Ivy League university loses $100m following anti-semitism row

A WEALTHY Wall Street donor has said that he is withdrawing a $100million (£79.8million) gift to the University of Pennsylvania after denouncing its “permissive approach to hate speech”.

Ross Stevens said that he was stunned when the president of his former university and chiefs of other top colleges struggled to give straight answers about anti-Semitism in congressional testimony.

Mr Stevens, who graduated from the university in 1991, gave his alma mater millions in funding in December 2017 for a finance innovation centre in his name but has now said that he is removing that gift. In a letter to staff, he said:

“Its permissive approach to hate speech calling for violence against Jews and

attitude toward harassment and discrimination against Jewish students would violate any policies of rules that prohibit harassment and discrimination based on religion.”

There have been growing calls for the resignation of Elizabeth Magill, the president of the university, as well as Claudine Gay, the president of Harvard, and Sally Kornbluth, the president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, after they appeared on Capitol Hill this week. When asked directly by Elise Stefanik, a Republican member for New York, whether “calling for the genocide of Jews” was against their respective codes of conduct, all three appeared to dodge the question and fall back on legal answers. In the days that followed, the presidents issued clarifications saying such actions did breach their rules.

Supporters of the presidents say that they have been juggling to balance a defence for free speech, as enshrined in the First Amendment, with maintaining a safe environment amid a series of protests many have been deemed anti-Semitic.

Their defenders have pointed out that the colleges were previously blamed for too little free speech when it came to conservative voices. Some of those same campuses were accused of so-called “cancel culture”.