Wealthy college donors like billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman have slammed Ivy League universities like Harvard for their responses to the Israel-Palestine war, while others have gone a step further and stopped their donations to the schools.
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Wealthy donors are slamming elite US colleges for their responses to the Israel-Palestine war.
Some of these wealthy alumni are also taking it a step further and closing their checkbooks.
Thousands of civilians have been injured or killed in Hamas’ attacks on Israel and Israel’s bombardments of Gaza.
Tensions between college campuses and their big money donors show no signs of slowing down. In the past week, wealthy college donors have closed their checkbooks, citing their disagreement with the universities’ responses to the Israel-Palestine war.
Last week, Apollo Global Management CEO Marc Rowan called for the resignation of the University of Pennsylvania’s president and chairman of the board of trustees. Rowan also urged his fellow alumni to reduce their normal contributions to the university to just $1 “so that no one misses the point.”
The Huntsman family recently notified Penn that it’s stopping further donations to the Ivy League school. The family includes Jon Huntsman Jr., the former governor of Utah and former US ambassador to China, Russia, and Singapore.
“The University’s silence in the face of reprehensible and historic Hamas evil against the people of Israel (when the only response should be outright condemnation) is a new low. Silence is antisemitism, and antisemitism is hate, the very thing higher ed was built to obviate,” Huntsman Jr. wrote in a letter, which was published by the university’s student newspaper, The Daily Pennsylvanian. “Consequently, Huntsman Foundation will close its checkbook on all future giving to Penn.”
The Huntsman family, which includes three generations of Penn graduates, has donated tens of millions of dollars to the school over the past three decades.
Their letter was reportedly written before the university’s president, Elizabeth Magill, sent an email about the war to the Penn community on Sunday.
“I want to leave no doubt about where I stand,” Magill wrote in the email. “I, and this University, are horrified by and condemn Hamas’s terrorist assault on Israel and their violent atrocities against civilians.”
Computer scientist and hedge fund veteran David Magerman of Renaissance Technologies joined in as well, telling Bloomberg on Tuesday that he was “deeply ashamed” of his connection to Penn and planned to stop all donations to the university.
Billionaire Estée Lauder heir Ronald Lauder has also threatened to stop donations to Penn.
At Harvard, the Wexner Foundation — named for Les Wexner, the retail billionaire who was once CEO of Victoria’s Secret — said Monday that it was “no longer compatible partners” with the university, citing “the dismal failure of Harvard’s leadership to take a clear and unequivocal stand against the barbaric murders of innocent Israeli civilians by terrorists last Saturday.” The announcement brings to an end a partnership spanning more than three decades between the foundation and the university.
However, Harvard president Claudine Gay had addressed the war in a video statement the Friday prior, saying, “Our university rejects terrorism — that includes the barbaric atrocities perpetrated by Hamas.”
Besides making a statement with their wallets, wealthy alumni have also slammed universities and their leadership over what they consider weak stances on antisemitism.
Billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman called on Harvard to publish the names of Harvard students who signed onto a letter saying Israel’s “apartheid regime is the only one to blame” for the war, which cited Israeli violence against Palestinians over the past several decades.
Also at Harvard, one of Israel’s richest people, Idan Ofer, and his wife, stepped down from the board of the Kennedy School of Government, attributing their departures to a “lack of clear evidence of support from the University’s leadership for the people of Israel following the tragic events of the past week, coupled with their apparent unwillingness to recognize Hamas for what it is, a terrorist organization.”
Thousands of people have been injured or killed in Hamas’ terrorist attacks on Israel and Israel’s bombardment of Gaza.
Israel and Egypt have long imposed a blockade on Gaza, and two days after Hamas attacked Israel, Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant announced a “complete siege” of the Gaza Strip, effectively cutting off access to power, food, and fuel for the 2 million people who live there.
On Thursday evening, Israel told more than a million civilians in northern Gaza to evacuate their homes within 24 hours. Gaza’s border crossings have largely been sealed off.