Major donor calls on UPenn president to resign after disastrous antisemitism testimony, rescinds $100 million gift
Ross Stevens pulled his pledge to the University of Pennsylvania days after Liz Magill testified before Congress, and the school's board pushed her out within the week.
Donor Ross Stevens rescinded a $100 million gift to the University of Pennsylvania in protest of president Liz Magill's congressional testimony on antisemitism, according to Fox Business. Stevens pointed to Magill's testimony in explaining the decision, though the retrieved reporting does not include a direct quote from him.
The testimony came December 5, 2023, when Magill appeared before a House committee alongside the presidents of Harvard and MIT. Asked whether calling for the genocide of Jewish people would violate Penn's code of conduct on bullying and harassment, Magill said: "If the speech turns into conduct, it can be harassment. Yes," and, pressed further, called it "a context-dependent decision," according to Fox Business.
Magill later walked the answer back, saying "a call for genocide of Jewish people is a call for some of the most terrible violence human beings can perpetrate," per Fox Business' account. The retrieved reporting does not specify the exact timing of that clarification relative to the hearing.
How Stevens explained the decision to his own staff
In a note to his own employees, Stevens wrote: "Absent a change in leadership and values at Penn in the very near future, I plan to rescind Penn's Stone Ridge shares to help prevent any further reputational and other damage to Stone Ridge as a result of our relationship with Penn and Liz Magill," according to reporting on the note. The gift had been structured as limited partnership units in Stevens' firm, Stone Ridge Asset Management, intended to fund a center for innovation in finance at Penn; Stone Ridge's agreement with the university reportedly allowed the firm to retire the shares for cause, including reputational damage to Stone Ridge itself.
The board's response
The Wharton School's board asked Magill to resign, and Penn's full board of trustees held an emergency meeting on Thursday, December 7, 2023, according to Fox Business. Board chairman Scott L. Bok announced afterward that Magill had "voluntarily tendered her resignation."
What followed
Magill's resignation as president took effect Saturday, December 9, 2023, Fox Business reported, though she retained her position as a tenured faculty member at Penn Carey Law. The available reporting does not detail whether Stevens' gift was later restored or redirected, nor does it specify the university's replacement search process.
The board chairman resigned too
Bok did not stay on. He resigned as chair of Penn's board of trustees himself, effective immediately, according to CNN and Fox News reporting on the fallout -- even though he had initially been expected to remain in the role to help manage the presidential transition. In his own resignation statement, Bok thanked Magill "for her service to the University as President" and called her "a very good person and a talented leader" who was "not the slightest bit antisemitic," pushing back on some of the harshest public characterizations of her even as he stepped down alongside her.
Wharton School board members had been especially blunt in the run-up to both resignations, telling Magill in writing, "As confirmed in your congressional testimony yesterday, the leadership of the University does not share the values of our Board," according to reporting reviewed on the episode. That pressure from Wharton's board, combined with Stevens' rescinded pledge and a wider wave of donor and political criticism following the December 5 hearing, is what the available coverage credits with forcing both the president's and the board chairman's departures within days of each other.
US In News compiled this archived account from contemporaneous coverage by Fox Business. It restores a story originally published on this site in December 2023; figures are as reported at the time.