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April 9, 2025
Dear President Eisgruber:
We, the officers of Princetonians for Free Speech (PFS), are writing to express our organization’s very deep concerns about the disruption of the program featuring former Israel Prime Minister Naftali Bennett on April 7 and actions of severe antisemitism during and after that program.
Princetonians for Free Speech
Since the terrorist attack on Israel and the invasion of Gaza, several universities have been prominently featured in the national news for protests, sometimes violent, on their campuses and for antisemitic acts. Princeton had protests and instances of antisemitism, but these were nowhere near the level of what occurred at some schools, such as Columbia and Harvard. At PFS, we believe this was in part because Princeton set forth clear standards in advance for protests on campus. It should have come as no surprise that two of the first schools the Trump Administration went after to freeze grants were Columbia and Harvard.
by Zeke Douglas Rosenthal, Edward Yingling, and Wyatt Browne
Daily Princetonian
Excerpt: On Wednesday, in response to a wave of national campus encampments in response to the war in Gaza, Vice President for Campus Life W. Rochelle Calhoun wrote in an email to the student body that “any individual involved in an encampment, occupation, or other unlawful disruptive conduct who refuses to stop after a warning will be arrested and immediately barred from campus.”
by Edward Yingling and Stuart Taylor
RealClear Politics
Excerpt: The lists of “top colleges” have varied little in many years. They always include the Ivies, Stanford, MIT, Cal Tech, etc. But that could change. Colleges of all types can differentiate themselves on the core values of free speech and academic freedom, and those that do will increasingly attract more and better students, faculty, and employment opportunities for their graduates.
By Edward Yingling and Stuart Taylor Jr
In July 2020, a Princeton University professor, Joshua Katz, wrote an article containing provocative language that generated controversy on campus. While voicing strong disagreement with that language, Princeton President Christopher Eisgruber clearly and publicly stated a few days later that it was protected by Princeton’s university-wide rule on free speech. But since then, through other Princeton officials, the university has for over a year viciously attacked Professor Katz as a racist on its website and elsewhere for the exact same language. These attacks have clearly violated the Princeton free speech rule, as well as other Princeton rules.
Edward Yingling and Stuart Taylor, Jr.
RealClearPolitics
Excerpt: Like alumni of universities across the country, many Princeton graduates have become deeply concerned about the attacks on free speech and academic freedom at our alma mater. It is not just the public attacks that are of concern. Multiple national and college-specific polls have shown that faculty and students are afraid to say what they think. Princeton is no different. One student told us he was afraid to speak up not just because he would be attacked, but because others with whom he was working on a project might also be attacked for associating with him.
Edward Yingling & Stuart Taylor, Jr.
RealClearPolitics
Excerpt: Free speech is very much in today’s headlines, especially with the outraged demands for technology companies to banish -- or not -- from their platforms speech they consider incitements to violence or hateful. But the greater danger may be the hostility within our colleges and universities to the free speech and academic freedom of faculty and students, and even alumni, who dissent from the views dominant on campuses today. Surveys show that a high, and growing, number of college students are opposed to free speech and to what the Supreme Court has called the “profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open.” As Princeton alumni and lawyers who have a strong belief in the vital importance of free speech, we have recently co-founded Princetonians for Free Speech. We have started by appealing mainly to alumni because they are the only university stakeholders who have the numbers and the capability to defend these basic freedoms effectively in campus environments where students and faculty who openly support free speech are outnumbered and outgunned by those who oppose it. But we hope to find allies among faculty and students as well.
To Princetonians for Free Speech Subscribers, Members and Friends,
Happy New Year! At PFS we are delighted to welcome our inaugural Executive Director; you can see below our introduction to Angela Smith. Our Special Feature includes two original articles by our PFS student writing fellows Marisa Hirschfield ‘27 and Khoa Sands ‘26. And nationally, we feature an event of particular importance to anyone interested in the state of academic freedom and free speech on America’s college campuses, held by the University of Chicago Forum for Free Inquiry and Expression. It is presented virtually as well as in person on January 31, 2025, and features Princeton professor and New York Times columnist Zeynep Tufekci. See below for details.
And PFS momentum is building! As 2024 came to a close, over 1,200 hundred new subscribers signed up with PFS. Please help to build awareness by asking your alumni and other friends to join us HERE. And for those who may have missed it, here is our 2024 Annual Report.
To Princetonians for Free Speech Subscribers, Members and Friends,
As the academic year begins at Princeton and on campuses throughout the country, an extraordinary array of newsworthy events has already occurred. In the wake of last semester’s sustained campus disruption and a contentious national election around the corner, this may be just the beginning. We start not with the usual one, but three Special Features.
By Ed Yingling '70
PFS Co-Founder
The Princetonians for Free Speech (PFS) second annual survey of Princeton students is now available. This survey provides information on student attitudes on key free speech issues. Because the survey is being done annually, comparisons can be made to see if Princeton is making progress. Unfortunately, with three important exceptions, on most issues the survey shows little or no progress from the troublesome results in the first survey. In a few cases, the results are worse than last year. Clearly Princeton still has work to do.
A group of Princeton faculty, supported by students and alumni, have developed a statement "condemning the anti-Israel and, in many cases, antisemitic demonstrations and encampments plaguing college campuses...." Signatures are being collected for the statement from Princeton and across the country. This list of signers is growing rapidly. Among the signers are Princeton Professors Robert George, Sergiu Klainerman, and John Londregan; faculty from USC and Chicago, and Princetonians for Free Speech co-founders Stuart Taylor, Jr. and Edward Yingling.
To sign, click here.
April 30, 2024
To Princetonians for Free Speech Subscribers, members and friends,
A major PFS event will occur at Reunions 2024: “You Can’t Teach That! The Battle over University Classrooms.” On Saturday, May 25, at 10 am, Princeton’s leading First Amendment scholar Keith E. Whittington, William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Politics, will appear in conversation with Jonathan Rauch, prize-winning author and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. See the description and details for this event in the Special Feature below. We hope to see you there!
By Leslie Spencer ’79
A group of Princeton faculty have come together to create The Princeton Council on Academic Freedom. It mirrors the new faculty groups at peer institutions, like the academic freedom councils at Harvard and Columbia, Faculty for Yale, and the University of Pennsylvania’s Vision for a New Future.
To Princetonians for Free Speech Subscribers, members and friends,
This month PFS spotlights an exciting event on campus. On April 22, a new film, The Coddling of the American Mind, based on the best-selling book of the same name by Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff, is showing on campus as part of a college campus national tour. See below for details.
We are eager to hear what you think of this newsletter and our other communications, so if you have a minute please fill out our subscriber survey if you have not yet done so.
And consider joining our Inner Circle for insider-only events with students, guest speakers, and our founders.
In many ways, Marisa Hirschfield ’27 represents the typical high-achieving Princeton student. A history major, Hirschfield writes for the Triangle Club and is interested in filmmaking and public interest law. Like many Princetonians, she identifies as politically progressive.
But where Hirschfield’s resume diverges from many of her classmates is that she serves as a writing fellow for Princetonians for Free Speech (PFS), a nonprofit founded by Stuart Taylor Jr. ’70 and Ed Yingling ’70 that seeks to promote free speech and academic freedom on campus. At Princeton, the free speech issue has been contested for the past several years but mostly involved conservative students who felt that they were being silenced or bullied for their views.
Stuart Taylor Jr., president of "Princetonians for Free Speech" and an RCP contributor, joined Tom Bevan, Friday on the RealClearPolitics podcast, to talk about the Trump administration’s decision to suspend hundreds of millions of dollars in grants to Princeton.
They discuss this piece by Christopher Rufo and Ryan Thorpe in City Journal: "Princeton’s War on Civil Rights"
Amid the ongoing showdown between the Trump administration and the Ivy League, one university president has positioned himself as a leader of the academic resistance: Princeton’s Christopher L. Eisgruber.
Earlier this month, the Trump administration suspended hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayer-funded grants to Princeton as part of its investigation into racial discrimination and anti-Semitism at the New Jersey campus. Eisgruber, though, was defiant, telling the New York Times that he’s “not considering any concessions” and calling for other university presidents to follow his lead.
Last Friday, the following letter was sent to President Eisgruber from the Princetonians for Free Speech Executive Committee regarding further action after the protests and event disruption that occurred on April 7th in McCosh Hall, and preparatory measures for upcoming campus events:
by Ed Yingling '70
Washington insiders believe it is very likely that a significant increase in the tax rate on university endowment income will be enacted this year. They cite the need for additional tax revenue to offset the Trump tax cut agenda and the antipathy of many Republicans to what has been happening on campuses for the last two years. They also focus on the fact that then-Senator JD Vance introduced a bill in the last Congress imposing a 35 percent tax on endowment income.
To PFS Subscribers, Members and Friends,
On March 10 the Department of Education’s office of Civil Rights sent letters to 60 universities, including Princeton. Theseletters warned of potential “enforcement actions” if institutions do not protect Jewish students.
On March 20, in reaction to the Trump administration’s threat to cut $400 million in Federal funding from Columbia University, 18 law professors with a range of views from liberal to conservative, signed a public letter in The New York Review arguing: “the government may not threaten funding cuts as a tool to pressure recipients into suppressing First Amendment-protected speech.” The next day, Columbia conceded to government demands. Other thanBrown University’s President Christina Paxson, who detailed what Brown would do under similar threats, Princeton’s President Eisgruber was a lone voice amongst the leadership of these universities – in The Cost of Government Attacks on Columbia, published by the Atlantic on March 19.
This week in The Chronicle of Higher Education, three of the 18 public letter signatories, all first amendment scholars, discuss what Columbia and other universities threatened with funding cuts should do. It is worth reading “It is Remarkable How Quickly the Chill Has Descended.” with Michael C. Dorf, of Cornell University; Genevieve Lakier, of the University of Chicago; and Nadine Strossen, of New York Law School.
By Edward Yingling and Stuart Taylor, Jr.
Daily Princetonian
Excerpt: In its May 2 article entitled “A decade later: a split legacy for Eisgruber,” the Daily Princetonian erred in saying that “Edward Yingling ’70 and Stuart Taylor ’70, co-founders of Princetonians for Free Speech” (PFS) argued that Eisgruber’s decision to fire then-professor Joshua Katz would “destroy Princeton’s acclaimed free speech rule” — making the free speech rule one that would protect only a small subset of the speech that the rule’s language and intent clearly do protect.
Leslie Spencer ‘79
Princeton Alumni Weekly
Excerpt: On Jan. 18, President Christopher Eisgruber ’83 released his “State of the University” letter entitled “Excellence, Inclusivity, and Free Speech.” The core of his remarks defended the course that Princeton has steered in pursuit of excellence and ever-increasing inclusivity through many decades and into these turbulent times.
To Princetonians for Free Speech Subscribers, Members and Friends,
Whoa. January certainly was a month of explosive change for higher education! Three executive orders that could impact funding of universities prompted President Eisgruber’s January 28 letter, which rightly admits “there is much we do not know.” See the Daily Princetonians coverage of Eisgruber’s letter: Eisgruber says U. is “exploring measures” in wake of Trump orders, stops short of specific guidance.
Most importantly, take a close look at our special feature, written by PFS cofounder Ed Yingling, 2025: A Breakthrough Year for Free Speech on Campus. It is a grand synthesis of the many ways 2025 could be a year of dramatic change at US Universities, change that could critically impact free speech, academic freedom and viewpoint diversity at Princeton and elsewhere. Yingling’s article helps to make sense of the radical changes that lie in store.
Khoa Sands ‘26
Elite academia has been dominated by the question of free speech and free expression over the past year. 2024 has seen the explosion of pro-Palestine campus protests, throwing institutions into disarray. At Harvard, UCLA, Columbia, and other universities, administrators struggled to respond as activists occupied campus and harassed other students. Scenes of chaotic fighting at UCLA were played on televisions across the country.
December 18, 2023
To Princetonians for Free Speech Subscribers, members and friends,
The chaos on elite university campuses since the massacre in Israel on October 7 has been a wake-up call. Presidents of Harvard, University of Pennsylvania and MIT answered questions by the House Committee on Education during what is now the most viewed hearing ever. It revealed lawyer-prepped obfuscation and the glaring double standards that are the norm in higher education on free speech protections. Donors and trustees forced the resignation of Penn’s president Liz Magill and its board chair Scott L. Bok. Harvard’s board came out in defense of President Claudine Gay while many called for her ouster. Alumni and donors are realizing the true nature of the institutional transformations of their alma maters’ core principles and are demanding change. This is no surprise to us: For three years PFS has watched and reported on this transformation at Princeton and at other universities throughout the country. Join us to keep informed and learn more.
November 28, 2023
To Princetonians for Free Speech subscribers, members and friends,
What a month. The shocking fallout on America’s campuses as a result of the October 7 massacre in Israel has made the mission of PFS more critical than ever. We have attempted to convey the gathering storm around free speech and academic freedom in this, our sixth Monthly Newsletter. We truly welcome your thoughts and feedback HERE.
You may have seen the just-released PFS inaugural Annual Report, recording highlights of an incredible year for PFS, and announcing our priorities going forward. IT’S GIVING TUESDAY! Have a look at the Annual Report HERE and tell us what you think. And consider PFS for your year-end giving HERE. We are extremely grateful for your support and we need you now more than ever!
By Leslie Spencer
Princetonians for Free Speech
It’s no surprise that the University of Chicago has made by far the biggest, boldest and most serious move of any university in the country to confront the crisis of free speech and academic freedom at American universities. Chicago ranks #1 on FIRE’s survey for a reason. On October 5-6, the University of Chicago launched a new permanent entity, the Forum for Free Inquiry and Expression, with a ground-breaking inaugural event bringing together the country’s leading lights on the state of free speech at American universities to examine what the problem is, how we got here, and what might be done.
August 9, 2023
Summers are not the fastest of times on campus. But the current summer recently brought a major development on the free expression front: the proposal by Princeton’s James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions and others of an important new academic free speech-free expression document: Princeton Principles for a Campus Culture of Free Inquiry.
