Ilya Shapiro, a senior lecturer at Georgetown University’s law school, resigned on Monday after the school investigated a controversial tweet he published about President Biden’s election to the Supreme Court.
“Dean William Trainer clarified to me the technical details that I was not an employee when I tweeted, but [Office of Institutional Diversity, Equity and Affirmative Action] he implicitly repealed Georgetown’s policy on speech and expression and set me up for discipline the next time I violated progressive orthodoxy, “Shapiro wrote in The Wall Street Journal. “Instead of participating in this delayed shooting, I resign.”
Shapiro was released on leave in February after tweeting that a Supreme Court candidate because she was a black woman would be “less” than the potential candidate Shapiro considered the most strategic choice.
“Objectively, the best choice for Biden is Sri Srinivasan, who is a solid program and intelligent,” Shapiro tweeted. “There is even a benefit to identity politics being the first Asian (Indian) American. But, alas, it does not fit into the latest hierarchy of intersectionality, so we will get a smaller black woman. Thank heavens for the small services? “
Shapiro deleted the tweet and apologized for his wording two days later.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend myself, but it was an unassuming tweet. I downloaded it,” he tweeted at the time.
He added: “A person’s dignity and worth simply do not depend and should not depend on race, gender or any other invariable characteristic. Although it is important to respect different points of view and experience in the judiciary, the explicit use of an identity policy in the selection of judges by the Supreme Court is a discrediting vital institution.
Georgetown Law School Dean William Trainer condemned Shapiro’s comments, calling them “harmful” and “contrary to the work we do at Georgetown Law to build inclusion, belonging.”
Trainer called for an investigation into “whether Mr Shapiro has violated the university’s non-discrimination and anti-harassment policies”. The investigation concluded that Shapiro “was not disciplined” because he tweeted his comments six days before the start of his term in Georgetown.
In his resignation letter, Shapiro highlighted the possibility of people taking offense at his other conflicting views, such as opposing abortion and positive action, and his perception that Georgetown was pursuing its policies unevenly based on employees’ political views.
He referred to a tweet from Georgetown professor Carol Christine Fair during the confirmation process of Supreme Court Justice Cavanaugh, who said: “Look at this chorus of white men with rights that justify the seized rights of a serial rapist. They all deserve a miserable death while feminists laugh as they take their last breaths. Bonus: to castrate their carcasses and feed them to pigs? Yes.”
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“When Prof. Fair advocated murder and castration on the basis of race and sex, Georgetown did not launch an investigation, but instead referred to Georgetown’s policy of free expression,” Shapiro wrote.
Shapiro said he could not “re-subject my family to public attacks on my character and livelihood” made “inevitable” by Georgetown’s “hostile work environment”.
“I will not live this way,” he wrote. “I have no choice but to resign.”
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