When the Education Departments Office for Civil Rights notified George Mason University on July 1 that it was opening an antisemitism investigation based on a recent complaint, the universitys president, Gregory Washington, said he was perplexed. Compared with other campuses, where protesters had ransacked buildings and hunkered down in encampments, George Mason had been relatively quiet over the past year, he said. His administration had taken extensive steps to improve relations with the Jewish community, had enacted strict rules on protests and had communicated all of that to the OCR during a previous antisemitism investigation that remained open. By the next day, though, there were signs that the new investigation was part of a coordinated campaign to oust him. One piece of evidence: the speed with which conservative news outlets reported on the OCRs action, which hadnt been publicly announced. The OCR letter was embedded in a July 2 article published by a right-wing news outlet, The Washington Free Beacon. The next day, the City Journal, published by the influential and conservative Manhattan Institute, ran an opinion essay headlined George Mason Universitys Disastrous President. The article accused Washington, the universitys first Black president and a first-generation college graduate, of backing racially discriminatory DEI programs referring to diversity, equity and inclusion efforts and failing to address campus antisemitism. It concluded that Washingtons track record warrants his resignation or dismissal. The similarities to recent events at another public university in Virginia were hard to ignore. The OCRs George Mason investigation was opened just four days after the University of Virginias president, James E. Ryan, announced that he was resigning to help settle a federal probe into the universitys DEI commitments. That happened after a group of conservative University of Virginia alumni, the Jefferson Council, published blog entries and newspaper ads decrying the president in part for focusing too heavily on diversity efforts and demanding that he resign. The councils connections to board members and Justice Department lawyers led many observers in higher education to conclude that Ryans forced resignation was the result of a coordinated assault. Now, Washington is feeling the same heat coming from similar sources. The temperature cranked up several degrees Thursday morning, when the Education Department notified George Mason that its opening a second investigation this one alleging the university illegally considers race in hiring and promoting employees. The department said it was acting on complaints from multiple professors at GMU. In a press statement Thursday, Craig Trainor, the Education Departments acting assistant secretary for civil rights, suggested that the agency has already reached sweeping conclusions about the universitys hiring practices. Despite the leadership of George Mason University claiming that it does not discriminate on the basis of race, it appears that its hiring and promotion policies and practices from 2020 to the present, implemented under the guise of so-called Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, not only allow but champion illegal racial preferencing in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This kind of pernicious and wide-spread discrimination packaged as anti-racism was allowed to flourish under the Biden Administration, but it will not be tolerated by this one, he wrote. The university rebutted those accusations in a statement saying it is complying with all federal and state mandates and does not discriminate. The university received a new Department of Education letter of investigation this morning as it was simultaneously released to news outlets, which is unprecedented in our experience, the statement said. As always, we will work in good faith to give a full and prompt response. Meanwhile, dozens of Jewish faculty members at GMU have signed on to a statement condemning an attack on our university community and our GMU President that is quickly intensifying under a false, racially divisive, and deeply cynical claim of combating antisemitism. Even before Thursdays announcement, Washington said he had detected a pattern thats been playing out at other universities targeted by President Donald Trumps administration: Multiple investigations are filed in quick succession and word leaks to news organizations. It seems like this is orchestrated, Washington said during an interview Wednesday. The same people who are kind of aligned that got rid of Jim Ryan are aligned against me. He finds the timing of the attacks against him and his university troubling. Given that the Office for Civil Rights doesnt publicly announce who is under investigation, we were wondering how these conservative outlets even got the information in the first place, Washington said. The almost hateful discussions of me in the City Journal article looked like a concerted effort to try to paint the institution in a negative light. Washington said the piece seemed to be urging the Trump administration to take the investigation to the next level, the Department of Justice, which could levy punishments against the university. Many faculty members at George Mason agree. They worry that despite the OCRs insistence in its letter to the university that its investigation will be unbiased, the Trump administration has already reached a verdict on the institutions president and wants him out. As evidence, they point to a web of ties between right-wing news organizations and politicians including Virginias Republican governor, Glenn Youngkin as well as some George Mason board members. The same unfounded and coordinated attacks that pushed Ryan out of UVa are now being leveled at GMU President Greg Washington, the campus chapter of the American Association of University Professors wrote in an online post. We think the DOJ, Governor Youngkin, and Youngkins appointees to GMUs governing board are trying to force President Washington out so they can hire an ideological ally who will impose the Governors political ideologies on Masons governance and curriculum. Late Wednesday, Virginias two Democratic U.S. senators, Mark R. Warner and Tim Kaine, doubled down on those warnings, publishing an opinion piece in the Richmond Times-Dispatch saying that the Trump administration appears to be eyeing its next target with George Masons president. The accusations which are pushed by bloggers with ties to ultra-conservative groups with histories of false claims about Mason and advocacy for the removal of university presidents are eerily similar to those lodged against Ryan, they wrote. They include vague and politically charged accusations centered around DEI and suggestions that the universitys administration has been insufficiently responsive to concerns raised by Jewish students about their safety on campus. Thats despite the fact that the universitys leaders have repeatedly and publicly condemned antisemitism and actually been praised by the local Jewish Relations Council and campus Hillel for their leadership and commitment to Jewish members of Masons community.
Of course, they want to get rid of the liked and qualified intelligent black president and replace him with some white Trump and McMahon bootlicker who can't even spell university, let alone ever been to one.
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I only appear to be out of line because I am the only one who is in line.
Because the university is the heart of the old regime, it is absolutely essential to the success of any regime change that all accredited universities be both physically and economically liquidatedwith a minimum of exceptions. (The only exception being technically specialized facilities, like a med school, that may take time to relocate.) Anything that isnt a pure trade school must cease to exist, body and soul.