The acting president of Columbia University apologized to members of the school community Wednesday after leaked text messages showed she had suggested the removal of a Jewish trustee.
“The things I said in a moment of frustration and stress were wrong. They do not reflect how I feel,” Claire Shipman wrote in a private email obtained by Jewish Insider and referring to an exchange that occurred before she was named acting president.
The apology comes after the House Committee on Education and Workforce sent a letter to Shipman Tuesday lambasting her for leaked correspondences in which she criticized Shoshana Shendelman, a Jewish member of Columbia’s Board of Trustees and vocal critic of the university’s handling of antisemitism allegations.
Columbia faced intense pressure from the federal government to address allegations of discrimination by some Jewish and Israeli students.
In the messages, which were dated from 2023 and 2024, Shipman also separately suggested the appointment of an “Arab on our board.”
““I have apologized directly to the person named in my texts, and I am apologizing now to you,” Shipman wrote in Wednesday’s email. “I have tremendous respect and appreciation for that board member, whose voice on behalf of Columbia’s Jewish community is critically important. I should not have written those things, and I am sorry. It was a moment of immense pressure, over a year and a half ago, as we navigated some deeply turbulent times. But that doesn’t change the fact that I made a mistake. I promise to do better.”
“One thing I hope salacious headlines will not obscure — my deep commitment to fighting antisemitism and protecting our Jewish students and faculty. Board members who have worked with me for more than a decade know that antisemitism, and the culture on our campus, was a priority well before October 7th, as do colleagues at the university, and personal friends,” the email continued.
Shipman also included a link to the steps the school was taking to address antisemitism on its campus as the school enters its fourth month of negotiations with the Trump administration after the federal government cancelled $400 million in grants to the school over campus antisemitism in March.
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