SPEC's Anderson Cooper event cancelled

By Dan Spinelli 04/27/15 10:26pm

Anderson Cooper will not be speaking at Penn on Tuesday night.

The Social Planning and Events Committee announced the CNN anchor’s sudden cancellation with a post on the event’s Facebook page on Monday night.

The post attributed Cooper’s cancellation to his “contractual obligation” to cover the ongoing riots in Baltimore. On Monday night, Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan declared a state of emergency due to several days of rioting in Baltimore after the funeral of Freddie Gray, a black man who died of spinal injuries while in police custody.

“At the end of the day, Anderson Cooper is the face of CNN. It is very important that he is there to cover what’s going on,” Wharton junior and SPEC Connaissance co-Director Victoria Zhao said.

Members of SPEC Connaissance and Film, who were planning to co-host the event, were informed “around 5 p.m.” on Monday that Cooper would not be speaking. They plan to issue refunds as soon as possible to the sold-out crowd of the event. Tickets cost $5 for Penn students and $10 for members of the public, although tickets were being resold for higher values.

Cooper was scheduled to speak in Zellerbach Theatre at the Annenberg Center, which holds up to 965 people.

“If someone bought with a credit card, it can be immediately refunded. For other types of payment, [Annenberg hasn’t] gotten back to us with exactly how they’ll do it,” College junior and SPEC Secretary Roshni Amin said.

SPEC organizers repeatedly affirmed their intention to “get out refunds as soon as possible.” The group will add any updated information to Facebook, and will be available to answer questions sent to film@specevent.net or connaissance@specevents.net.

“We are working with Annenberg to really expedite that process,” Zhao said.

There are no immediate plans for Cooper to reschedule or for another speaker to take his place. “It’s too late [to replace him], and we aren’t allowed to have any events during finals week,” Amin said.

The indeterminate nature of Cooper’s stay in Baltimore because of the developing importance of the riots in that area also influenced SPEC’s decision to outright cancel the event, rather than reschedule.

Such a sudden cancellation is highly unusual for SPEC’s events. “I don’t think this has happened to SPEC in a very long time,” Amin added.

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