- The hastily arranged board meeting started at 9 a.m. and is being held virtually
- This follows a barrage of calls to fire UPenn President Elizabeth Magill
The University of Pennsylvania's Board of Trustees is holding an emergency meeting as President Elizabeth Magill faces calls to resign following her “unacceptable” statements during a congressional hearing.
The hastily arranged board meeting started at 9 a.m. and is being held virtually — after a flurry of calls from students and donors alike to fire the Ivy League college's president.
This is the latest sign of mounting, intense pressure on Penn to oust their president, who told Congress that censuring students calling for a Jewish genocide was not of paramount importance, but that it is “context specific.”
Magill, a lawyer by profession, grinned and smiled as she publicly refused to categorize calls for genocide of Jews as harassment or a violation of the school's code of conduct.
UPenn President Liz Magill said the school had demonstrated its “unyielding commitment to combating anti-Semitism” – but also refused to categorize calls for the genocide of Jews as harassment or a violation of the school's code of conduct. She grinned as she spoke to Congress
a petition The call for Magill's resignation had grown to more than 10,300 signatures by Thursday morning.
Students, faculty and donors alike have expressed disdain for the president, whose words and actions have demonstrated her lackluster desire to end rabid anti-Semitism on UPenn's campus.
The petition against her said she “has created an environment where such bigotry feels tolerated, if not endorsed, by the leadership of the university.”
In a sensational attempt to bounce back from her abhorrent behavior toward Congress, Magill posted a fawning video statement on Wednesday.
In the video, she said she wasn't “focused” on the issue, and said she wanted to “be clear” that calls for genocide were “evil, plain and simple” — though she said the blame lay with her policies university and the Constitution, rather than with her.
She said that while serving with the presidents of MIT and Harvard, she was “focused on our university's long-standing policy, consistent with the U.S. Constitution, which says speech alone is not a criminal offense.”
Sally Kornbluth of MIT and Claudine Gay of Harvard gave equally deplorable answers when questioned about their colleges' code of conduct.