Claudine Gay Must Be Removed From Harvard—National Association of Scholars

A conservative group is calling on Harvard University to remove its president, Claudine Gay, amid a backlash over her comments at a congressional hearing on antisemitism.

The National Association of Scholars (NAS), a nonprofit that advocates against diversity policies, issued the call as Gay—who became Harvard's first Black president in July—faces intense pressure from lawmakers and donors to resign following the December 5 hearing.

"The time has come to bring down the curtain on a presidential appointment that plainly had the support of campus activists and a fair number of faculty members—but which was from the beginning ill-founded, and is now a national embarrassment," the group wrote in an article published on its website on Monday.

Newsweek has contacted Gay, Harvard University and the NAS for comment via email.

Harvard and other universities have been accused of failing to protect Jewish students on campus amid rising fears of antisemitism and the fallout from Israel's war in Gaza, which has faced heightened criticism for the mounting Palestinian death toll.

Gay and the presidents of the University of Pennsylvania and Massachusetts Institute of Technology sparked an outcry for their legalistic responses to questions about campus antisemitism at the hearing.

The criticism focused particularly on their answers to a line of questioning from Rep. Elise Stefanik, who repeatedly asked whether "calling for the genocide of Jews" would violate their schools' codes of conduct.

"It can be, depending on the context," Gay said.

Pressed further, she said that Harvard takes action when the speech "crosses into conduct that amounts to bullying, harassment, intimidation."

She later apologized, telling the The Crimson student newspaper that she "got caught up in what had become at that point, an extended, combative exchange about policies and procedures."

She added: "What I should have had the presence of mind to do in that moment was return to my guiding truth, which is that calls for violence against our Jewish community—threats to our Jewish students—have no place at Harvard, and will never go unchallenged."

It did little to quell the criticism. More than 70 mostly Republican members of Congress, and some donors, have called for all three presidents to be removed.

Liz Magill resigned as president of the University of Pennsylvania on Saturday, while MIT's governing body issued a statement on Thursday declaring "full and unreserved support" for President Sally Kornbluth.

Harvard's highest governing body has not issued a public statement since the hearing, but was nearing a resolution on Monday that would allow Gay to remain in her job, The New York Times reported, citing unnamed people with knowledge of the discussions.

Harvard faculty and alumni have rallied behind Gay. More than 700 faculty members signed a petition asking the governing body to "defend the independence of the university" and resist political pressures "that are at odds with Harvard's commitment to academic freedom."

The NAS said that Gay's answers during the hearing "were far from satisfactory, but they are not the only reason why she should be removed from the presidency."

Gay's performance "on December 5 should be—to borrow a word she used repeatedly on that occasion—put into context," the group said.

That context, according to the NAS, includes Gay's "shoddy professional work, which would by normal standards disqualify her for any academic appointment at Harvard" and "her record of plagiarism."

Allegations of plagiarism surfaced on social media at the weekend, when conservative activist Chris Rufo wrote in a post on X that he had "obtained documentation demonstrating that Harvard President Claudine Gay plagiarized multiple sections of her Ph.D. thesis, violating Harvard's policies on academic integrity."

Gay denied the allegations. "I stand by the integrity of my scholarship," she said in a statement to Inside Higher Ed. "Throughout my career, I have worked to ensure my scholarship adheres to the highest academic standards."

Gay's thesis advisor, Professor Gary King, also dismissed the allegations that Gay lifted lines from other people's work, including his own. "There's not a conceivable case that this is plagiarism," King told The Daily Beast. "Her dissertation and every draft I read of it met the highest academic standards."

The NAS also said that after the Supreme Court's decision to end affirmative action in college admissions, Gay "is plainly not the right person to lead Harvard into this new era."