The father of a Baraboo High School graduate forcibly pulled the district superintendent away from his daughter as she crossed the stage to receive a congratulatory handshake during the school’s graduation ceremony Friday.
The man, who is not being named to protect his daughter’s identity, ran onto the stage just after the girl had been handed her diploma and began working her way down a line of school officials shaking hands.
Before she could get to district Superintendent Rainey Briggs, the man, wearing a white polo shirt and baseball cap, grabbed Briggs by his right arm and pushed him away.
“That’s my daughter,” the man can be heard saying in video of the ceremony by TV43 Baraboo.
Briggs can be heard telling the man, “You better get up off me man. Get away from me bro” as staff working the graduation and three Baraboo police officers including the school resource officer intervened. At one point, a voice can be heard saying, “I don’t want her touching him.”
Baraboo, Wisconsin.
Superintendent Briggs is black, the man and his daughter are white.