January 2017 Women’s March that occurred in cities across the country following Trump’s inauguration. UNL Chancellor Ronnie Green and Andrea Barefield, the director of Student Conduct & Community Standards, are listed as defendants in the suit.
The lawsuit claims UNL administrators “engaged in a pattern of retaliatory conduct based on the Chapter and its members’ political viewpoints and political speech” and were part of an effort to “punish” Fiji for supporting Trump.
A university spokeswoman told The Daily Beast the school does not comment on pending litigation.
On January 21, 2017, Fiji members unfurled the president’s campaign banners from a balcony of their frat house and chanted, “Trump, Trump, Trump” as women marchers passed them, according to the complaint.
At the time, some marchers claimed the frat boys yelled other vulgarities including, “No means yes,” referring to sex without consent, and asked female demonstrators whether their female genitalia was blue, in reference to the Democratic Party. (Fiji denies its members made such statements.)
The lawsuit, filed on Feb. 18, claims the 2017 Women’s March was the beginning of a pattern of discipline against Fiji. Some march participants complained to Green and university brass, who then launched a Title IX investigation and suspended the frat. “While behavior outside the fraternity during the Women’s March attracted public attention, our investigation has shown broader conduct issues at the fraternity,” Juan Franco, the former vice chancellor for student affairs, said in a February 2017 statement.
One month later, Franco announced Fiji would be suspended until 2020 because of a pattern of behavior including “reckless alcohol use, hazing and inappropriate sexually based behavior, including a pattern of sexually harassing conduct.”
Franco added: “While not the focal point of the suspension, comments made by Fiji members Jan. 21 outside the fraternity house during a women’s march were consistent with the pattern of sexually harassing conduct evident in multiple other incidents.”
Fiji’s suspension was lifted in spring of 2019, the complaint says. But the troubled frat was put on probation in 2021 following accusations of underage drinking.
The fraternity was ultimately shuttered in August 2021, when a 17-year-old college student reported that she’d been raped by a 19-year-old member of the group, on the night of the first day of classes. The alleged rape occurred just before 4 a.m. on Aug. 24.
Student newspaper The Daily Nebraskan reported that the girl told police that she and an 18-year-old female acquaintance went to the frat party together. She said the friend left before the alleged assault but ended up driving her to the hospital afterward.
The investigation into the alleged rape is still ongoing, a university spokeswoman told The Daily Beast.
Last October, the Lincoln Journal-Star reported that the 19-year-old male student had left campus and hadn’t been charged by university police or any other agency.
In its lawsuit, Fiji appears to deny the assault ever took place. “In the early morning hours of August 24, 2021, rumors began circulating on social media that stated, among other things, that a female University freshman was sexually assaulted at the Chapter House,” the court filing states. “The Fiji Plaintiffs are unaware of who initiated these rumors. To the Fiji Plaintiffs’ knowledge, these rumors are untrue.”
According to its lawsuit, Fiji says its chapter and members “condemn sexual assault” and reached out to university police to assist in the recent sexual assault investigation. “Thereafter, the evidence gathered from this cooperation was used to charge the Chapter with violations of the University’s alcohol policy in direct contravention of the University’s Title IX policy,” the complaint states.
The frat’s complaint alleges Green and Barefield violated their First Amendment rights to freedom of speech and freedom of association, and their Fourteenth Amendment right with respect to deprivation of property and liberty without due process.
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