Cherokee County teacher at center of Trump t-shirt flap resigns
CHEROKEE COUNTY, Ga. - The Cherokee County teacher suspended after being caught on video telling two students to turn their Trump “Make America Great Again” t-shirts inside out resigned Wednesday.
Lyn Orletsky was on placed on paid leave mid-September after the video surfaced on Turning Point News. Orletsky was a math teacher at River Ridge High School in Woodstock.
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Orletsky said the students wore the shirts shortly after the violence in Charlottesville, where many hate groups had hijacked the "Make America Great Again" slogan.
When asked what her reaction would have been if the students wore "I'm With Her" Hillary Clinton shirts, she said it had nothing to do with politics.
The school sent an email to parents apologizing for the teacher's actions, telling them the shirts did not violate the dress code, and that Orletsky had been removed from the classroom.
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Nearly two weeks later, the controversy had not died down. State Senator Michael Williams, of Cumming, who is running for the Republican nomination for Governor in next year’s election, organized a demonstration in support of the students and called for Orletsky’s firing by the school board.
Orletsky said she had gotten a lot of support as well as a lot of hate emails. She said she even got death threats. She released the following statement regarding her resignation:
“After attacks on my character and threats on my life, I have made the decision to resign from my teaching position at River Ridge High School. While in hindsight I would have handled the situation differently, the outcry over this incident has been disproportionate to the event itself.”
The Cherokee County School Board will consider her resignation at their next meeting on Thursday.