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In a dramatic fall for the leader of one of the world’s most prestigious universities, Liz Magill, the president of the University of Pennsylvania, voluntarily resigned from the helm of the Ivy League school today. Saddened after a lot of criticism for his testimony about anti-religious. Capitol Hill Tuesday. The Chairman of the Board of Directors Scott Bok also resigned on Saturday.
“It is my privilege to serve as President of this remarkable organization,” Magill said in a statement. “It is an honor to work with our faculty, students, staff, alumni, and community to advance Penn’s important mission.”
Magill will remain at Penn as a tenured professor at Penn Carey Law School.
“On behalf of the entire Penn community, I want to thank President Magill for his service to the University as President and wish him well,” Bok said in a statement. “Magill last week took a very serious step – along with two university leaders who sit with him – after five hours of intense questioning before a congressional committee. After that, it became clear that his position was no longer stable, and we decided together with him that it was time to leave.”
Magill will remain as interim president until an interim leader is appointed. Penn has no plans to resign despite several calls for Magill’s resignation this week, according to CNN.
The resignation marks a sudden and shocking fall for the longtime school. While Magill has been under fire for months for his handling of campus protests, the final straw was his damning testimony before Congress on Tuesday.
Magill struggled to answer questions about whether calling for genocide against Jews would violate UPenn policy. He and other university presidents failed to say clearly that calls for the killing of Jews caused violence and unrest on campus. The deal was publicized and prompted an uproar among business leaders, donors and politicians to order Magill to resign.
“It is time for President Magill to step down,” said Vahan Gureghian, a former Penn trustee who resigned in October in protest the school hosted a Palestinian literary festival held on campus. “The opportunity to show the leadership of the last two months.”
Gureghian also called on Bok to resign on Saturday, calling him “the money-maker.”
The resignations of Magill and Bok come a day before the University of Pennsylvania’s board of trustees plans to meet nearly Sunday, according to two people familiar with the matter. The Penn student newspaper, the Pennsylvania dailyand the Philadelphia Inquirer first reported news of the emergency committee meeting, which was scheduled to take place at 5 pm ET Sunday.
It was not clear whether Magill’s future will be discussed at the meeting, but considering the flood of reprimands, it is difficult to think that Magill’s future is not the main focus.
Bok said he was asked to remain in his role to help with the presidential transition but believes “now is the right time to leave.” Penn Saturday night name Julie Platt, vice chair of the University of Pennsylvania Board of Regents, serves as interim chair.
Bok called Magill “a very good man and a talented leader” and “not the least bit anti-religious.”
It is a partisan group of over 70 members of Congress send a letter to the board members of Penn, Harvard and MIT on Friday required Magill and his colleagues to withdraw.
“Due to this time of crisis, we want your board of directors to immediately remove each of these presidents from their positions and to issue an action plan to ensure the safety of Jewish and Israeli students, teachers, and educators. on your campus,” the lawmakers wrote. . “University presidents’ responses to questions aimed at discussing the growing anti-religious sentiment at colleges and universities were repulsive.”
Those special calls came from the Wharton Advisory Board and former US Ambassador Jon Huntsman, who told CNN that Magill’s removal was “non-negotiable.”
One major donor, Ross Stevens, threatened to rescind a large gift, worth about $100 million in shares, if Magill did not go.
Magill, along with the presidents of Harvard and MIT, faced widespread condemnation for his testimony at the conference this week.
Bok takes a different view: Magill was weak and took a wrong step – but he was treated unfairly.
“He was exhausted from months of continuous attacks abroad, he was not himself last Tuesday,” said Bok. “With a lot of preparation and a lot of lawyers because of the opposition and high standards, he gave a legal answer to a moral question, and it’s wrong. It was made for a 30-second soundbite during more than five hours of testimony.”
But Yale School of Management Professor Jeffrey Sonnenfeld says it’s not a case of wrongful speech: Magill and other university presidents missed the forest for the trees, advocating for the right to free speech rather than security. the students.
“University leaders have a high responsibility to uphold the truth and protect their campuses from hate, threats, and violence,” Sonnenfeld said in a statement. “Freedom of expression is NOT a right anywhere in society. Angry speech is different from speech.”
It was the focus of the House committee’s review against the campus. Presidents have previously faced criticism for not doing enough to ensure the safety of Jewish students and others in their schools.
But criticism from donors, politicians, seniors and business leaders was largely reserved for Magill, even as he tried to clarify his remarks on Wednesday.
“I didn’t focus on it – but I should have – the truth is that it cannot be denied that the call for the genocide of the Jews is a call for some of the most horrific acts of violence that human beings can commit. . It’s bad. Plain and simple,” Magill said in a video posted on X. “I want to be clear: A call for the murder of Jews … would be harassment or intimidation.”
Magill never apologized for his testimony.
Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik, whose questioning of Magill sparked outrage, said Magill’s ouster was “the least of it.”
“One down. Two to go,” Stefanik was written on a post on X. “This is just the beginning of addressing the rot of antisemitism that has destroyed America’s most ‘marked’ higher education institutions.”
Magill was there fight and lead Penn into trouble for several months.
In September, weeks before Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel, the University of Pennsylvania allowed speakers who Penn’s administration revealed had a history of making anti-Semitism statements to participate in “Palestine Writes Literature Festival” on campus.
In response to criticism of the university’s decision to allow controversial speakers, Magill and other university chief executives issued a statement that tried to appease both sides of the dispute but ended up all the anger of the supporters of Israel and Palestine.
“We unequivocally – and forcefully – condemn antisemitism as contrary to our principles,” the statement said. But it added that “as a university, we also strongly support the free exchange of ideas that is central to our educational mission. This includes the expression of ideas that are controversial and even inconsistent with our institutions.”
In response, 36 members of teachers at the school, before the festival, signed a letter criticizing this statement and Magill.
“It is equally important for us as teachers to state our support for Palestinian artists and writers, and make it clear that we condemn the opposition as well as Islamophobia and the oppression of Palestinians,” the letter said. “We ask that as the leader of the Penn community, you immediately amend your statement to clearly support the diversity of opinions and the diversity of religion, color, and culture in the campus. ”
Many donors also reached out to Magill and the school about the festival and Penn’s enthusiastic response. Weeks later, when Hamas attacked Israel and killed at least 1,200 people, that anger turned into a festering disease of rage.
Some famous people announced with the depth of the donation that they will do end their support of the school if he persisted, Magill soon issued another statement that tried to bring the parties together, but it did little to quiet the critics.
“I strongly condemn hateful words that defame others that contradict our values,” Magill said. “In this difficult time, we must respect the pain of our classmates and colleagues and realize that our words and actions have the power to harm and heal our community. We must choose healing, against those who will divide us but respect and care for each other.”
When University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill was called for the position just 20 months ago, she was announced as “clear agreement” to lead the Ivy League university.
Magill had a gold plated book when he was called last year to be the 27th leader of the school that is almost 300 years old.
He came to UPenn after serving as dean, number two in administration, at the University of Virginia, where he attended law school. He attended law school there while working as a clerk to Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Before becoming Provost at UVa, he was Dean of Stanford Law.
But the marriage did not last.
Criticism of the Palestine Writes literature festival, and the university’s response, has grown since the Hamas attack on Israel. As violence has escalated on campus in recent months, he has struggled to hold back his anger.
Donors have been calling for his resignation for months. He has also come under attack from those on campus who felt he did not do enough to protect academic freedom in the face of attacks on the festival.
This article has been updated with additional information.