More Universities Are Choosing to Stay Neutral on the Biggest Issues

Just a few years ago, universities frequently issued statements on pressing social and political matters.

When Russia launched its attack on Ukraine in 2022, Harvard’s president at the time condemned it as “senseless” and “deplorable,” even raising Ukraine’s flag in Harvard Yard. After George Floyd was killed by a white police officer, Cornell’s president expressed feeling “sickened.” In response to the violence against Israel on October 7, 2023, the University of Michigan’s president characterized it as a “horrific attack by Hamas terrorists.”

However, over the past year, these universities have shifted course, adopting policies that restrict official statements on current events.

A new report released Tuesday by the Heterodox Academy—a group critical of progressive dominance on college campuses—found that by the end of 2024, 148 colleges had implemented “institutional neutrality” policies. The trend reflects the intense political scrutiny universities now face. Notably, all but eight of these policies were introduced after the Hamas attack.

“We must create space for our faculty to share their expertise, intelligence, and scholarship freely, without institutional interference,” said Mark Bernstein, a regent at Michigan, when the policy was adopted in October.

He pointed out that historically, the university had refrained from making statements on major events, such as the assassinations of Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy or even the two world wars.

“Institutional statements are a modern invention, and a misguided one at that, which undermines our public mission,” he argued.

The shift toward neutrality comes amid increasing pressure from the Trump administration, which has taken an aggressive stance against universities for failing to address antisemitism and for endorsing diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives.

Last Friday, the administration announced it would revoke $400 million from Columbia University, sending shock waves through the higher education sector. Officials have already signaled plans to scrutinize additional universities.

The trend of universities making public statements on controversial issues gained momentum about a decade ago, coinciding with the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement and police shootings of Black Americans, said Alex Arnold, director of research at the Heterodox Academy.

For years, conservative critics argued that such statements leaned too far left. Free speech advocacy groups, such as the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, worried that they discouraged dissent. Despite these concerns, institutional statements remained largely uncontroversial—until the Hamas attack changed the landscape.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has long divided the left, but the October 7 attack and the ensuing war deepened those divisions. Universities found their statements scrutinized and criticized for being too slow, too weak, too biased—or all three.

Under mounting pressure from donors, lawmakers, and the public, university leaders began questioning the necessity of issuing statements at all.

Nearly 80% of the colleges that adopted neutrality policies are public institutions subject to state oversight. Lawmakers in states such as Texas, Utah, and North Carolina mandated that their public universities implement these policies, while Tennessee is considering similar legislation.

Most of these policies apply to senior administrators, such as university presidents and provosts, while some extend to academic departments. Many also regulate faculty speech in an official capacity, though they typically reaffirm professors’ right to express personal views, according to the Heterodox Academy.

“The controversy surrounding universities’ responses to the Hamas attack has prompted institutional leaders to carefully reconsider their role in public discourse,” said Arnold. “I believe this shift is likely to endure.”

Critics argue that the neutrality movement is merely an attempt by administrators to avoid difficult discussions on the Middle East conflict and to placate donors and legislators.

When Clark University in Massachusetts announced it would refrain from taking positions, the school newspaper’s opinion editor denounced the decision as a “fake policy” meant to suppress discussion.

Yet, even institutions that have embraced neutrality have not remained entirely silent on contentious issues.

At a recent Anti-Defamation League event in New York City, Michigan’s president, Santa Ono, denounced the boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement against Israel as antisemitic, stating that his response was to deepen investment in those partnerships.

In an email, the university clarified that its neutrality policy carries a “heavy presumption” against issuing statements unrelated to internal university affairs.

“Combating antisemitism and ensuring an inclusive environment where all students can thrive is both a moral and legal obligation, directly tied to our core mission as an institution of higher education,” said Colleen Mastony, a university spokeswoman.

Despite these policies, university leaders sometimes struggle to adhere to them. In an October interview with Harvard’s student newspaper, university president Alan Garber called a statement by pro-Palestinian students “offensive,” prompting the editorial board to urge him to “follow your own policy.”

Last month, the American Association of University Professors, a faculty rights organization, released a statement on neutrality that was, fittingly, neutral. It noted that institutional neutrality is “neither a prerequisite for academic freedom nor inherently incompatible with it.”

With Donald Trump’s re-election campaign underway, these policies are facing new challenges.

As the administration, which has labeled universities as “the enemy,” intensifies its crackdown on higher education, colleges are under increasing pressure to take a stand.

But many university presidents have been frightened into silence, said Patricia McGuire, president of Trinity Washington University, a small Catholic institution near the White House.

“They saw what happened to Claudine Gay and other university leaders,” she said, referring to the former Harvard president who resigned last year following a congressional hearing on antisemitism. “They don’t want to be next. So they keep quiet, hoping the storm will pass.”

No institution is more closely associated with neutrality than the University of Chicago, where incoming students receive the Kalven Report, a 1967 document advocating institutional neutrality. Written during the Vietnam War era, the report asserts that a university “is the home and sponsor of critics; it is not itself the critic.”

Tom Ginsburg, director of the Forum for Free Inquiry and Expression at the University of Chicago, says neutrality policies help reassure lawmakers that colleges welcome diverse viewpoints.

“Because institutional statements often reflected majority campus views, which lean overwhelmingly left, adopting neutrality signals to lawmakers that universities aren’t in the business of ideological indoctrination,” he explained.

Yet, even the Kalven Report includes a caveat: universities should speak out when their core mission and commitment to free inquiry are at risk.

According to McGuire, that moment has arrived. “This administration’s assault on knowledge and expertise is deeply alarming,” she said. “Higher education must push back at every opportunity.”