Nathan Apodaca, the President of the Students for Life chapter at California State University San Marcos, has filed a federal lawsuit against campus officials after being denied $500 to host a pro-life speaker. The university collects mandatory student fees that are allocated to student groups who request these funds. However, the university has given nearly $300,000 to fund events by LGBTQA groups such as “Furries vs. Pet Play,” “Safe Zone Training,” and “Kink 101.”

These mandatory student fees, which have been raised from $50 to $75, are used by the associated students to fund student activities or club events on campus. Students for Life applied for $500 to bring well-known free speech and pro-life advocate Mike Adams. However, they were turned down by the associated students, who claimed that they did not use their funds to host events that invited speakers. The Students for Life group has discovered that indeed the associated student funds are used to stimulate student centers geared towards traditionally marginalized groups on campus to host events, including speaker events.

During the 2016-2017 school year, the total amount of funds collected from these mandatory student fees totals roughly $1.13 million. Alliance Defending Freedom, the organization providing legal defense for Apodaca and CSUSM Students for Life, argue that student centers such as the Gender Equity Center and the LGBTQA Center received over 21 percent of all mandatory student activity fees. That's a combined $296,498, which in contrast is far more than the three percent of student activity fees allotted to 100+ other groups on campus combined. Only $38,629 was granted to these groups.

In April, the school hosted the month of “gAyPRIL” through these student centers. This month-long celebration featured a multitude of student fee funded events multiple times a week that catered towards non-heterosexual individuals. These events and the other advocacy events hosted by the Gender Equity Center and the LGBTQA Center were funded exclusively by mandatory student fees.

"It seems like a scam that students have to pay these fees but don’t have a say in how the fees are used," Apodaca told Red Alert Politics. "The university is supposed to be a marketplace of ideas, we think that it should be kept that way and the student fees money should go towards funding a variety of ideas. We believe that students should hear both sides- but they’re not getting that here at CSUSM.

The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California on May 17th.

CSUSM’s interim Vice President Margaret Chantung told LifeZette in an email, "Cal State San Marcos is committed to fostering a diverse and open campus environment where a host of ideas and views can be discussed… we take student complaints and concerns very seriously. Unfortunately no further comment is available at this time due to this ongoing litigation.”

Apodaca said that the goal of this lawsuit is to change the discriminatory policy for all students, and to give equal access and resources regardless of any ideological, racial or gender differences. “We want everyone to have the same access so we can turn CSU San Marcos back into the marketplace of ideas so we can rigorously debate the issues that do matter,” asserted Apodaca. “Right now, faculty and a select few in the Gender Equity and LGBT center are getting first class treatment, and everyone else isn’t even getting economy class.”