In the latest episode of Breaking Battlegrounds, hosts Chuck Warren and Sam Stone dig deeper with Jennifer Sey, former U.S. National Gymnastics Champion turned entrepreneur and outspoken advocate. This time, the conversation shifts from athletics to her early opposition to COVID-era school closures—and what that experience taught her about public debate, courage, and backlash.
Sey recounts how, in early March 2020, before most schools had even closed, she began questioning the data and calling for a measured approach. For that, she faced fierce criticism and personal attacks. Now, years later, even as the consensus shifts to acknowledge that schools stayed closed too long, Sey says she has yet to receive a single private apology from those who attacked her.
Drawing a parallel between the “mass psychosis” of the COVID debate and today’s heated controversies over gender and sports, Sey warns of a culture where party loyalty, fear of being ostracized, and online mob tactics outweigh common sense. She emphasizes that whether it’s school closures or protecting fairness in women’s athletics, speaking out early—and standing firm—is critical even when it comes at a personal cost.
This candid conversation offers a rare glimpse into the toll of public dissent, the importance of data-driven decision-making, and why Sey believes that standing your ground ultimately matters more than being liked.
Transcript
**Chuck Warren: **Absolutely. So, you know, we’ve got three minutes left here. You obviously were a world-class athlete, which means you have great fortitudes. You can press yourself. When you came out and took a lot of crap, and we’ll call it nothing more than that, for your comments on COVID and schools being open. Since that happened, and you’ve seen all these reports come out now, have you had people privately apologize to you for giving you crap? Jeez.
**Jennifer Sey: **No.
**Chuck Warren: **That’s unbelievable.
**Sam Stone: **I wish I could say I was surprised by that.
**Chuck Warren: **I’m so disappointed in that.
**Jennifer Sey: **Yeah I mean now that we know right? I mean kind of knew at the time but nobody said it at the time and I was early you know. I started to advocate and locked on school closures you know that before they even closed uh... in early March.
**Sam Stone: **Because you were looking at the data, remember from your post, you were looking at the data, none of the data made sense for what they were talking about.
**Jennifer Sey: **It didn’t make any sense that there was this like mass psychosis just like with the gender stuff. You know and I think now general consensus is the I mean I have a more aggressive point of view than what the general consensus is. The general consensus is schools were closed too long minus they never should have closed, we can’t lock people down for any reason whatsoever. Stay home if you want to stay home but I think people are either too embarrassed to admit they cheered for you know their friends being canceled.
Shouted out the window stay home save lives everyone else is an evil bigot that wants to murder black children. I think they’re either too embarrassed or there is a portion that still believes it was the right thing to do and we need to just locked down harder. So but it was like a mass psychosis and we are in another one right now on gender stuff and it’s insane. I don’t understand it’s like people throw all common sense out the window and their party loyalty is sort of more significant than anything and it’s like a religious pervert.
**Sam Stone: **Yeah, it absolutely is.
Listen to the full episode of Breaking Battlegrounds anywhere you stream your podcasts!