Columbia University president hit with no-confidence vote after protests

The faculty who voted are in the school of Arts and Sciences, which is the largest of Columbia’s 21 schools and serves the most students. The motion was introduced by faculty who serve on the board of Columbia’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors. Of the 709 faculty who cast a vote, 65 percent supported the motion, 29 percent were against it and 6 percent chose to abstain.

University spokesman Ben Chang said faculty in Arts and Sciences represent roughly 20 percent of the more than 4,600 full-time faculty at Columbia, noting that the majority of faculty were not part of the vote. He said Shafik regularly consults with faculty, the administration and trustees, and “appreciates the efforts of those working alongside her on the long road ahead to heal our community.”

On Thursday, Arts and Sciences Dean Amy E. Hungerford wrote to faculty expressing hope that they can constructively partner with university leaders.

“The vote represents the opinion of its supporters, and in doing so makes clear a level of frustration and disappointment among many,” Hungerford wrote in an email. “The more consequential question is how we move forward focusing on the aims and goals that I believe the faculty and the university’s highest leadership share.”

The language of the motion condemns Shafik’s decision in late April to call New York City police to clear out an encampment of protesters without consulting the university senate and criticizes her for closing the school’s Morningside campus, barring many students, faculty and staff from labs, libraries and offices. It also faults her for promising during a congressional hearing on antisemitism in April to fire faculty who engage in antisemitism.

“The President’s choices to ignore our statutes and our norms of academic freedom and shared governance, to have our students arrested, and to impose a lockdown of our campus with continuing police presence, have gravely undermined our confidence in her,” the motion reads. “A vote of no confidence in the President is the first step towards rebuilding our community and reestablishing the University’s core values of free speech, the right to peaceful assembly, and shared governance.”

Shafik, an economist who became Columbia’s leader in July, has faced intense scrutiny there and beyond. Since her testimony on Capitol Hill last month and the ensuing protests on campus, calls for her resignation have come from House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and other Republicans in Congress.

Claire Shipman and David Greenwald, co-chairs of the university’s board of trustees, recently wrote in a letter to The Washington Post, “It is disappointing, but perhaps not surprising, that in a time of crisis, the voices of critics tend to be the loudest.” They said she had borne the burden of leading through the crisis “with great wisdom and moral clarity.” The board supports her, they wrote, and feels she is the best leader for Columbia.

Brent R. Stockwell, a biochemistry professor at Columbia, said he voted against the motion because Shafik had done her best in a difficult situation. “She was trying to support the Jewish and Israeli faculty who felt uncomfortable with the protest situation,” said Stockwell, who has taught at Columbia for 20 years. “There’s a confluence of different reasons why people were supporting the protests, but my feeling overall is they were not creating the right environment on campus.”

He said some faculty criticized the administration but haven’t said what should have been done in the face of insistent demands by protesters that could not be accommodated and threats to public safety. The resolution, he said, failed to mention what many felt was an antisemitic environment created by the protesters or their illegal breaking and entering into Hamilton Hall.

The American Association of University Professors changed a proposal to censure the president to a no-confidence vote after what Reinhold Martin, the incoming president of the faculty group, described as “heavily armed NYPD” cleared protesters from Hamilton Hall. “That was a moment of truth,” he said.

Now, he said, “We must rebuild.”

The school’s powerful university senate, which includes faculty members, students, administrators and others, did not directly address Shafik’s leadership in a vote last month, but acted to create a task force to examine the administration’s leadership amid tensions over the Israel-Gaza war.

Ivan Corwin, a professor of mathematics, who was not in favor of the no-confidence vote, said Columbia needs to find a way to return to a fully open campus.

“I think that there’s a lot of willingness to try to find a path forward,” Corwin said. “I think one of the things that’s very important going forward is to make sure that students, faculty and alumni all feel ownership of the institution and feel like they have a voice that is going to be heard when conflicts arise.”

The resolution at Columbia comes amid a flurry of votes of no confidence in university leaders over their handling of the antiwar protests that have gripped college campuses. Faculty at Barnard College, Emory College and the University of Southern California have expressed a lack of confidence in their leaders in recent weeks.