Report: Ohio colleges and universities spent more than $2.55 million on speakers in 2025
Brutus Buckeye, The Ohio State University’s mascot, fires up the crowd before the Buckeyes' annual military appreciation football game on Nov. 9, 2019, at Ohio Stadium in Columbus, Ohio. (Photo by Staff Sgt. Michael Carden)
Ohio’s public colleges and universities collectively spent more than $2.55 million on campus speakers in 2025, according to a news report.
Senate Bill 1 mandates that the state’s public colleges and universities maintain online databases that every Ohioan can easily access from the main homepage via no more than three links, free of paywalls, listing the invited speakers who received at least $500 from the public institutions.
The bill, also known as the Advance Ohio Higher Education Act, was signed by Gov. Mike DeWine in March 2025 and became law in June 2025. Republican lawmakers said that the bill will make higher education more transparent, especially considering the alleged ideological left-wing dominance on college and university campuses.
According to a report by Signal Ohio, the public colleges and universities in the Buckeye State spent more than $2.55 million on visiting speakers between July 2025 and February 2026.
Among all hosted and paid speakers, Ohio State University had 775, the University of Cincinnati had 236, and Ohio University had 96. Other institutions had far fewer speakers, with Cleveland State University hosting and paying for only 14, and Central State University allegedly not having the speakers to whom they needed to pay more than $500.
When Signal Ohio examined individual payments, it found that Miami University paid $175,000 to comedian Seth Meyers for his stand-up performance and almost $17,700 to a booking agency. Additionally, the University of Akron spent $55,000 to invite journalist Connie Chung, Bowling Green State University spent $52,500 on influencer Brittany Broski’s comedy event, and Cleveland State University paid author Musa al-Gharbi up to $5,000 for a left-wing discussion on campus’s Center for Civics, Culture and Society, which was ironically established by Republican lawmakers to counter left-wing bias on college and university campuses.
Ohio State also recently became a shining example of irony when one of its professors allegedly attacked an independent journalist who attempted to interview one of the speakers last month inside a center founded to counter the left-wing bias.
Compliance with the bill’s rules varies across college and university campuses, with some institutions, such as Miami, Bowling Green State, Cleveland State, and Ohio State, providing extensive databases, the University of Akron offering an Excel spreadsheet, and others, such as Wright State, using simple text lists.
State Rep. Tom Young, R-Washington Twp., told Signal Ohio that he thinks some schools “are just checking the box” on compliance, with Senate Bill 1 sponsor state Sen. Jerry Cirino, R-Kirtland, saying it may be too early for additional enforcement measures.
