Linfield University votes no confidence in leadership after allegations of mishandling of antisemitism and sexual harassment
Linfield University has passed a vote of no-confidence in their leadership after the alleged mishandling of several apparent instances of antisemitism and sexual harassment.
Professor Daniel Pollack-Pelzner alleged that he was on the receiving end of several instances of antisemitism from the President and Board Chair of Linfield University. In a Twitter thread, Prof Pollack-Pelzner stated that in one instance, President Miles Davis made a passing comment about the size of Jewish noses. In another, he reported that President Davis said that “people like him” were “overreacting to the appearance of swastikas on campus.”
However, it was after Prof Pollack-Pelzner reported the sexual assault allegations brought against Linfield University trustees by several members of the student and faculty that he received particularly insidious, antisemitic comments.
He says that President Davis withheld his reports for fear that it would bring the University into disrepute, accusing him of “harbouring a secret agenda to grab power,” and that he said that “people like him [Prof Pollack-Pelzner] were destroying Linfield University from within.”
The accusation that Jews are willing to harm others for their own profit and gain is a classic antisemitic trope.
Prof Pollack-Pelzner also recalls that President Davis warned of “disloyalty from within” in a meeting, asserting the antisemitic trope of “Jewish dual loyalty,” the idea that Jews will only remain loyal to other Jews.
Prof Pollack-Pelzner alleged that President David said that Prof Pollack-Pelzner could “only show loyalty by accepting the teachings of Jesus Christ in the New Testament.”
He stated that after that interaction, he went to HR, but that he knew there was a serious problem when even the university’s Head of HR told him that she didn’t “believe the Jews have a secret agenda to grab power at all!”
After more than a month since Prof Pollack-Pelzner revealed this on Twitter, Linfield University’s faculty passed a vote of no confidence.
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