Ibram X. Kendi accuses ‘racist mob’ of being behind Claudine Gay’s resignation

Ibram X. Kendi accused “racist mobs” of being persistent in trying to remove “all Black people from positions of power and influence” who are not upholding “the structure of racism” in the aftermath of Harvard President Claudine Gay’s resignation.

Gay announced her decision on Tuesday after controversy arose over her congressional testimony regarding antisemitism on the college campus and reports of plagiarism in her past work. Kendi claimed in various posts on X, formerly known as Twitter, that “racist mobs” were to blame for the pressure leading to her resignation and accused the media of giving “credibility” to the alleged mob.

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“Racist mobs won’t stop until they topple all Black people from positions of power and influence who are not reinforcing the structure of racism. What these racist mobs are doing should be obvious to any reporter who cares about truth or justice as opposed to conflicts and clicks,” he wrote. “Too often mainstream reporters join the racist mob or give it credibility — as they did in this case — just as they did a century ago.”

In a subsequent thread on X, Kendi said the “racist mob” justifies its “anti-Black” attacks by finding a “seemingly legitimate” criticism of the person, questioning whether a white person would be subject to the same scrutiny regarding plagiarism.

“When a racist mob attacks a Black person, it finds a seemingly legitimate reason for the attack that allows for it to accrue popular support and credibility, and which allows the growing mob to deny they are attacking the person in this way because the person is Black,” he said. “That’s how anti-Black racist attacks have been justified. The seemingly legitimate reason, in this latest case at Harvard, is primarily academic misconduct or plagiarism. The question to assess whether this was a racist attack isn’t whether Dr. Gay engaged in any misconduct.”

“The question is whether all these people would have investigated, surveilled, harassed, written about, and attacked her in the same way if the Harvard president in this case would have been White,” Kendi said. “I. Think. Not.”

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Gay was the second of the three university presidents who testified before Congress in December to resign from their position following backlash over their responses to questions about antisemitism on college campuses.

Liz Magill resigned as president of the University of Pennsylvania less than a week after her congressional testimony. Gay kept her job despite backlash over her testimony but stepped down after alleged instances of plagiarism were brought to light.