{"id":248080,"date":"2025-09-23T05:07:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-23T05:07:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/248080\/"},"modified":"2025-09-23T05:07:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-23T05:07:09","slug":"new-documents-show-shapiros-penn-proxy-pushed-for-faculty-discipline-broad-antisemitism-definition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/248080\/","title":{"rendered":"New documents show Shapiro\u2019s Penn proxy pushed for faculty discipline, broad antisemitism definition"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\"03-14-2021-quad-maya-pratt\"\/
\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\tDocuments have surfaced detailing Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and his representative\u2019s involvement in internal affairs at the University, including efforts to influence faculty decisions and governance.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCredit: Maya Pratt<\/a> \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

Documents acquired by The Daily Pennsylvanian show that Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and his representative at Penn sought the firing of one professor and the public condemnation of another, embraced an expansive definition of \u201cantisemitic speech,\u201d and intervened in the University’s January 2024 Board of Trustee chair election.\n<\/p>\n

The documents follow an August report by the Chronicle of Higher Education<\/a> which revealed that Shapiro has gained an unprecedented level of influence at Penn over the past two years, with his office helping guide<\/a> Penn\u2019s response to antisemitism concerns. Many of the documents focus on the role of 1982 College graduate Robert Fox, who served as Shapiro\u2019s representative to Penn during and after the University’s fall 2023 leadership crisis that ended with the resignations of then-Penn President Liz Magill and Board of Trustees Chair Scott Bok.\n\t\t<\/p>\n

Per an archaic Penn statute<\/a>, Pennsylvania\u2019s governor is allocated a nonvoting observer seat on its Board of Trustees through which the governor could attend and chair any meeting. While this right has not been exercised in the recent past<\/a>, and Penn has not let the governor send a representative in their stead, Bok told the Chronicle<\/a> that the University changed its precedent and relented to Shapiro\u2019s desire for a representative as pressure built on Penn during the fall 2023 semester.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

In statements to the Chronicle both Shapiro’s office and a University spokesperson defended the decision, citing the governor\u2019s role in Penn\u2019s charter and the importance of combatting antisemitism and other forms of hate.\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\u201cThe University of Pennsylvania is committed to ensuring that Jewish students, faculty, and staff continue to feel safe, valued, and empowered to flourish and lead within our community,\u201d a Penn spokesperson wrote to the DP, pointing to recent progress through ongoing efforts by the University Task Force on Antisemitism and the Commission on Countering Hate including “policy and security changes,” kosher dining options, and “new academic and social programs.”\n<\/p>\n

Divisive stances on Penn\u2019s antisemitism task force<\/p>\n

In January 2024, Fox \u2014 a Philadelphia-based lawyer and former adjunct professor at Penn\u00a0\u2014 joined the University’s antisemitism task force as a nonvoting member on behalf of Shapiro two months after its initial formation. Shortly after, several task force members contacted the task force\u2019s chair with concerns about him maintaining meetings\u2019 confidentiality.\u00a0\n\t<\/p>\n

Penn Dental School dean and Task Force chair Mark Wolff met with Fox to pass along the concerns, and later drafted<\/a> a message to the group \u2014 which he ran by the governor’s proxy prior to sending \u2014 to note Fox’s awareness.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cHe also expressed to me that he recognized and would respect that Task Force meetings are strictly confidential, and that our group is advisory to the President,\u201d Wolff wrote. \u201cHe does look forward to sharing his, and the Governor\u2019s, thoughts on managing events on campus.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Fox later forwarded the email to Amanda Warren, Shapiro\u2019s director of external affairs and his main point of contact in the governor\u2019s office.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cI have no problem with this but what was the faculty concern\u201d Fox wrote. \u201cThat I would not treat the meetings as confidential? Jeez.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

In addition, according to the Chronicle<\/a>, two anonymous members of the task force \u2014 who were granted anonymity due to the task force\u2019s policy of strict confidentiality \u2014 detailed \u00a0frustration among its members after Fox’s arrival.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cThe general concern was around perceived politicization once the governor or someone from his team were to have their hand in it, and that they would push for certain outcomes \u2026 based on the political hopes and preferences of the governor,\u201d one member told the Chronicle, adding that \u201c[Fox] would, numerous times, make a point of invoking that he was trying to represent the governor\u2019s position.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Wolff declined to comment for this piece, citing the task force\u2019s confidentiality policy.\n<\/p>\n

According to one member of the antisemitism task force, Fox was aligned with the faction of its members who supported the strongest university action against perceived antisemitic activity on campus, according to the Chronicle.\n<\/p>\n

On February 26, 2024, Fox \u2014\u00a0apparently as part of the task force\u2019s ongoing efforts \u2014\u00a0drafted an email to Warren with \u201cexamples of antisemitic speech to be used in a definition.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

The email included 12 examples, ranging from traditional forms of antisemitism \u2014 such as \u201cJews as child killers or the blood libel\u201d to anti-Israel rhetoric. Included in Fox\u2019s list was \u201ccalling for the destruction of Israel,\u201d \u201cdenying Israel\u2019s right as a sovereign state to self-determination,\u201d \u201cdenying Jewish indigeneity in Israel,\u201d and \u201cZionists are oppressive and hateful and must be fought by any means.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Desire for discipline and condemnation of Penn professors<\/p>\n

Fox, in his capacity on the antisemitism task force and Board of Trustees on behalf of Shapiro, also demonstrated a willingness to advocate for public repercussions for those he believed to be using antisemitic rhetoric.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

In early February 2024, two months after Magill and Bok\u2019s resignations, antisemitism concerns again erupted<\/a> on campus over cartoons published by Penn lecturer Dwayne Booth. Critics denounced the cartoons as antisemitic \u2014 though Booth has defended them as satirical and taken out of context \u2014 with Jameson later condemning them \u201cas reprehensible, with antisemitic symbols\u201d in a University-wide statement while defending academic freedom.\n<\/p>\n

Fox, in a message<\/a> to Warren following Jameson\u2019s email, wrote that the University-wide message was \u201cinadequate,\u201d and seemed to call for Booth\u2019s firing. Fox referred to the cartoons as \u201cvirulently anti semitic,\u201d saying that Jameson\u2019s response \u201csignals to me that to the faculty their rights are absolute.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Booth, in response to a request for comment, wrote that Fox\u2019s \u201cwillful misreading of my anti-genocide cartoons as being antisemitic\u201d and characterization of his work as \u201con a public website\u201d rather than in professional publications \u201cis so uninformed and cloying that it doesn\u2019t deserve further comment.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\u201cAdditionally, to suggest that President Jameson was not doing enough to crush the voices of those students and faculty members expressing concern over the growing genocide in Gaza is likewise ludicrous,\u201d Booth wrote.\n<\/p>\n

Ultimately, Jameson and the Annenberg School of Communication refrained from firing Booth, who remained in his position through the end of the 2024-25 school year.\n<\/p>\n

Later in the semester, after Penn\u2019s antisemitism task force had finalized its final report but before its publication, Fox sought to add a note condemning Beth Wenger \u2014 Penn\u2019s School of Arts and Sciences\u2019 associate dean for graduate studies and a fellow member of the task force \u2014 for her remarks at SAS\u2019s graduate student commencement ceremony in May 2024.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

At the ceremony, a student speaker concluded an extended speech about his scholarship by criticizing the \u201cinterconnected, white supremacist, imperial, and hypermilitarized violence waged on the people of Gaza\u2026 and even the protesters on our own campus.\u201d Wenger, afterwards \u2014 appearing to read from a pre-prepared script \u2014 thanked the speaker and said that \u201cit gives us so much pleasure to send scholars like this in the world.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Wenger did not respond to multiple requests for comment for this piece.\n<\/p>\n

While regularly updating Warren on his drafts and progress, Fox circulated several draft statements among task force members to attempt to get signatories. Fox\u2019s initial draft condemned the students\u2019 statements as \u201cboth false and anti-Semitic,\u201d later writing that \u201cThe undersigned strongly condemn the statement of the associate dean [as] entirely antithetical to the work of the Task Force and Penn\u2019s values.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\u201cWe make this statement so there is no ambiguity that this language should not be tolerated, let alone endorsed by a dean at the University,\u201d Fox continued.\n<\/p>\n

Over the next two weeks, Fox revised and softened the statement, apparently gaining various levels of support from four other task force members.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cTo me the issue is not whether people are making a fuss about this. It is whether we are doing the right thing,\u201d Fox wrote to the four other members. \u201cAnd I think by doing nothing Penn is repeating its failure to respond proactively, which continues to create a negative perception.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

He proceeded to propose the members send their statement to the Anti-Defamation League in hopes that Wenger\u2019s rhetoric would not harm Penn\u2019s grade in its upcoming campus report card on antisemitism.\n<\/p>\n

One of the task force members, when asked about this incident, said that they did not particularly remember Fox advocating for the condemnation of Wenger.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I believe it,\u201d they added.\n<\/p>\n

Involvement in Penn\u2019s board chair election<\/p>\n

In January 2024, only two months after Fox\u2019s appointment to the Board of Trustees and several weeks after Magill and Bok\u2019s resignations, the group was set to elect a new chair to lead the group \u2014 and, eventually, the selection process for Penn\u2019s next president.\n<\/p>\n

Shortly before the planned election, nine members of the Board \u2014 including Fox \u2014 sent a letter<\/a> to all trustees requesting a postponement of the chair election scheduled for the following day, calling the search process insufficiently \u201ctransparent and inclusive.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Fox penned a message<\/a> of his own to the Board requesting the delay and criticized the process as a failure of \u201cgood governance and unity,\u201d particularly citing a rushed elections process and the removal of previously planned written statements by candidates.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom what I have observed and read, the process has not met that standard,\u201d Fox wrote.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, after pushback from Interim Board Chair Julie Beren Platt and at least one other trustee, the vote continued as planned. Then-chair of the board of advisors of Penn’s School of Arts and Sciences Ramanan Raghavendran was elected to replace Bok.\n<\/p>\n

Platt did not respond to repeated requests for comment. Raghavendran declined to comment for this piece.\n<\/p>\n

Frequent complaints about Penn\u2019s administration<\/p>\n

While heavily involved in Penn\u2019s affairs, Fox often noted his dissatisfaction with his level of involvement and Penn\u2019s senior leadership at large.\n<\/p>\n

When first added to the task force, Fox complained<\/a> to Warren that the task force was \u201caiming to treat [him] in the same fashion\u201d as the other external presenters to the group. Fox also protested to Warren that the task force had not shared with him its interim recommendations to Interim Penn President Larry Jameson.\n<\/p>\n

At one point in March 2024, Fox questioned<\/a> a Penn administrator about why he was not allowed to sit with the Board of Trustees at official meetings nor be assigned to any of its committees, later writing to Warren that \u201cit comes from the top as we expected\u201d \u2014 appearing to blame Raghavendran.\n<\/p>\n

The next month, Jameson and Raghavendran authored a confidential note to the trustees including updates on the work of Penn\u2019s task forces against antisemitism and hate. The two wrote that they extended their \u201ccontinued thanks\u201d to six trustees and one former trustee \u2014 all listed by name \u2014 for their participation on the two committees, but did not include Fox in the list.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cAgain note the absence of a representative of me in Larry\u2019s note,\u201d Fox wrote to Warren. \u201cThey don’t get it.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Coordination with other elected officials<\/p>\n

As they enmeshed themselves in Penn’s governance, Fox and Shapiro worked closely with students in the Penn Israel Public Affairs Committee \u2014 a Penn student pro-Israel advocacy group \u2014 to a great enough extent that the students thanked the governor\u2019s office for their \u201cpartnership<\/a>.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

In September 2024, after one of many calls between the students and Fox, a PIPAC member sent<\/a> Fox a message with six \u201cactions items.\u201d The list included working with Penn\u2019s newly-announced Office of Religious and Ethnic Inclusion \u201cregarding accountability for students and professors,\u201d coordinating with the \u201csympathetic\u201d Matt Bradford (D-Worcester) \u2014 the Majority Leader of the Pennsylvania House \u2014 and planning a vigil to commemorate the one-year anniversary of Oct. 7.\n<\/p>\n

The communications also indicated support from Shapiro\u2019s office for the students\u2019 push to codify the IHRA definition of antisemitism, which has been denounced<\/a> by some for allegedly conflating antisemitism with criticism of the state of Israel.\n<\/p>\n

The student also highlighted an October 1 \u201cactivism day\u201d to discuss “passing legislation supporting IHRA, mask protocols, and accountability for universities.\u201d\n\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\tSign up for our newsletter<\/p>\n

Get our newsletter, DP Daybreak, delivered to your inbox every weekday morning.<\/p>\n

On the Oct. 1 visit, the students also met with Warren and TJ Yablonski, Shapiro\u2019s Secretary of Legislative Affairs.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cI will work with him ahead of time to identify some key legislators that would be good targets for a meeting and where we can help,\u201d Warren wrote to the students prior to the meeting. \u201cI am sure we can be helpful with Leader Bradford, among others.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Bradford\u2019s office did not respond to several requests for comment for this piece.<\/p>\n

The Daily Pennsylvanian is an independent, student-run newspaper. Please consider making a donation<\/a> to support the coverage that shapes the University. Your generosity ensures a future of strong journalism at Penn.<\/p>\n

Donate<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Documents have surfaced detailing Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and his representative\u2019s involvement in internal affairs at the University,…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":248081,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5132],"tags":[5672,5229,8432,131759,131758,50,1448,2830,1311,80,11027,1399,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-248080","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia","8":"tag-administration","9":"tag-america","10":"tag-beats","11":"tag-gaza-encampment","12":"tag-magill-resigns","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-pa","15":"tag-pennsylvania","16":"tag-philadelphia","17":"tag-politics","18":"tag-studentlife","19":"tag-top","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-united-states-of-america","22":"tag-unitedstates","23":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","24":"tag-us","25":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115251881165460118","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248080","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=248080"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248080\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/248081"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}