EDITORS' CORNER
OPINION: Democrats plan to fight perceived Trump bullying by browbeating Yale?
Yale University must stand up to President Donald Trump’s negotiations over allegations of illegal racial discrimination in admissions – or else the school could be punished.
This is the message Connecticut Democrats sent the university last week. The threatening letter highlights the hypocrisy of liberal Democrats, who squeal about Republican involvement in higher education, while also threatening to use their own power to get what they want.
The Ivy League university is currently in negotiations with the Department of Justice, after the federal government reportedly found proof of racial bias in medical admissions.
The school’s “admissions data demonstrate that Black and Hispanic students have a much higher chance of admission to Yale than White or Asian students with the same test scores,” the DOJ announced after a year-long investigation.
On average, black and Hispanic applicants were admitted with significantly lower academic qualifications than white and Asian applicants, The College Fix previously reported.
Ever the defenders of illegal racial discrimination against whites and Asian applicants, Connecticut Democrats scrambled into formation to kill any resolution between Yale and Trump.
The letter initially offers to support the school in its battle.
“We write to you as members of the Connecticut General Assembly with proud Yale ties, on behalf of a state whose history, economy, and civic identity have been bound up with this University for more than three centuries,” the letter to President Maurie McInnis and the board of trustees begins.
The signers include seven alumni and one spouse of a Yale professor. State Representative Matt Blumenthal (pictured) is leading the effort. His father, U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal, has also urged resistance to Trump’s efforts to negotiate with Yale.
The letter continues on to lay out why Yale should not work with Trump and says such a deal could be ripped up later by the administration.
It then ends with a not-so-subtle threat to rip away tax exemptions if the school does not listen to its alumni (who are legislators with some amount of authority over schools that operate in the state, don’t you know).
Noting the history of Yale’s “privileges” under state law, the Democrats note that those benefits could be revoked. “If Yale demonstrates that it will not use its wealth, standing, and legal strength to defend the very freedoms its charter and tax privileges were granted to protect, the General Assembly could revisit that bargain in earnest, and potentially with our support.”
Signers later gave comments trying to bury the coercive nature of the letter.
“We’re not looking to exert control or constrain the university in any way,” state Rep. Steve Winter told the Yale Daily News.
Right, and the mob boss isn’t saying he will blow up your car or smash in your business windows if you don’t pay the protection tax. He’s just suggesting it would be a “shame” if something were to happen.
State Representative Jonathan Steinberg likewise said he hopes to “make it clear that Yale enjoys that status because we expect it to behave not only to the benefit of the institution and students, but to benefit Connecticut.” Trump, not he, is the real bully, you see.
Yale can certainly decide how it wants to handle a federal investigation. And legislators may be correct in removing tax exemption status for an ultra-wealthy elite university.
But Connecticut Democrats shouldn’t pretend they are acting any differently than Trump or Republican governors in using political power to push for their agenda.
