Harvard University President Claudine Gay resigned Tuesday from her position after she was fiercely attacked for her testimony in Congress about anti-Semitism during pro-Gaza protests on campus.
According to the Russian channel Russia Today, Gay has been criticized in recent months after reports emerged that she did not cite scientific sources correctly. The latest accusations were published by an anonymous source on a conservative online media outlet.
Gay was criticized after she refused to answer whether calling for the extermination of Jews violated Harvard University’s code of conduct when she testified before Congress, along with the presidents of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Pennsylvania, last month.
Gay, who made history as the first black person to hold the position of president of Harvard University, explained in her resignation text that she had been subjected to personal threats and “racist hostility.”
Her step down comes after the foundation’s administrative body supported her following her testimony in Congress.
But the commission criticized the university’s initial response to the Palestinian factions’ attack on October 7, which Israel said resulted in the killing of 1,200 people inside Israel and the holding of about 240 people hostage.
Previous apologies in December
Harvard’s President had apologized for controversial remarks she made at a congressional hearing about antisemitism on US college campuses. When asked whether calls for the genocide of Jews constituted harassment under university policy, Dr Claudine Gay said it depended on the context. Dr Gay, and two other university presidents who gave similar answers, have since faced fierce criticism.
“I am sorry,” she said in an interview with The Crimson student newspaper.
“Words matter. When words amplify distress and pain, I don’t know how you could feel anything but regret,” she added.
Addressing the criticism in her interview with The Crimson, Dr Gay said she had “got caught up in what had become at that point, an extended, combative exchange about policies and procedures”.
It is the second time Harvard’s first black president has sought to clarify comments that have drawn national condemnation, including from the White House. Some have since called for her resignation.
Claudine Gay’s rise
Claudine Gay (born 1969) is an American political scientist and academic administrator who was the 30th president of Harvard University, and the Wilbur A. Cowett Professor of Government and African and African-American Studies. Gay’s research addresses American political behavior, including voter turnout and politics of race and identity.
On assuming office in 2023, she became Harvard’s first black President. Before that, she served as the Edgerley Family Dean of Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Gay grew up the child of Haitian immigrants who came to the United States and met in New York City as students. Her mother studied nursing and her father studied engineering. Gay spent much of her childhood first in New York City, and then in Saudi Arabia, where her father worked for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, while her mother was a registered nurse. Gay is a cousin of writer Roxane Gay.
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