My Alma Mater is Quashing Conservative Speech … So We Filed a Civil Rights Complaint

The Daily Signal

By Hannah Fay

October 07, 2025



"On Sept. 5, we filed a civil rights complaint with the Department of Education and the Department of Justice against our alma mater, Davidson College. We did not make this decision out of anger towards Davidson but from our hope that Davidson can become an institution of free expression that encourages students to pursue truth. 


We had chosen Davidson as student athletes and recall being high school seniors, eager to attend a college where we could simultaneously pursue a high level of athletics and academics and be challenged to become better competitors, students and, most importantly, people. We believed that Davidson would be the perfect place for our personal growth, where we would be encouraged to encounter new ideas while contributing our own. Little did we know that Davidson does not welcome students with our convictions. 


During our senior year, we decided to restart the Davidson chapter of Young Americans for Freedom, a national conservative student organization, which had been disbanded. With this decision, we knew that we would receive backlash from peers. Before the school semester even started, we received hateful online comments such as “Who let y’all out of the basement?” We saw how other universities treated conservatives and had even experienced hostility firsthand at Davidson, being called “homophobic” or “uninclusive” for our involvement in Fellowship of Christian Athletes, whose statement of faith declares that marriage is between a man and a woman. We realized that, although we were friends with progressive individuals for the past few years, fully aware and accepting of their political beliefs, they would likely distance themselves from us once they learned of ours. 


While we were prepared for this reaction from our peers, we did not expect to receive such opposition from Davidson administrators. We naively believed that despite the college’s leftist indoctrination efforts (requiring cultural diversity courses, mandating student athletics to watch a documentary arguing that all white people were inherently racist, having a DEI office, designating secluded spaces for LGBTQ+ students, etc.), they would still surely encourage free speech. After all, a liberal arts institution should cultivate a space where students can freely inquire, peacefully debate, and form decisions for themselves. 


Before the semester even began, we faced resistance from the administration as we could not get approval to restart the club from the Director of Student Activities Emily Eisenstadt for three weeks after a follow-up email and a faculty advisor request. Other conservative organizations also faced irresponsiveness from the Director of Student Activities. However, when leftist groups wanted to bring Gavin Newsom to campus, they had no problem getting a swift response.   


Despite continued administrative opposition, we hosted speakers, including pro-life activist Abby Johnson and President Ronald Reagan’s economic advisor Arthur Laffer; organized events such as the 9/11 “Never Forget”; and attempted to engage in civil conversations about abortion. Our efforts even led to us being awarded “Chapter Rookie of the Year” by Young America’s Foundation. 


Our most notable event, and the reason for our complaint, was our “Stand with Israel” project, in which we placed 1,195 Israeli flags into the ground to memorialize the innocent victims of the Oct. 7 Massacre by Hamas. We also laid out pamphlets on tables in the library and student union titled, “The Five Myths About Israel Perpetrated by the Pro-Hamas Left,” provided to us by Young America’s Foundation. 


This event led to two significant outcomes. First, our flags were stolen overnight. When we brought this to the attention of Davidson administrators and the Honor Council, they dismissed the case and chose not to investigate, despite their so-called commitment to the Honor Code. 


Second, on Feb. 26, 2025, over four months after the event, we received an email from Director of Rights and Responsibilities Mak Thompkins informing us that we faced charges of “violating” the Code of Responsibility. We had allegedly made students feel “threatened and unsafe” due to our distribution of pamphlets that allegedly promoted “Islamophobia.” 


This was ironic to us, given that we did not even know who our accusers were, let alone not ever having interacted with them. What’s more, we knew of Jewish students who genuinely felt targeted because of the rampant antisemitism on our campus. For example, a massive Palestine flag was hung across our main academic building the day after President Donald Trump won the election, and the student group ‘Cats Against Imperialism’—Davidson’s college moniker is “Wildcats”—distributed pamphlets promoting their aggressive pro-Palestinian agenda. Yet, unlike us, they faced no consequences. 


Davidson’s biased treatment towards pro-Israel students led to our filing a civil rights complaint with the DOJ and Department of Education. Davidson College must be held accountable for its blatant discrimination and violation of Title VI and Title IX; it should not receive any federal funding until it complies with the federal law. 


In light of the recent assassination of Charlie Kirk, it is now more important than ever that higher education promotes free expression. Colleges and universities are predominantly controlled by leftists who demonize conservatives and the values we stand for. If Davidson cannot commit to shaping students who understand the equal dignity of every person made in the image of God, regardless of religion, it risks corrupting individuals and prompting them to support, or even commit, acts of political violence. 


We hope that Davidson will become a community that values all perspectives and treats all students with dignity and respect, including the Jewish population. 


Though we are not of Jewish descent, we strongly support Israel and the Jewish people and faced discrimination based on the content of our support. If we had, as our counterparts did, expressed antisemitism, Davidson officials would have treated us differently. 


Hannah Fay is a communications fellow for media and public relations at The Heritage Foundation.

Where Liberty and Learning Endure

June 29, 2026
As America commemorates 250 years of independence, we reflect on the enduring principles of liberty and learning that have defined Davidson College for nearly two centuries.

Bankruptcy and Higher Education

June 21, 2026
By Todd Zywicki The Wall Street Journal June 21, 2026 Auburn University is known for its agricultural and STEM programs, its flight school and athletic programs. But the land-grant university recently became notable for another reason: The board of trustees is taking control of the school back from its faculty. The board began seizing the university’s academic programs—including curriculum, course offerings, degree requirements and academic credentials—at its June 5 meeting. The board also dissolved the faculty senate and replaced it with an advisory council to the president, which includes two faculty members from each of the university’s colleges and additional members appointed by the president. The board’s assertion of authority mirrors incoming mandates by the Alabama Legislature restricting the role of faculty senates in the state’s public university system. Predictably, Auburn’s faculty has responded with howls of outrage, decrying these intrusions on the faculty’s authority over academic operations. How could outsiders appointed through a political process have the expertise to make such delicate decisions? I’ve been a professor at a state university for almost 30 years, and I am sympathetic up to a point. But before becoming a professor I was a bankruptcy lawyer. And bankruptcy law teaches an important lesson for how academia can respond to this moment. Bankruptcy gives businesses an opportunity to admit mistakes, reform and emerge stronger. Successful enterprises don’t need bankruptcy lawyers. But when an enterprise loses its way, it goes into receivership. Most universities aren’t financially bankrupt but have lost their mission and direction. Society has long recognized certain institutions’ authority to manage their own affairs. Two notable examples are licensed professionals—such as doctors and lawyers—and universities. Universities, even state universities, have run their enterprises with minimal external oversight. Faculties enjoyed substantial rights of self-governance because they committed to higher standards than those required by ordinary jobs. Professors would establish and maintain standards of scholarly integrity, freedom of speech and inquiry, and rigorous dedication to merit-based assessment of research in specialized areas. They policed their own house, enforcing norms of truth-seeking, maintaining scholarly integrity and rigor, and ensuring that students emerged with basic knowledge, employable skills and civic competency. But over the past several decades, commitment to those values collapsed. Surveys by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression consistently reveal fear among students and faculty around expressing unfashionable ideas. Universities have seen shout-downs, cancellations and even violence against speakers. Merit and quality yielded to “diversity” and “equity.” Truth-seeking has been displaced by faddish theories and ideologically charged teaching and research. Professors design esoteric departments and teach niche classes to cliques of activist students while the needs of other students and taxpayers for real education go unaddressed. Like companies I represented, universities have lost their way. And many have proved either unable or unwilling to self-correct. When that happens, it is appropriate to put institutions into receivership until they reform and rededicate themselves to their mission. At Auburn incoming students must now take certain required civics and history courses to master basic competency in U.S. history and government. To ensure the classes actually meet that objective, professors will have to make their syllabi publicly available. In the classroom, instructors will be expected to stick to the matter at hand and avoid free-ranging political punditry. Just as other companies can learn from the ones that go bankrupt, other institutions of higher education can learn something from Auburn: Fix what’s broken, or someone else might fix it for you. Mr. Zywicki is a professor at George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia Law School. He was a Dartmouth College trustee, 2005-09. https://www.wsj.com/opinion/bankruptcy-and-higher-education-4c2b178e

Race Preferences Are Falling Nationwide

June 19, 2026
By the Editorial Board The Wall Street Journal June 19, 2026 The Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling against racial preferences is turning out to be a landmark with profound consequences as its influence spreads. On Thursday the famously progressive Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled unanimously that a state program that issued scholarships based on race violates the U.S. Constitution. Justice Annette Ziegler wrote for the court that the Constitution requires “that every person ‘must be treated based on his or her experiences as an individual—not on the basis of race,’” and that the state cannot “use race as a factor in affording educational opportunities among its citizens.” That must have been painful for the activist liberal majority on the court. In a concurrence, Wisconsin Chief Justice Jill Karofsky took some shots at Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard College (2023) before acknowledging that “I am bound by the precedent set forth in SFFA” and other Supreme Court rulings “when interpreting the Fourteenth Amendment.” The case was brought by the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty against a 1985 Badger State law that reserved need-based scholarships through a grant program for “Black American,” “American Indian,” “Hispanic” and some Southeast Asian undergraduate students enrolled in Wisconsin’s private and technical colleges. Last week the Iowa Supreme Court ruled that a scholarship program earmarked for black University of Iowa students studying physical sciences was “impracticable” under SFFA. State governments would be wise to repeal these discriminatory grant programs, or the courts will do it for them.
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