Ilya Shapiro Announces Resignation After Georgetown U. ‘Abandoned Free Speech’

Constitutional law scholar Ilya Shapiro announced his resignation from Georgetown University on Monday, saying that the school has “yielded to the progressive mob,” and has “abandoned free speech.”

“The university didn’t fire me, but it yielded to the progressive mob, abandoned free speech, and created a hostile environment,” Shapiro explained in an op-ed, titled, “Why I Quit Georgetown,” published Monday in the Wall Street Journal.

Here is Ilya Shapiro’s (@ishapiro’s) resignation letter from Georgetown Law, as well as his Wall Street Journal opinion piece explaining why remaining there was untenable despite being reinstated after a four-month investigation into a tweet he’d sent.https://t.co/grXHSby7p7 pic.twitter.com/x2fGv1qwM6

— Jerry Dunleavy (@JerryDunleavy) June 6, 2022

Shapiro went on to explain that “after a four-month investigation into a tweet, the Georgetown University Law Center reinstated me last Thursday.”

“But after full consideration of the report I received later that afternoon from the Office of Institutional Diversity, Equity and Affirmative Action, or IDEAA, and on consultation with counsel and trusted advisers, I concluded that remaining in my job was untenable,” he added.

In February, Georgetown Law suspended Shapiro over a tweet that criticized President Joe Biden’s “affirmative action” Supreme Court nomination process, which he said will cause the president’s nominee to “always have an asterisk attached” to her name.

In his op-ed, Shapiro said that IDEAA had “implicitly repealed Georgetown’s Speech and Expression Policy and set me up for discipline the next time I transgress progressive orthodoxy.”

“Instead of participating in that slow-motion firing, I’m resigning,” Shapiro declared.

In his resignation letter to Bill Treanor, the dean of the Georgetown University Law Center, Shapiro said, “In contrast to the Jesuitical values that you’re fond of reciting, this institution no longer stands for tolerance, respect, good faith, self-reflective learning, and generous service to others.”

“I cannot again subject my family to the public attacks on my character and livelihood that you and IDEAA have now made foreseeable, indeed inevitable,” he added. “As a result of the hostile work environment that you and they have created, I have no choice but to resign.”