Embattled Law Prof. Amy Wax to UPenn: Lift Sanctions or I’ll See You in Court

Embattled Law Prof. Amy Wax to UPenn: Lift Sanctions or I’ll See You in Court

Embattled law professor Amy Wax, recently sanctioned by UPenn for her outspoken conservative views, has just handed the school an ultimatum: lift the sanctions or lawyer up.

In a letter obtained by The Free Beacon, Wax’s attorneys argue that by tolerating antisemitic speech while punishing Wax’s speech, the University has violated federal law against race-based discrimination. It has also breached its contract with Wax, which guarantees her academic freedom under the terms of her tenure, the lawyers say. They give UPenn until this Thursday to comply with the letter’s demands before they sue.

We’ve been following the events leading up to last week’s showdown between Wax and UPenn here:

• Report: UPenn To Sanction Dissident Law Professor Amy Wax
• Report: Embattled UPenn Law Prof. Amy Wax Appealing Hearing Board Sanctions Quietly Recommended Over The Summer
• House Committee Demands U Penn Antisemitism Records, Decries Hypocritical Mistreatment Of Prof. Amy Wax
• Embattled UPenn Law Prof Amy Wax Sets the Record Straight: “mainstream media coverage has been agenda-driven”
• It “Sucks” That Prof. Amy Wax Still Employed, U Penn Law Dean Declared On Recently Released 2019 Audio
• Tables Turned: Prof. Amy Wax, Charged With Wrongthink, Files Counter-Grievance Against U Penn Law Dean
• U Penn Law Prof. Amy Wax Seeks Dismissal Of University Disciplinary Proceedings: “Premature, Unwarranted, and Prejudicial”
• How A Weak Penn Law Dean Weaponized Student Hurt Feelings Against Dissident Prof. Amy Wax

When we last checked in on Amy Wax, UPenn had announced it would sanction her “for a major infraction of the university’s behavioral standards.”

Her “discriminatory and disrespectful statements to specific targeted racial, national, ethnic, sexual orientation, and gender groups with which our students and colleagues identify” created “an unequal learning environment,” the school said.

Wax’s punishment included suspension for one year at half pay, loss of her named chair, and public reprimand—though she was not fired and did not lose tenure.

As part of her punishment, Wax is also required to note in her public appearances that she is not speaking on behalf of the school.

The sanctions imposed in September marked the conclusion of Wax’s years-long conflict with the university, which began when she she triggered the woke campus mob by unapologetically expressing traditonal American views in a 2017 op-ed.

But if you’ve been following the once-esteemed professor’s story, you had to know that the school’s sanctions weren’t really the end, but a new beginning.

Because what really got the woke campus mob going after Wax in the first place—and endeared her to the rest of us—is that she never backs down.

As soon as the attacks against her started, Wax doubled down, persistently publicly commenting on hot-button topics such as the negative consequences of affirmative action and immigration restrictions. Her remarks escalated student protests and a petition for her removal.

(Incidentally, you also won’t be surprised to learn that Wax was reportedly offered a deal to ease the sanctions if she would agree to keep quiet about how the school was treating her, and she flat-out refused it.)

Her comments that America would be better off “with fewer Asians and less Asian immigration”—because Asian immigrants support the Democrat party responsible for ruining the country—prompted swift condemnation from the dean—and finally gave him the pretext to begin proceedings to terminate her.

Those proceedings dragged on relentlessly—even as Wax battled cancer—for over two years, culminating in the school’s September ruling that upheld the university faculty board’s decision to sanction Wax in June of last year, following Wax’s appeal of that decision and its review by Penn’s Senate Committee on Academic Freedom and Responsibility, as we reported here.

Then-President Elizabeth Magill signed off on the sanctions over the summer of 2023 before she resigned in disgrace following her disastrous congressional testimony where she couldn’t bring herself to say whether calling for the genocide of Jews violated the school’s code of conduct.

The congressional committee investigating antisemitism said Wax’s case shows how Penn applies one standard to people who express viewpoints it favors and another to people who don’t.

And that double standard, Wax’s lawyers say in their demand letter, is grounds for the real discrimination in her case. For while the school says Wax’s comments violate its anti-discrimination policies, her lawyers argue that it’s UPenn that discriminates on the basis of race.

UPenn has been giving Wax ammunition all year for her threatened lawsuit by tolerating antisemitic and anti-American speech on the grounds that it’s protected by the First Amendment—while sanctioning her comments.

For example, Wax’s lawyers ask, why didn’t Penn punish Dwayne Booth, an undergraduate lecturer, for this blood libel cartoon against Jews:

More of his hideous cartoons captured by Aaron Sibarium here:

UPenn declined to sanction Dwayne Booth, a lecturer at the school, for his cartoons depicting “Zionists” as Nazis who drink the blood of Palestinians.

But it is sanctioning Amy Wax, a tenured law professor, for “unprofessional conduct” and “targeted disparagement.” https://t.co/NOdfR1wneD pic.twitter.com/BoQKoe5krk

— Aaron Sibarium (@aaronsibarium) September 23, 2024

Wax’s lawyers say UPenn Interim president J. Larry Jameson issued a statement condemning the cartoons, but made no mention of sanctions, claiming Booth and other likeminded speakers have the “right and ability … to express their views, however loathsome we find them.”

As of this writing, Jameson’s statement has been scrubbed from the UPenn website.

On another occasion, the demand letter says Penn deferred to Professor Ahmad Almallah, a Palestinian poet and artist-in-residence at Penn who also lectures at the University. He reportedly led a rally in Philadelphia where he chanted “[t]here is only one solution” regarding Israel:

Ahmad Almallah, who used a picture of a terrorist for his Twitter photo, organized anti-Israel rallies @Penn & led chants calling for terrorism against Jews, including, “There is only one solution, intifada revolution” and “Resistance is justified.” https://t.co/kXhHWwJLRf pic.twitter.com/i9Ilf7yLwj

— Canary Mission (@canarymission) January 26, 2024

Wax’s lawyers point out that when asked asked at the congressional hearings why Penn didn’t punish Almallah, then-President Magill responded that Penn’s speech policy “is guided by the United States Constitution,” preventing them from taking action against his antisemitic threats.

More recently, undergraduate Professor Julia Alekseyeva posted a video openly celebrating the fact that the alleged murderer of Brian Thompson, the CEO of UnitedHealth Group, was an alumnus of the University and called the assassin ‘[t]he icon we all need and deserve.'”

Although Alekseyeva later retracted the statement, she received only a slap on the wrist from the undergraduate Deputy Dean Jeffrey Kallberg, who condemned the statement and welcomed her “correction.”

“The proposition that Professor Wax’s speech merited disciplinary action based on the putative ‘harm’ caused by her speech—but none of the foregoing instances did—is preposterous,” Wax’s lawyers write in the letter.

They argue that the University’s double standard is grounds for claims of race-based discrimination under federal law. By tolerating antisemitic speech on the one hand, while punishing Wax’s speech about minorities on the other, UPenn’s speech policies “transparently discriminate on the basis of race, including most notably the race of the subject of the speech at issue.” “As such,” the letter continues, “they violate federal law’s various prohibitions against race-based discrimination.”

And by sanctioning Wax’s speech based on its content, the school is in breach of its contractual promise to protect her academic freedom as a tenured professor, her lawyers say.

As of now, the clock is still ticking until December 19th for the school to disavow the sanctions against her before Wax’s lawyers file her lawsuit.

But in this interview with Richard Hanania, Wax explains that the last time her lawyer, David Shapiro, raised the specter of litigation—and discovery of UPenn’s duplicity—the school said it didn’t “care about any of that stuff.” All it cared about was, “the students apply and the money rolls in—and they mean federal money.”

Watch here till the end:

Amy Wax on the "Midwit Gynocrats" she has had to deal with at Penn.

"These people are as intellectually mediocre and undistinguished as you could possibly imagine."

They punished her for her fearlessness. pic.twitter.com/yi86O0VNcF

— Richard Hanania (@RichardHanania) September 24, 2024

So I’ll be watching (but not holding my breath) to see whether the school caves before then.

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