USC professor speaks out on refusal to remove pro-police flag from office: Campus is a 'progressive bubble'

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USC professor defends Blue Lives Matter flag: 'There's a competing point of view'

University of Southern California Professor James Moore refuses to cave to student pressure to remove the flag from his office.

A University of Southern California professor is defending his refusal to cave to student pressure to remove a pro-police Blue Lives Matter flag from his office.

James Moore, professor of engineering and policy, posted the flag at the start of the fall semester outside of his office on campus. He has since faced repeated calls to remove the flag. 

"I wanted to communicate to progressively-oriented students that there's a competing point of view," Moore told "Fox & Friends" Friday. "They live in something of a progressive bubble on a college campus… I wanted to communicate to conservative students, of which there are many, that in fact they're entitled to their voice, that the messages they hear are really not representative of society at large."

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Moore says he hung the flag to send a counter-message to the premise that Black lives are at particular risk of police violence.

"I think it's a lie," he said. "Black lives benefit rather strongly, disproportionately from the activities of police… Black lives are at greatest risk from reduced police service."

( USC Professor James Moore)

"If all lives matter and Black lives in particular matter, then we need to make sure that they're secure."

The office of the dean of the Viterbi School of Engineering and USC's Office of Equity and Diversity told students there is no policy supporting the removal of the flag, according to the Daily Trojan.

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"The university does not have a policy that limits the display of materials in spaces like this, though we are looking at whether it is needed," the university said in a statement to the student-run daily newspaper. "As part of the university’s commitment to academic freedom, a faculty member can express his or her individual beliefs and viewpoints on a wide variety of topics – even controversial issues – but they do not speak on behalf of a school or the broader university."

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Moore says he feels a responsibility to his students who are receiving "constant messaging" from the university that the world is a progressive place with a progressive point of view.

"They suspect otherwise, and I wanted to alert them to the fact that they're entitled to those suspicions," he said.

Fox News' Emma Colton contributed to this report.