Harvard University’s president, under fire over testimony she gave about anti-Semitism on campus, will remain in her job after a meeting of the institution’s governing body issued a statement backing her on Tuesday.
Claudine Gay has been engulfed by criticism after she declined to unequivocally say whether calling for genocide of Jews violated Harvard’s code of conduct as she testified before Congress alongside the heads of MIT and Pennsylvania universities. “It depends on the context,” she told lawmakers in one tense exchange.
The Harvard Corporation, one of the university’s two governing boards, said in a statement, “we today reaffirm our support for President Gay’s continued leadership of Harvard University.”
But the body did criticize the university’s initial response to the Hamas’s October 7 attacks that Israel said killed 1,200 people inside Israel and saw around 240 people taken hostage.
Israel’s offensive has reduced much of Gaza to rubble and killed at least 18,200 people, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run health ministry. “So many people have suffered tremendous damage and pain because of Hamas’s brutal terrorist attack, and the University’s initial statement should have been an immediate, direct, and unequivocal condemnation,” the corporation said. “Calls for genocide are despicable and contrary to fundamental human values.”
President Gay has apologized for how she handled her congressional testimony.
Penn University’s president Liz Magill resigned in the wake of her responses to Congress, and pressure had mounted on Gay both inside and outside of Harvard to follow suit.
More than 70 lawmakers including two Democrats called for her resignation, while a number of high-profile Harvard alumni and donors have called for her departure.
In excess of 700 Harvard faculty members signed a letter supporting Gay, Harvard’s first Black woman president.
