Higher education in the United States has long been subject to a right-wing smear campaign painting college campuses as incubators for dangerous radicalism. There is little doubt that the election of President Donald Trump, who ran a campaign with explicit anti-intellectual currents, has increased its ferocity.
In late May, Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, assistant professor of African-American Studies at Princeton University, was forced to cancel public speaking appearances after receiving a slew of death threats in response to her outspokenness on the issue of racism in America. Johnny Eric Williams, a tenured professor of sociology at Trinity College, was suspended (https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/06/27/trinity-college-connecticut-puts-johnny-eric-williams-leave-over-controversial#.WVJLwm8XX-g.facebook) and forced into hiding due to similar threats over an article on race he shared on his personal social media accounts. Essex County College adjunct instructor Lisa Durden lost her job for defending an all-black Memorial Day event on the show of conservative pundit Tucker Carlson. And Drexel University professor George Ciccariello-Maher has once again found himself the target of a right-wing campaign demanding his firing due to his controversial tweets, which have brought on an investigation into his social media activity by his employer.
These conditions present the perfect moment for the Left to redouble its commitment to defending higher education, both to show solidarity with the many liberals and leftists who make their lives in academia, and to protect the importance of the free exchange of ideas under our bottom-line-focused capitalist system.


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