Columbia Faculty Alliance Statement on the Attack on Interim-President Shipman and her Apology

Another day, another leak of administrative text messages, this time in the right-wing Free Beacon, followed by a remarkably credulous article in the Times. A group of Columbia faculty and staff have released the following statement, check it out:

New York City, 7/2/2025

In the past 48 hours, we watched yet another temporary president—Claire Shipman—being attacked by D.C. MAGA policymakers and their rightwing supporters at Columbia.

In private messages dating to late 2023 and early 2024, recently leaked to the press, Claire Shipman argued for board diversity, questioned newly appointed trustee Shoshana Shendelman's exaggerated complaints against student protesters, hesitated to call the NYPD on campus, suggested suspended student orgs be reinstated, and noted the federal government's travesties. These points, made while Shipman was co-chair of the Board of Trustees ("BoT"), align with current demands of many of Columbia’s staff and faculty.

The timing of this leak is suspicious. Who benefits from sending Shipman’s messages to the right wing Free Beacon? Shoshana Shendelman, the disgraced BoT and pharma-investor who flouted FDA rules and tanked her company, leading to a securities fraud lawsuit, has recently come under pressure to resign from Columbia’s board. Desperate to repair her image, over the last week Shendelman managed to get CUMed to promote her on X and shill for RFK Jr’s anti-science MAHA program. She also tried to repair her reputation in a Fox oped, and in recent days repped the BoT and CU on Fox and Breitbart to spread fear and Islamophobic lies about Zohran Mamdani, New York City’s Democratic nominee for mayor, voted for by more than half a million people.

Meanwhile, CU is once again watching a female president being attacked by forces both inside and outside the university, under the thin veneer of bad faith accusations of antisemitism. Elise Stefanik, an upstate NY congresswoman with no connection to CU, demanded Shipman's resignation on X.

In response to this pressure, Interim President Shipman had the opportunity to stand by her words, and demand Shendelman resign. However, she chose to apologize for everything she wrote.

While we reject the congressional demand for her resignation, we are disappointed in Shipman’s apology. Rather than apologize, Shipman should have continued to advocate for a BOT more representative of Columbia's student and faculty population (there are currently no Muslim BOT members), freedom of speech, and our students’ right to protest. Instead, she caved and failed to insist on the university’s autonomy. SHAME.

Moreover, we are shocked that Shipman professed to having “tremendous respect” for a board member who is currently being sued for securities fraud and received an FDA warning for failing to present information about dosing errors in her drug trials. Why does she apologize to a board member who was instrumental in calling for NYPD action against Columbia’s peaceful protesters? We reiterate that Shendelman should resign, as do over 250 faculty, staff, students and alumni who signed the petition calling for her removal.

We call on Shipman to stand by her words and not to bow to external pressure.

Columbia Faculty and Staff Alliance