Columbia Profs Struggle With Reading Comprehension, Suggest Jewish Board Member 'Leaked' Subpoenaed Texts
'Who benefits from sending Shipman's messages to the right wing Free Beacon?' faculty group asks in response to texts Columbia produced under subpoena
On Wednesday, Columbia University president Claire Shipman issued an internal statement apologizing for the private text messages that showed her calling for the removal of a Jewish board member. One day later, an anonymous group of Columbia faculty members released their own statement on the texts. They criticized Shipman for apologizing—and suggested that the Jewish trustee, Shoshana Shendelman, leaked the texts "to the right wing Free Beacon."
There's just one problem: Columbia itself provided the texts to the House Committee on Education and Workforce, which then released them in a letter, as our piece on the texts stated.
Though the faculty members behind the Substack statement are not known, one Columbia professor, Joseph Howley, linked to the statement in an Instagram post that included a screenshot of the portion accusing Shendelman of leaks. Howley teaches "Literature Humanities in Columbia's Core Curriculum," the Ivy League school's required literature course for undergraduate students. The class is meant to teach Columbia students how to "make sense of literary texts together, on paper and in discussion."
Our Collin Anderson has more below:
An anonymous group of Columbia University faculty members released a statement suggesting a Jewish member of the school’s board of trustees "leaked" acting president Claire Shipman’s private text messages to the Washington Free Beacon. In reality, Columbia itself provided the messages to a House committee, which released them in a letter, as a Free Beacon report on the texts noted.
The statement came from "a group of Columbia faculty and staff," according to "Rise Up, Columbia," a Substack page run by "members of the Columbia community intent on fighting back against attacks on our university." It says Shipman's texts were "recently leaked to the press" and calls the "timing" of the leak "suspicious."
"Who benefits from sending Shipman's messages to the right wing Free Beacon?" the faculty members ask before answering their own question: "Shoshana Shendelman," a Jewish member of Columbia's board who, according to the statement, "has recently come under pressure to resign" and is "desperate to repair her image."
Shendelman, however, could not have leaked Shipman's messages, as Columbia itself provided them to the House Committee on Education and Workforce.
The committee first asked Columbia for documents related to campus anti-Semitism in February 2024. By August, the committee determined that Columbia had "failed to produce numerous priority items requested by the Committee" and subpoenaed the school as a result. The subpoena specifically covered text messages from Shipman.
The committee went on to release some of the texts—including one in which Shipman described congressional oversight of campus anti-Semitism as "capital [sic] hill nonsense"—in an October 2024 report. It followed that report up with a July 1 letter to Shipman that included her texts disparaging Shendelman. The Free Beacon's report on those texts notes that they were "included in a letter sent to Columbia on Tuesday by committee chair Tim Walberg (R., Mich.) and Rep. Elise Stefanik (R., N.Y.)."
ho cares who benefits. the fact is that Columbia university is exposed as the disgusting, Racist, hate-filled organization it is.
Trump is correct. Columbia university needs to have its accreditation pulled and its non-profit status ended.
Nailed them. Dopey leftists with their slips showing.