MTSU President Sidney A. McPhee shared a letter with the campus community explaining his decision to fire an employee in a leadership role in the Office of Student Care and Conduct on Thursday morning.

The employee, Laura Sosh-Lightsy, allegedly posted to social media that she had “zero sympathy” for Charlie Kirk following his death on Wednesday.

This led to blowback from smaller conservative commentators to Sen. Marsha Blackburn.

Hours later, MTSU confirmed Sosh-Lightsy had been fired.

“This is the time we count on our staff to be thoughtful, supportive and even-keeled,” Thursday’s statement said. “Imagine our shock, then, when we learned that an employee had posted callous and insensitive comments on Facebook to an audience that certainly knows of her role at MTSU.”

Sosh-Lightsy’s job was to adjudicate student behavioral matters, but her actions made her ineligible to work with students on their conduct, according to the statement.

The entire statement is available below.

To contact the news editor, email [email protected].