CPAC Cancels Milo Yiannopoulos as Speaker Over Pedophilia Comments

Conservative group calls Breitbart editor’s Facebook response to scandal “insufficient”

Milo Yiannopoulos
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The Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) has rescinded Milo Yiannopoulos’ invitation to speak at a Wednesday conference following discovered comments from the Breitbart editor on pedophilia that  sparked outrage over the weekend.

“Due to the revelation of an offensive video in the past 24 hours condoning pedophilia, the American Conservative Union has decided to rescind the invitation of Milo Yiannopoulos to speak at the Conservative Political Action Conference,” the organization said in a statement.

“We realize that Mr. Yiannopoulos has responded on Facebook, but it is insufficient. It is up to him to answer the tough questions and we urge him to immediately further address these disturbing comments,” CPAC added.

On Sunday, recorded remarks were discovered in which Yiannopoulos said some relationships between adults and 13-year-olds are consensual. He also joked that being molested had made him good at oral sex.

The video surfaced two days after he accused transgender women of wanting to molest children during an appearance on HBO’s “Real Time With Bill Maher.”

Read CPAC’s full statement below:

Due to the revelation of an offensive video in the past 24 hours condoning pedophilia, the American Conservative Union has decided to rescind the invitation of Milo Yiannopoulos to speak at the Conservative Political Action Conference.

We realize that Mr. Yiannopoulos has responded on Facebook, but it is insufficient. It is up to him to answer the tough questions and we urge him to immediately further address these disturbing comments.

We initially extended the invitation knowing that the free speech issue on college campuses is a battlefield where we need brave, conservative standard-bearers.

Over 100 people will speak at CPAC starting on Wednesday. We give great thought to who is invited to speak, but the CPAC platform is not an endorsement of everything a speaker says or does. We continue to believe that CPAC is a constructive forum for controversies and disagreements among conservatives, however there is no disagreement among our attendees on the evils of sexual abuse of children.

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