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‘1619′ Creator Nikole Hannah-Jones Rejects UNC Tenure Offer After Weeks Of Complaining

   DailyWire.com
Nikole Hannah-Jones attends the "Neutral Ground" premiere during the 2021 Tribeca Festival at Pier 76 on June 19, 2021 in New York City.
Monica Schipper/Getty Images for Tribeca Festival

Nikole Hannah-Jones, who won the Pulitzer Prize for her historically inaccurate “1619 Project,” rejected the University of North Carolina’s offer of a tenured position after spending weeks complaining that she was not offered tenure.

CNN reported that Hannah-Jones made the announcement on “CBS This Morning” with Gayle King on Tuesday. Instead, Hannah-Jones has accepted a tenured position at Howard University’s school of communications as the newly created Knight Chair in Race and Journalism. The school is also creating a Center for Journalism and Democracy led by Hannah-Jones, which will reportedly train students in investigative journalism.

“We are at a critical juncture in our democracy, and yet our press does not reflect the nation it serves and too often struggles to grasp the danger for our country as we see growing attacks on free speech and the fundamental right to vote,” Hannah-Jones said in a statement, according to CNN. “In the storied tradition of the Black press, the Center for Journalism and Democracy will help produce journalists capable of accurately and urgently covering the challenges of our democracy with a clarity, skepticism, rigor and historical dexterity that is too often missing from today’s journalism.”

In addition to Hannah-Jones, Ta-Nehisi Coates will also join the university as a faculty member with the College of Arts and Sciences.

Hannah-Jones’ rejection of UNC’s offer comes after the university initially offered her a position with tenure but later removed the tenure offer due to objections from the school’s Republican-dominated Board of Governors, The Daily Wire previously reported.

UNC faced a backlash over the decision to pull Hannah-Jones’ tenure from the offer, resulting in clashes between students and police on campus.

Following the backlash, UNC again offered Hannah-Jones tenure after a closed session of the Board of Trustees met last Wednesday.

In response to the situation, Hannah-Jones released a statement:

I want to acknowledge the tremendous outpouring of support I have received from students, faculty, colleagues, and the general public over the last month – including the young people who showed up today at the Board of Trustees meeting, putting themselves at physical risk. I am honored and grateful for and inspired by you all. I know that this vote would not have occurred without you.

Today’s outcome and the actions of the past month are about more than just me. This fight is about ensuring the journalistic and academic freedom of Black writers, researchers, teachers, and students. We must ensure that our work is protected and able to proceed free from the risk of repercussions, and we are not there yet. These last weeks have been very challenging and difficult and I need to take some time to process all that has occurred and determine what is the best way forward.

Hannah-Jones’ “1619 Project” for The New York Times was eviscerated by historians for its inaccuracies, particularly by its claim that the American Revolution was “motivated by the urge to protect slavery.” The Daily Wire previously reported:

In October 2020, a group of scholars demanded that Hannah-Jones be stripped of her Pulitzer Prize for her essay, which they described as “profoundly flawed.”

“We call on the Pulitzer Prize Board to rescind the 2020 Prize for Commentary awarded to Nikole Hannah-Jones for her lead essay in ‘The 1619 Project,’” the statement begins, which was signed by 21 professors, academics, and historians. “That essay was entitled, ‘Our democracy’s founding ideals were false when they were written.’ But it turns out the article itself was false when written, making a large claim that protecting the institution of slavery was a primary motive for the American Revolution, a claim for which there is simply no evidence.”

The New York Times eventually had to retract portions of the 1619 Project’s claims after scholars eviscerated its claims.

Among the historians who excoriated the 1619 Project was Allen C. Guelzo, who serves as a senior research scholar in the Council of the Humanities at Princeton University and director of the James Madison Program’s Initiative in Politics and Statesmanship.

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