Harvard has long been accused of fostering an anti-free speech environment and quelching viewpoint diversity. That was the subject of my recent debate with Law Professor Randall Kennedy at Harvard. A new report confirms many of the objections raised in that debate, including a chilling environment where only a third of Harvard’s most recent graduating class expressed comfort in discussing controversial subjects.
Some 89 percent of the graduating class responded to the survey. The study of the Classroom Social Compact Committee, co-chaired by Economics professor David I. Laibson ’88 and History professor Maya R. Jasanoff ’96, found that, with an overwhelmingly liberal faculty and student body, even liberal Harvard students still found a chilling environment for free expression at the school. And it is getting worse. The results show a 13 percent decrease from the Class of 2023.
This year, Harvard found itself in a familiar spot on the annual ranking of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE): dead last among 251 universities and colleges.
What is most striking is the fact that Harvard has created this hostile environment while maintaining an overwhelmingly liberal student body and faculty. Only 9 percent of the class identified as conservative or very conservative.
Yet, even liberals feel stifled at Harvard. Only 41 percent of liberal students reported being comfortable discussing controversial topics, and only 25 percent of moderates and 17 percent of conservatives felt comfortable in doing so.
During the Harvard debate, I raised the gradual reduction of conservatives and libertarians in the student body and the faculty.
The Harvard Crimson has documented how the school’s departments have virtually eliminated Republicans. In one study of multiple departments last year, they found that more than 75 percent of the faculty self-identified as “liberal” or “very liberal.”
Only 5 percent identified as “conservative,” and only 0.4% as “very conservative.”
According to Gallup, the U.S. population is roughly equally divided among conservatives (36%), moderates (35%), and liberals (26%).
So Harvard has three times the number of liberals as the nation at large, and less than three percent identify as “conservative” rather than 35 percent nationally.
Among law school faculty who donated more than $200 to a political party, 91 percent of the Harvard faculty gave to Democrats.
While Professor Kennedy dismissed the notion that Harvard should look more like America, the problem is that it does not even look like Massachusetts. Even as one of the most liberal states in the country, roughly one-third of the voters still identify as Republican.
The student body shows the same bias of selection. Harvard Crimson previously found that only 7 percent of incoming students identified as conservative. The latest survey shows that level at 9 percent.
Some faculty members are wringing their hands over this continued hostile environment. However, the faculty as a whole is unwilling to restore free speech and intellectual diversity by adding conservative and libertarian faculty members and sponsoring events that reflect a broad array of viewpoints.
Given my respect for Professor Kennedy, I was surprised that he dismissed the sharp rise in students saying that they did not feel comfortable speaking in classes. Referring to them as “conservative snowflakes,” he insisted that they had to have the courage of their convictions.
This ignores the fact that they depend upon professors for recommendations, and challenging the school’s orthodoxy can threaten their standing. Moreover, a recent survey shows that even liberal students feel chilled in the environment created by Harvard faculty and administrators.
There was a hopeful aspect, however, to the debate. Before the debate, the large audience voted heavily in favor of Harvard’s position. However, after the debate, they overwhelmingly voted against Harvard’s position on free speech.
It is an example of how exposure to opposing views can change the bias or assumptions in higher education.
There is little likelihood that Harvard or higher education will change. It is like the old joke about how many psychiatrists it takes to change a light bulb. The answer is just one but the bulb really has to want to change.
At the end of the day, there is no real indication that Harvard faculty want any of this to change. They will continue to report the results of surveys and express deep angst and confusion over the results. What they will not do is meaningfully change their course in the hiring of faculty, admission of students, and sponsoring of debates.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro professor of public interest law at George Washington University and the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage.”
Cleaning Gaza. Trump’s genius.
https://pjmedia.com/vodkapundit/2025/02/11/trump-has-a-deadline-for-the-hostages-and-an-ultimatum-for-egypt-and-jordan-n4936875
“When Trump floated the idea last week, even some reasonably pro-Trump conservatives were aghast, mistaking the suggestion for an American invasion of Gaza — or worse. By the time Trump repeated it to Baier on Sunday, there were barely any gasps to be heard at all. When he repeated it again yesterday, it was virtually an established fact that the Arab countries, particularly Egypt and Jordan, were going to have to step up and, after almost 60 years, do their bit to settle the ridiculous “forever refugee” status of the Gaza Arabs.”
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Jean Valjean was put in prison for taking a loaf of bread.
Let us not forget how hostile those with that kind of power can be.
Professor Turley wrote about a minister who is calling for violence, actual violence.
My first thought was what kind of religious leader would do that…….and my 2nd thought in this ‘age of rage’ which the Professor so aptly draws attention to was that those who do what this minister is advocating could end up getting shot, and killed, for being perceived as a threat to the health of someone with a gun.
I told you musk doesn’t give a rats hind end about loosing $200 billion on Tesla, there is a trillion dollar prize he is working on…
https://flip.it/hXSKKo
# Trump has had 8 years of unceasing harassment and two attempted assassinations. He’s declared an ultimatum to Iran.
He’s looking for traps, set ups, frames in addition to cutting the executive branch size. He should because they’re there. USAID has money going to terrorists, enemies of the US. If not found its treason. It’s treason to knowingly leaving it unreported by anyone. It’s negligence not to expect it.
Congrats DJT.
# Harvard is treading a line of political sabotage against the US as it does not support the Constitution. Presumably if that line is crossed professor Turley will speak up .
Nothing you wrote is true—- nothing. Trump committed the crimes he was charged with and those he was convicted of. That’s not “harassment”. I’m not going to bother trying to point out that the slop you wrote that came from MAGA media is provably false because you don’t believe facts.
If MAGA media says USAID pays terrorists, you believe it even though it’s a lie published by MAGA media to cover up the illegal and unconstitutional shutting down of agencies created and funded by Congress. We have a system of checks and balances— the judiciary is a check against overreach by the Executive Branch. So now MAGA media attacks judges who enter restraining orders against Trump’s illegal shutting down agencies, letting Musk employees copy confidential information and sharing it on unencrypted emails, and locking out government employees and even members of Congress. Because MAGA media says Courts are wrong—you MAGAS go along with it.
Gigi – if you write in your checkbook that a check was for auto expenses when you paid for gas is that a crime.
If you say not – then Trump is not guilty of any crime.
If you say yes than all americans are guilty of the same crime trump is.
At some point in time in your personal private financial records you have labeled a payment in a way that a
DA that is out to get you can call false.
I beleive Trump is still appealing this – if the NY courts do not fix it, then eventually the supreme court will.
The first problem that you have is that the supreme court – Ruth Bader Ginsberg no less ruled long ago that Fraud – the crime Trump allegedly committed is a “Property Crime” – it requires that someone was deprived of something tangible that they owned.
Trump’s calling payments to a lawyer legal expenses did not change his taxes, it did not deprive anyone of property.
The statute used by Bragg and Merchan to convict trump is either unconstitutionally overbroad as applied – meaning that Bragg and Merchan expanded the law beyond its legitimate bounds, or unconstitutionally vague as written – the state created a law that is facially unconstitutional.
Unfortunately while this case is certain to get tossed – Merchan made innumerable errors that require tossing the case,
The FACT is the case never should have seen the inside of a court room. It would be nice if a court actually through it out on the merits.
But the massive number of errors merchan made, make it unlikely that the appeals courts will get to the merits before throwing it out.
I would note that the Enmoron case has exactly the same problem – it too is a fraud case – albeit civil fraud rather than criminal
But the problem still remains – fraud is about property.
You are here and you lie all the time. You can not be prosecuted or sued for lying. Because lying is neither a crime nor a civil cause of actions.
The law can only address lies under narrow circumstances – the most common is where you have some duty to tell the truth.
The duty to tell the truth is not created by the law out of thin air. Legislatures can not pass a law that say it is a crime or a civil cause of action to tell the truth while you are chewing bubble gum – that would be unconstitutional – in a number of ways.
In the two NYC cases – the state of NY can not say there is a state cause of action if you lie about the value of something – you had a duty to tell the truth. In the specific instance of the Trump mortgages – that is not the case – both the documents provided required the lender DB to make its own valuation, industry practice – and possible the law require the bank to make its own evaluation, and the general rule – it used to be for all buyers but now only for sophisticated buyers – which DB most certainly is, is caveat emptor – buyer beware.
One of my businesses is in due dilligence – you can not buy or sell a home today without an apraisal and a home inspection, and a title search – these are all “due Dilligence.” In the commercial secor the requirements are far more rigorous than homes.
Put simply the duty to verify the value of the properties rested with Deutche Bank not Trump.
So Trump had no duty to be truthful – so merely proving that Trump lied – which BTW is quite different from Trump erred in valuing his property, is not sufficient to be civil fraud.
I would further note that the US constitution requires jury trials for civil desputes with anything more than inconsequential fines or costs.
The NY statute that allowed Enmoron to hear the case without a jury – is specifically because these cases can not have significant fines.
The moment they due – unless there is a jury trial they violated the constitution.
Regardless all these NY prosecutions are rife with error. None are crimes, none are actual fraud.
You can label an expense as anything you want in your checkbook – and you will not be prosecuted – and Trump should not have either.
MAGA media is not the only one saying USAID paid terrorists.
Musk has the receipts.
All of this is stupid. Most people are under the delusion that USAID was about foreign humanitarian aid – it is not.
It is about foreign influence. there is a reason that USAID has lots of connections to the CIA.,
There is a reason that USAID was funding Gain Of Function research in Wuhan. There is a reason that USAID was involved in the loan guarantees to Ukraine that Joe Biden threatened, as well as those that involved Trump’s first impeachment.
USAID is a foreign influence pedaling operation. It is involved in spying, it is involved in planting stories in the media – both true and false and alittle true and alittle false.
It is not surprising that USAID was being used by the US to overthrow the Assad Regime. What is surprising is that it was funding Al Queda -0 after 9/11 – the US had funded Al Queda to thwart the USSR in afghanistan. That could well have gone through USAID.
The worst revalation about USAID is that it was involved in the Impeachment of Trump feeding stories to the media.
What the US govenrment is free to do in meddling with foreign govenments is judged by its effect. The constitution does not have rules for how the US govenrment may interact with foreign govenrments and people. A citizen of a foreign country outside the US has no constitutional protections from our government.
But the same actions taken by USAID to address a foreign govenment or person – are crimes and violations of the constitution when they take place in the US.
You are fighting that USAID was funding al Queda to depose Assad.
That is greatly offensive to most americans. But if Directed by Obama who was president at the time – or Biden later.,
it would be perfectly legal and constitutional – if offensive and unwise.
These are not Musks employees – these are employees of DOGE a US agency – a small one, but still part of the US govenrment.
Gigi,
While this country has been behaving fiscally stupid for a long time, we have crossed several thresholds that mean that absent action ssoon things will accelerate on their own towards h311
center left economists Reinhart and Roggoff – sometime ago found that nations that allowed debt to rise to over 80% of GDP had a great deal of trouble growing and it was nearly impossible to get out from under that debt.
The US Debt has been over 80% of GDP for more than a decade.
And we have seen a drop in growth as a result.
One of the next problems that occurs is when the interest on the debt starts growing at a rate faster than the economy is growing.
That is occuring now. During the early Obama administration interest on US debt was a bit over $100B/year – pretty cheap really.
By 2021 it had risen to 400B/yr, now is it over 600B/yr.
The interest ont he debt is growing faster than the economy, faster than other govenrment spending.
If we do not act – if we doe not get interest rates down, if we do not get inflation down. The interest on the debt will grow faster and faster.
It will shortly be larger than the Defense Budget. After that it will be larger than entitlements, after that it will be larger than all other federal spending. The interest on the debt is going to grow at a compoud rate unless we do something.
What must we do – we MUST get interest rates down, and to do that we MUST get inflation under control.
Under Biden inflation peaked at over 9% then dropped to 2.4% and then rose back to almost 3% before Trump was inaugurated.
Trump is inheriting rising inflation – and that will not only make things bad for american families – it will eventually lead to hyper inflation.
We can not raise taxes – we are already taxing at slightly higher than the revenue optimizing maximum.
That means higer tax rates will negatively impact the economy and NOT produce more revenue.
If we wish interest on the debt to not consume the entire federal governemnt – we need to act now, because the longer we wait the more draconian the steps needed.
Trump and Musk are looking to significantly cut govenrment spending. Int he past 18months Argentina ended hyper inflation by doing exactly that radically cutting govenrment spending.
One way or another government spending is going to get cut – and radically.
you can do as Trump and Musk are doing now, or in 2, 4, 8 years – you will be slashing Social Security and Medicare.
So there is no question that spending is going to get cut.
The question is WHERE. Are you going to cut USAID, DOE, $200B of SS and Medicare Fraud – things like that NOW,
or are you going to wait until the cuts are far more draconian ?
regardless the cuts are coming.
A little pain now – or alot later. Voters chose a little now.
Please get out of the way.
Shutting down agencies is not unconstitutional. It MAY violate federal law.
The Judiciary is not a check on executive overreach, it is a check on illeal and unconstitutionalk actions by any branch.
These are not the same thing.
Log In isn’t working.
The administration is thinking of sending IRS agents to enforce immigration law.
I hope they also consider assigning some of them to investigating the corrupt FBI.
The FBI can’t be trusted to investigate itself for bad actors. They apparently can’t even be trusted to keep immigration raid plans secret.