This piece is part of MI x DW, a collaboration that brings Daily Wire readers exclusive commentary and research from the Manhattan Institute’s world-class team of scholars.
***
It was never going to end well. <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c1j1ye6n30no">Jason Arday</a>, the University of Cambridge’s “youngest-ever black professor,” was found dead, apparently by his own hand, on August 14. News of his death, at just 41, came after weeks of public speculation that began with <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/20/world/europe/arday-cofnas-suspended.html">claims</a> that his academic work had been plagiarized before rapidly morphing into a broader investigation into the rigor of his scholarship and the quality of his <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/08/10/arday-accused-student-of-white-privilege-questioned-mark">teaching</a>, as well as his <a href="https://wtop.com/lifestyle/2026/08/jason-ardays-death-sparks-uk-debate-over-academic-rigor-racism-after-media-frenzy">claims</a> of achieving almost superhuman athletic feats while overcoming seemingly insurmountable developmental and health obstacles.
Many on the <a href="https://bylinetimes.com/2026/08/18/the-peter-thiel-linked-race-science-network-that-penetrated-cambridge-university-and-targeted-jason-arday">woke Left</a> are determined to set these criticisms aside and exonerate Arday. Mass <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/aug/17/tens-of-thousands-pay-tribute-jason-arday-trafalgar-square-vigil">vigils</a>, reminiscent of the Black Lives Matter protests that swept the globe in 2020, have taken place in London. <a href="https://www.uwe.ac.uk/news/professor-jason-arday">Universities</a> and <a href="https://www.universitiesuk.ac.uk/latest/news/statement-jason-arday">academic organizations</a> have issued statements of condolence, with some promising to do even more to root out <a href="https://cdbu.org.uk/reflecting-on-the-passing-of-professor-jason-arday">racism</a>. Following the 2020 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, scrutiny turned to police behavior. In the wake of Arday’s demise, some are <a href="https://bylinetimes.com/2026/08/19/jason-arday-we-must-rage-rage-against-the-journalism-of-cruelty">pointing the finger</a> at journalists. Arday’s supporters claim that he was “<a href="https://theemancipator.org/2026/08/15/ideas/the-media-lynched-jason-arday">lynched</a>” by a “<a href="https://bylinetimes.com/2026/08/19/jason-arday-we-must-rage-rage-against-the-journalism-of-cruelty">media running on monetised hate and cruelty</a>.”
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These claims might be easily dismissed if they weren’t also part of what seems to be a groundswell for a new assault on press freedom in the U.K.
Cambridge University’s chancellor has described press coverage of Arday’s story as a “<a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyxklg3xypo">racist feeding frenzy</a>.” A senior Labour MP has declared that Arday was the victim of “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/aug/17/tens-of-thousands-pay-tribute-jason-arday-trafalgar-square-vigil">a vicious campaign</a>.” Others claim that Arday faced levels of scrutiny far <a href="https://www.mentalhealtheurope.org/when-scrutiny-exposes-a-double-standard-jason-arday-racism-and-the-cost-to-mental-health">surpassing</a> that of white academics accused of plagiarism. The story now taking hold on the academic Left is that journalists hounded the innocent, vulnerable Arday to death in a <a href="https://bylinetimes.com/2026/08/18/the-peter-thiel-linked-race-science-network-that-penetrated-cambridge-university-and-targeted-jason-arday">coordinated attack</a> designed not just to take down one scholar but to discredit the entire DEI project.
This narrative bears little relationship to the truth. Though it was former Cambridge scholar <a href="https://substack.com/@nathancofnas/p-207415162">Nathan Cofnas</a> who ignited this summer’s press coverage, other <a href="https://afcomm.org.uk/2026/08/05/jason-arday-reported-academic-critic-to-police">professors</a> and <a href="https://www.timeshighereducation.com/opinion/i-was-reported-police-over-arday-case-i-was-just-doing-my-job">journalists</a> had previously raised questions about Arday’s academic integrity. Far from being a naive victim, Arday reported his detractors to the police for harassment and hired a top law firm to quash news stories investigating his background and qualifications.
Nor is it true that white people accused of fabricating their life stories have been spared scrutiny. This time last year, the British media ran numerous stories about Raynor Winn, author of the best-selling book <a href="https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/the-real-salt-path-how-the-couple-behind-a-bestseller-left-a-trail-of-debt-and-deceit?utm_campaign=562505_TheObserverDaily_260325&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;utm_source=dotdigital">The Salt Path</a>, who, it turned out, wasn’t named Raynor Winn and hadn’t led the life described in her memoir.
The accusation that Arday’s story received excessive or disproportionate media coverage is impossible to answer. August is usually a quiet news month, and editors look for stories. Arday’s own fantastical embellishments to his biography virtually guaranteed public interest. Ironically, if Arday and Cambridge University had dealt internally with the criticisms first made by other academics or let accusations be aired in the specialist trade press, the story might never have gained momentum. From first to last, it’s hard to see how Cambridge even once acted in Arday’s best interests.
Blaming the media for Arday’s death lets not just Cambridge but British academia off the hook. Arday received his Ph.D. from a university in Liverpool despite allegedly having had <a href="https://21percent.org/?p=4109">only one formal meeting with his supervisor</a>. He then worked at several other universities in quick succession, climbing the ladder as professor, before arriving at Cambridge. These universities were so in thrall to DEI that they abandoned all critical faculties. When journalists challenged them, they dug in their heels and defended Arday. Rather than investigating whether diversity initiatives had overridden academic integrity, they are using Arday’s suicide to justify more DEI training as necessary within a “racist” society.
Meantime, press freedom — and journalists themselves — are coming under threat. Activists are compiling <a href="https://x.com/HeidiBachram/status/2089708194100555889">lists</a> of those who wrote about Arday, with some demanding that they be targeted, scrutinized, and held to <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DcHYfnXDPRg">account</a>. They have already scented success: the University of Ghent has <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/aug/20/academic-who-accused-jason-arday-of-plagiarism-suspended-by-his-university">suspended</a> Cofnas, the academic and blogger who broke the Arday story. One of the journalists who initially criticized Arday has issued a <a href="https://x.com/novaramedia/status/2089804526500954586">video</a> apologizing for his comments.
The attacks on journalists covering the Arday story play into the hands of those with a long-standing suspicion of free speech and antipathy toward press freedom. Zack Polanski, the leader of Britain’s <a href="https://www.pollcheck.co.uk/polls/green-party">Green Party</a>, which polls around 10%, has called for a national <a href="https://www.gbnews.com/politics/jason-arday-zack-polanski-media-culture-cambridge-professor-death">inquiry</a> into the “culture and behaviour” of the media over the treatment of Arday. Other Greens are demanding tighter <a href="https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/greens-propose-state-regulation-journalists-consciences-c6n0tpjtp">regulation</a> of journalistic practices, arguing that reporters should be allowed to opt out of assignments they deem unethical and that large online platforms have a statutory duty to “actively promote and protect plurality and diversity of voices.”
Author <a href="https://spectator.com/article/what-happened-to-will-self">Will Self</a> has added his voice to those demanding a full public inquiry into the role of the media in Arday’s death and has even named individual journalists he holds responsible. Others are calling for legal limits on the number of articles about one person that can be published within a particular time frame: <a href="https://pressgazette.co.uk/news/ipso-reviewing-high-volume-of-jason-arday-coverage-complaints-after-cambridge-academics-death">IPSO</a>, the independent press regulator, is already reviewing the “high volume” of coverage Arday’s story garnered. The <a href="https://goodlawproject.org/petition/jason-arday-letter">Good Law Project</a>, a campaign group that uses the law “to fight against hate and spread hope,” has joined calls for more state regulation of the press: “There cannot be any doubt that Dr. Arday’s tragic death was the direct, foreseeable and foreseen result of press harassment. A significant element in that harassment was the colour of his skin. Self-regulation of the press has comprehensively failed.”
It’s important to note that Jason Arday’s death did not create this censorious press climate in Britain, where left-wing activists have long railed against journalists who publish material they dislike. But Arday’s suicide has become an excuse to take up this anti-press campaign with renewed fervor.
Arday’s death is a tragedy for his family and friends. It must not become an excuse to introduce yet more restrictions on press freedom.
***
This is republished with permission from the Manhattan Institute’s City Journal. The original can be found <a href="https://www.city-journal.org/article/jason-arday-death-free-press">here</a>.
<a href="https://www.city-journal.org/person/joanna-williams">Joanna Williams</a> is the author of <a href="https://www.amazon.com/How-Woke-Won-Threatens-Democracy/dp/1739841328">How Woke Won</a>. She writes at <a href="https://substack.com/@cieo">Cieo</a>.

Jason Arday death

Press Freedom, DEI, And The Response To Cambridge’s Jason Arday Controversy

Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI)

Jason Arday

MI x DW

Woke Culture

A year ago, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/wapo-ordered-to-rehire-radical-hamas-defender-who-mocked-reaction-to-charlie-kirks-death?author=Hank+Berrien&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=0&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=Up+Next&amp;rowType=Up+Next&amp;title=WaPo+Ordered+To+Rehire+Radical+Hamas+Defender+Who+Mocked+Reaction+To+Charlie+Kirk%E2%80%99s+Death">Karen Attiah</a>, an untalented, narcissistic, racist, terror-sympathizing man-hater who loves the word “<a href="http://m">democracy</a>” more than life itself, was fired from her job as an opinion writer at The Washington Post. Her crimes against journalism? Lying, failing basic standards of accuracy, and posting egregious commentary about Charlie Kirk within hours of his assassination.
This week, after a year-long public tantrum, a private arbitrator forced the Post to take her back. Like a bad ex blackmailing you into getting back together.
Democracy Lives On…in the forced rehire of every Bluesky Karen who cannot accurately quote a dead man. On September 10, 2025, the same day Charlie Kirk was assassinated in front of thousands, Attiah posted this:
“Black women do not have the brain processing power to be taken seriously. You have to go steal a white person’s slot”. &#8211; <a href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!db2o!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fe1e3c8f1-c515-4afa-9dd6-2d808ad9d2ee_1198x346.png">Charlie Kirk</a>
Kirk was not, of course, speaking about all black women. He was responding on a live show to Joy Reid, Michelle Obama, Sheila Jackson Lee, and Ketanji Brown Jackson, discussing their own affirmative-action status. He played the clip of Sheila Jackson Lee declaring from the House floor:
<blockquote>I rise today, as a clear recipient of affirmative action…particularly in higher education. I may have been admitted on affirmative action both in terms of being a woman, and a woman of color&#8230;</blockquote>
Kirk’s apt reply: “We know. You do not have the brain processing power to otherwise be taken really seriously. You had to go steal a white person&#8217;s slot to go be taken somewhat seriously.”
He was correct. Sheila Jackson Lee spent nearly 30 years as the low-competence representative for Texas’ 18th district (cough term limits cough) while compiling an impressive résumé of public gaffes. She confused Mars with the Moon. She announced that “today we have two Vietnams, side by side, North and South.” She claimed the Constitution is 400 years old. And in 2024, she informed high school students that the Moon is a planet “made up mostly of gases.” Somehow, this woman graduated from both Yale and the University of Virginia School of Law, where she obviously did not study the solar system.
But who has time for journalistic integrity these days? It’s far easier to ignore reality, post absurdly racist and defamatory misquotes, and then collapse into victimhood the moment consequences appear. Attiah used her vast brain-processing power to suggest Kirk was a violent white man, call the United States a “sick” country that “worships violence,” express solidarity with <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/wapo-columnist-celebrates-anti-jew-terrorism-as-exactly-what-decolonization-means">Hamas</a> terrorists who murder Israeli civilians, threaten <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/wapo-editor-white-women-lucky-were-not-calling-for-revenge">revenge</a> against white women, and lament that white America refuses to get rid of their guns while suggesting we <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/08/25/lgbtq-culture-wars-laura-ann-carleton/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_campaign=wp_opinions&amp;utm_medium=social">arm the gays</a>. Because in her moral universe, selective political violence is practically a civil duty.
Speaking of violence, Karen Attiah wakes up and chooses it against men every day. She simply prefers to channel her white-male rage in the gym rather than in more creative outlets <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/shorts/85edf547-5650-4079-ad71-df022690f2bd?elementPosition=3&amp;row=10&amp;rowHeadline=Trending+Shorts&amp;rowType=Shorts+Carousel">such as the bathtub</a>, once <a href="https://freebeacon.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/karen-attiah-fitness.jpg">writing</a> that her fitness goals included “building legs strong enough to crush men’s hopes and dreams.”
It’s a wonder she’s forty and still single.
Apparently, that was the bulk of her brilliant output. Following her firing, a Post staffer anonymously <a href="https://freebeacon.com/media/wapo-fires-karen-attiah-radical-beefcake-columnist-who-praised-hamas/">observed</a> that “Karen Attiah wrote two columns in the last three months, and one was about her body-building regimen. I think the Post will be OK.” Speak for yourself, Anon. This past year has been terribly difficult for us body-building gurus who relied on the motivational mantras of Miss Crush-Men Karen in the opinion section of a political newspaper.
The most revealing part of this entire saga is the pure, distilled hypocrisy of how she handled her own termination. She was fired for a clear pattern of racist and hateful posts made in the hours after a public assassination; posts that generalized, distorted, and celebrated the dehumanization of a man who had just been murdered in front of the world. And under the leadership of a new, sane, and competent editor, Adam O’Neal, the Washington Post treated those posts as the misconduct they were.
Yet Attiah’s response was not reflection or even a mild course correction; it was victimhood word vomit. She immediately framed the firing itself as an act of racism and hate directed at her. In her narcissistic telling, the newspaper wasn’t enforcing basic standards of accuracy and civility; it was silencing a black woman for speaking uncomfortable truths. The same person who spent years diagnosing “whiteness” as a pathology and treating political violence as selectively acceptable suddenly discovered that accountability is only legitimate when it happens to other people. She got fired for being racist and hateful…then spent the next year insisting that the firing was racist and hateful.
And so the bad ex has clawed her way back into the house through arbitration, threats, and sheer force of grievance. This particular ex is the kind who would also find a way to soft-pedal Lindsay Clancy, treat the murder of her political foes as something closer to justice than tragedy, and who still manages to keep a soft spot in her heart for Hamas.
The Washington Post is now stuck with her and a fat couples-therapy bill, and the rest of us are stuck with more unsolicited columns about getting jacked in order to attack men.
This, we are told, is democracy in action: a forced reunion between an institution that tried to set a boundary and an activist who refuses to accept that boundaries apply to her. Everyone loses. Especially the photographer who had to take this <a href="https://freebeacon.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/attiah-post2.jpg">picture</a> during the breakup.
<a href="https://freebeacon.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/attiah-post2.jpg"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-1164173" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/attiah-post2.jpg" alt="" width="736" height="515" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/attiah-post2.jpg 736w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/attiah-post2-300x210.jpg 300w" sizes=" (max-width: 736px) 100vw, 736px" /></a> 
The only winner is the grievance industrial complex, which has once again proven that if you scream “racist” and “Democracy is dying” loudly enough after being held accountable for actual racism, someone in a suit will eventually hand you your job back.
When in reality, the real “death of democracy” looks more like Anthony Fauci lying to the public for years and facing zero consequences while the rest of us lived under the rules he helped to invent. It looks like Kamala Harris being coronated as the Democratic nominee without ever winning a single primary vote. It looks like pollsters and operatives spinning up fake websites and misleading data operations designed to confuse the public and nudge election outcomes. And it looks like conservative TikTokers (myself included) who can’t post a single video without it being silently removed or suppressed under the ever-shifting excuse of “violating community guidelines,” guidelines that somehow never seem to apply equally in the other direction.
That is the actual erosion. Not a newspaper being ordered to rehire one of its most deranged and morally depraved columnists. Maybe Mr. O’Neal should mandate that she write with Professor Umbridge’s blood quill — I must not tell lies — until it finally sinks in.

Hoover Institution Hosts Discussion On Jamal Khashoggi And US-Saudi Relations

The Bad Ex Who Blackmailed Her Way Back To The Washington Post

DW Opinion

Karen Attiah

Washington Post

Nathan Cofnas, the academic who exposed plagiarism allegations against former Cambridge professor Jason Arday, has been suspended by a Belgian university over public statements about the scandal and placed under disciplinary investigation.
Ghent University announced Thursday that it had suspended a postdoctoral researcher as a “precautionary measure” while it investigates whether disciplinary action is warranted. Cofnas identified himself as the researcher and said he expects the university to fire him.
“I was just suspended by Ghent University. They will almost certainly fire me,” Cofnas wrote on <a href="https://x.com/nathancofnas/status/2090416033072861245">X</a> Thursday.
The university did not name Cofnas in its <a href="https://www.ugent.be/en/news-events/statement-respect-human-dignity-opposition-discrimination.htm">statement</a>, but said the investigation concerns “recent public statements” by a postdoctoral researcher about Arday, who was found dead in his London home last week after resigning from Cambridge amid an investigation into his academic record.
“Ghent University stands for respect for human dignity and opposes discrimination, hatred, and racism,” Rector Petra De Sutter and Vice-Rector Herwig Reynaert said. “We attach great importance to academic freedom and to open academic debate, even when views are controversial. However, that freedom is not unlimited.” 
The university said it imposed the suspension pending a preliminary disciplinary investigation to determine whether there are sufficient grounds to refer the matter to its disciplinary body.
Cofnas, however, argues that he is being punished for reporting facts that powerful academic institutions failed to confront. 
“I’m an easy scapegoat,” Cofnas wrote in a <a href="https://www.wsj.com/opinion/free-expression/how-i-became-the-scapegoat-in-the-jason-arday-affair-dc134088?st=8ddArw&amp;reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink">Wall Street Journal op-ed</a> published Friday. “The lesson can’t be that it’s unacceptable to point out wrongdoing that implicates powerful public figures.”
Cofnas first published his allegations against Arday on July 21 in a Substack article titled “<a href="https://substack.com/home/post/p-207415162">DEI Fraud and Cover-Up at Cambridge</a>.” Using plagiarism-detection software, Cofnas identified what he said were extensive similarities between portions of Arday’s doctoral thesis and an earlier thesis by another academic. Subsequent reporting raised additional questions about Arday’s academic credentials, employment history and extraordinary claims about his personal life.
Arday, who had been celebrated as Cambridge’s youngest black professor, denied plagiarism but acknowledged mistakes in his academic work. Cambridge initially defended him, describing criticism as a “vile campaign to undermine his credibility.”
That position changed after further reporting prompted the university to launch an investigation into Arday’s academic qualifications and honorary appointments. Arday resigned from his professorship the same day Cambridge announced the investigation.
“I no longer wish to feel as though I am living under a constant spotlight, where every aspect of my life is subject to public examination and judgement,” Arday wrote in his resignation statement.
Nine days later, Arday was found unresponsive at his home in south London and <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/professor-recently-outed-for-fraudulent-biography-found-dead">pronounced dead</a>. Police said the death was unexpected but was not being treated as suspicious. 
Cofnas has acknowledged that his reporting contributed to the chain of events that followed, but rejects the suggestion that he bears moral responsibility for Arday’s death. 
“I set off a series of events that led to a death,” Cofnas wrote Friday. “If I say I have no regrets, it sounds like I don’t appreciate the horrific nature of the outcome. If I say I do regret it, it sounds like I’m accepting moral responsibility for what happened.”
“But the lesson can’t be that it’s unacceptable to point out wrongdoing that implicates powerful public figures,” he continued. “That’s what I did when I exposed fraud and institutional corruption at Cambridge.”
Cofnas has also pointed to the scale of the media coverage that followed his original article. He wrote that he published one article while British newspapers subsequently published 249 articles about Arday over a 22-day period. 
“Although no one has found so much as a mistaken comma in the article I wrote about Arday, I’m apparently not entitled to protection against attack for telling the truth,” Cofnas wrote.
The National Union of Journalists has criticized Cofnas following Arday’s death, describing his role as “deeply concerning” and noting that he has previously described himself as a “race realist.”
Cofnas is a controversial figure in academia. Cambridge investigated him in 2024 and concluded that his published views were offensive to many but did not breach university rules. He subsequently sued Emmanuel College alleging discrimination, but lost his case and is appealing the decision.
He later moved to Ghent University as a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Philosophy and Moral Sciences. 
In its statement, Ghent University said it recognizes the importance of academic freedom but that such freedom “goes hand in hand with responsibility and may be restricted to protect the rights of others.” The university did not specify which of Cofnas’ statements it believes may constitute discrimination, citing the confidentiality of personnel and disciplinary proceedings.
Cofnas argues that the disciplinary investigation is itself evidence of the tension between academic freedom and ideological conformity that he has spent years criticizing. 
“The university has laid the groundwork to fire me,” Cofnas told the <a href="https://www.wsj.com/world/uk/the-controversial-academic-who-ignited-the-jason-arday-furor-1071e7fc">Wall Street Journal</a>. “I’m the scapegoat for everyone.”

Memorial Held For Former Cambridge Professor Jason Arday In Trafalgar Square

Scholar Who Exposed Black Cambridge Prof’s Plagiarism Suspended As School Decries ‘Discrimination’

Belgium

Britain

Cambridge University

Education

England

Free Speech

Freedom of Speech

Freedom of the Press

Great Britain

higher education

Plagiarism

Radical education

United Kingdom

Universities

Last September, a young man named George Abaraonye greeted the assassination of Charlie Kirk with a message to his fellow Oxford students: “Charlie Kirk got shot, let’s f*cking go.” At the time, he was the incoming president of the Oxford Union, the world-famous debating society that trained a sizable chunk of Britain’s prime ministers, and it took a two-thirds vote of its members to remove him.
This week, the same young man published an essay entitled “They’re killing black boys at Oxford and Cambridge,” in which he rails against “mob justice” and warns journalists that they “will not be clean from this sin.” The man who whooped at an actual, literal assassination has appointed himself Britain’s foremost authority on the sanctity of life.
His subject is Jason Arday, the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/con-man-wielding-racial-grift-exposes-prestigious-university-as-a-gutless-pushover?row=0&amp;elementPosition=9&amp;rowType=Web+Search">Cambridge professor</a> whose remarkable résumé (visiting professorships that three universities say never existed, 30 marathons in 35 days, an invented book, cancer that was testicular in the pitch for his memoir, which turned to brain cancer by the time it made it into the book itself) collapsed after three weeks of scrutiny, and who resigned.
On Friday, Arday was found dead at his home in London. He leaves behind two children, and his death is, of course, a tragedy. The grief lasted about five minutes before the political operation began.
On Monday night, a crowd gathered in Trafalgar Square in London for what was billed as a vigil. Placards read “unalived by a witch-hunt.” The Labour Member of Parliament, Bell Ribeiro-Addy, told the crowd that it was the media that killed him. The veteran Labour MP Diane Abbott blamed a “vicious media.” Simon Woolley, the principal of a Cambridge college, called it a “lynching” and a “public assassination.” The veteran activist Patrick Vernon inducted Arday into a martyrs’ pantheon alongside George Floyd. The ambition could not be plainer: Britain is to have its own George Floyd moment, and this time the officer in the dock is the free press.
London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, condemned the press for “pernicious public shaming.” The bestselling author Matt Haig demanded that Prime Minister Andy Burnham end a world in which journalists “face zero consequences” for their reporting. Hacked Off, Britain’s perennial press-regulation lobby led by Hugh Grant (who has never forgiven the press for highlighting his…penchant for ladies of negotiable affection), called for a state framework of “genuine press accountability.”
Campaigners now want a public inquiry into the coverage and a law to “cap news coverage of any individual within a set time frame.” They are already calling it Arday’s Law. Meanwhile, the progressive activist group, the Good Law Project, gathered signatures for a petition insisting the allegations against Arday were “entirely false,” which will come as news to the three universities that denied Arday’s claimed professorships on the record.
Americans might assume that Britain’s Left has always been this squeamish about politicizing a death. Not quite. Five weeks ago, when the veteran conservative politician Ann Widdecombe was brutally murdered in her own home by way of blunt force trauma to the head, we were sternly instructed that drawing political conclusions from a killing was ghoulish, and that decent people wait for the facts. That commandment has now been suspended. Politicizing the murder of a conservative is not allowed, but doing so for the suicide of a progressive icon is now totally fine.
Set aside the hypocrisy and examine the principle actually being demanded: that true, newsworthy stories must not be published in case their subject harms himself.
This rule would hand every fraudster, embezzler, and lying politician a veto over his own exposure, and the more theatrically fragile the wrongdoer, the stronger his protection becomes. Arday himself demonstrated how such a veto works in practice. When a retired professor raised questions about his research, Arday reported him to the police. A journalist who investigated him was likewise reported to Scotland Yard, and his editors heard from Britain’s most feared libel firm. Suppressing scrutiny was the strategy all along. His mourners simply want it placed on a statutory footing.
The pressure is already telling. Aaron Bastani, co-founder of the left-wing outlet Novara Media, bravely and legitimately criticized Arday during the scandal, but has now had to recant on camera: “Professionally I erred, but ethically I really screwed up.” The aforementioned Diane Abbott (who once confidently asserted that Chairman Mao did more good than bad) used the vigil stage to smear the academics who first questioned Arday’s work. Universities are circulating messages offering support to students frightened by the coverage, as though reading a newspaper were a form of trauma. The struggle session is well underway, comrades!
Americans have seen this film before. In 2020, the death of a flawed man was transmuted into a national reckoning: institutions knelt, cities burned, and dissenters learned to whisper.
But if the Left have their way today, even whispering truth will become a literal crime. We must not allow this to happen to a free press.
***
James Price is a former Chief of Staff to the Chancellor of the Exchequer and a senior fellow at the Adam Smith Institute.

The Canonization Of Jason Arday And The Death Of The Free Press

Free Press

In 2023, Jason Arday was celebrated as the youngest black professor ever hired by England’s Cambridge University. Three years later, he stood accused of plagiarism, shoddy scholarship, incomprehensible writing, and poor teaching. Sadly, between the time this article was written and its publication, Arday died, apparently at his own hand. No one wished this end.
Arday’s life story was a mix of Pinocchio and Forest Gump, ending in tragedy. He claimed to have raised millions for charity while overcoming autism, dyslexia, epilepsy, a brain tumor, broken limbs, and more.
Arday progressed despite glaring signs of instability and delusion because academics, publishers, and the leftist British media were so desperate to champion a young, black academic that they were naively credulous and professionally negligent. They skipped rational skepticism, verification, and even basic proofreading.
Arday was not unique. His story is a glimpse of a bigger picture in Britain and America: people hired because of their race or sex rather than objective qualifications — DEI hires — are held to a lower standard than those hired via a competitive process.
In the conventional academic world, scholars are expected to publish original research and meet professional standards. Yet DEI hires aren’t expected to produce as much. Claudine Gay rose to the pinnacle of American academia — president of Harvard University — despite a <a href="https://www.heritage.org/education/commentary/failing-grade-harvards-claudine-gay">record of publication</a> “about half the average rate for a political science professor, even at a middling university.”
But at least Gay wrote something. In 2020, “antiracism” scholar Ibram Kendi raised $55 million to run a new Center for Antiracist Research at Boston University. Three years later, his center fired half its staff, and in 2025 it closed, having produced <a href="https://www.wsj.com/opinion/how-ibram-x-kendi-broke-boston-university-academic-freedom-progressive-fb92d525">almost nothing</a>. Kendi nonetheless found a soft landing at Howard University.
Harvard is generous to ex-Democrat political appointees. Biden’s “Special Representative for Racial Equity and Justice,” <a href="https://www.hks.harvard.edu/about/desiree-cormier-smith">Desireé Cormier Smith</a>, “Special Envoy to Advance the Human Rights of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer and Intersex (LGBTQI+) Persons,” <a href="https://www.hks.harvard.edu/centers/carr-ryan/our-work/news-announcements/jessica-stern-former-us-special-envoy-advance-human">Jessica Stern</a>, and “Special Representative for International Labor Affairs,” <a href="https://www.hks.harvard.edu/about/kelly-fay-rodriguez">Kelly Fay Rodriguez</a>, all landed fellowships in 2025 that seemed to mirror their previous jobs at the State Department. They have no teaching load, and a cursory internet search shows a total of six articles or papers written by them all since they started. (I’ve written about 200 in the same period).
In addition to low expectations of productivity, DEI hires regularly get away with plagiarism.
Plagiarism means taking other people’s work as your own. It is theft of intellectual property and therefore the cardinal sin of academia. The most glaring form is using another person’s exact words without quotation marks and attribution. Almost as bad is taking another’s ideas without crediting them. Arday reportedly did both.
Once the accusations were out there, Arday and his defenders followed a common playbook on both sides of the Atlantic: First, deny. The Good Law Project <a href="https://goodlawproject.org/petition/stand-in-solidarity-with-jason-arday/">called</a> the accusations of plagiarism “entirely false.”
Second, accuse critics of racism. Arday reportedly <a href="https://freespeechunion.org/news/in-a-desperate-bid-to-avoid-scrutiny-professor-arday-tried-to-use-the">called the police</a> when a reporter asked him questions. Incredibly, the police investigated, then told the journalist to desist because he was exacerbating Arday’s mental health issues. Britain’s top cop later <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0rd9y99grzo">apologized</a>, saying they “dropped the ball” — a ball in a game they should not have been playing in the first place.
A third tactic, if the evidence is mounting and incontrovertible, is to excuse the plagiarism. Arday said that he memorized things to mitigate his autism.
A fourth line of defense is to say that it wasn’t plagiarism; it was just “poor attribution,” or it was unintentional, or the <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/accusation-guilt-what-jason-arday-case-reveals-power-derce/">pure sophistry</a> of claiming that “all text is a composite of previous works.”
The final line of defense is the whitewash — the institution does a quick, feckless investigation and implausibly finds no evidence of plagiarism. Case closed! Amazingly, this sometimes works.
It almost did for Claudine Gay. Despite ample evidence of her using other people’s words without quotation or citation, Harvard bent over backward to avoid saying she plagiarized. Their investigation used euphemisms like “<a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10928-024-09904-z">inadequate citation</a>,” and they allowed her to retroactively correct — a luxury not afforded their students. However, Harvard quietly moved Gay out of the president’s office and back into her full professorship — at a mere $800,000 salary.
The full whitewash worked for Jerlando Jackson, dean of Michigan State University’s College of Education, when he was accused of plagiarizing in many papers and in his PhD thesis. He took entire passages “liberally and without citation,” according to reporters, from a <a href="https://statenews.com/article/2025/01/scholar-plagiarized-by-msu-dean-says-he-was-never-consulted-during-exonerating-review">professor</a> from whom Jackson copied. MSU exonerated Jackson, and for good measure claimed he was “the target of racist, vile, and despicable attacks.” He <a href="https://education.msu.edu/people/j/jerlando-f-l-jackson">appears</a> to remain a dean at MSU.
Northwestern University law professor Myriam Gilles was <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/lawsuit-against-northwestern-discrimination-in-hiring-law-faculty-alleges-widespread-plagiarism/">accused of plagiarism</a> in a lawsuit alleging that Northwestern was hiring based on DEI, not objective criteria. The side-by-side comparisons in this <a href="https://media.eppc.org/2024/10/25-FIRST-AMENDED-complaint-by-Faculty-Alumni-and-Students-Opposed-to-Racial-Preferences-FASORP-against-Faculty-Alumni-and-Students-Opposed-to-Racial-Preferences-FASORP-9.30.2024.pdf">complaint</a> of Gilles’ work with those of other scholars are pretty damning.
Yet, the plaintiffs predicted that the “university will not take any corrective or disciplinary action against Gilles for any of these transgressions — even though the university would suspend or expel a Northwestern student who engaged in this type of behavior.” Indeed, Gilles appears to <a href="https://www.law.northwestern.edu/faculty/profiles/myriamgilles/">remain</a> a professor in full standing at Northwestern Law School.
America’s ultimate DEI hire was Kamala Harris, who Joe Biden chose as his vice president. According to Chris Rufo, she co-authored a book using whole passages from Wikipedia, a report by the Urban Institute, and a press release from John Jay College. Even in its attempt to debunk Rufo’s assertions, the website Snopes <a href="https://www.snopes.com/news/2024/10/26/harris-plagiarism-book/">admitted</a>: “the words [Harris] used were not properly attributed to their sources.” The author of Plagiarism Today <a href="https://www.plagiarismtoday.com/2024/10/15/the-kamala-harris-plagiarism-scandal/">excused</a> it as “sloppy writing habits.”
As for Arday, when the outcry became too much for Cambridge to ignore, he saw the writing on the wall and resigned from his professorship. Shortly afterward, he took his own life. By facilitating and even applauding his delusions, the credulous, obsequious DEI machine did Arday no favors.
***
Simon Hankinson is a senior research fellow in The Heritage Foundation’s Border Security and Immigration Center and author of <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Ten-Woke-Commandments-Must-Obey/dp/1680533614">&#8220;The Ten Woke Commandments (You Must Not Obey)&#8221;</a> from Academica Books.

Jason Arday’s Life Was The Tragic Cost of Academic Tokenism

For years, radical activists have pressed DEI mandates in classrooms and boardrooms. Now they are taking the same campaign to courtrooms, using litigation to weaponize the court system and create a backdoor mechanism for imposing radical diversity policies outside the legislative process.
Alliance for Consumers’ new report, <a href="https://allianceforconsumers.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/AFC_DEI-Lawfare-in-America-Report_Final.pdf">Lawfare in America: Diversity, Equity and Inclusion</a>, details how activists and their trial lawyer allies use employment litigation to secure settlements that compel companies to adopt DEI practices, including mandatory diversity training, hiring benchmarks, pay-equity audits, and years of outside oversight to ensure diversity quotas are being met.
These lawsuits, which often end with settlements, receive far less public attention than woke legislative proposals. There are no committee hearings, no floor debates, and no scrutiny for politicians supporting the DEI agenda. Instead, under the looming threat of legal liability, companies capitulate to activist plaintiffs’ demands to embed DEI initiatives by reshaping hiring, management, and internal policies for years to come.
A settlement involving Goldman Sachs illustrates how this strategy operates. The $215 million agreement required pay-equity studies and empowered an independent expert to examine the company’s performance-review process. It did more than compensate employees who brought claims; it placed core employment practices under outside supervision.
The pattern extends well beyond one company. In an infamous lawsuit against Google, Lieff Cabraser, a law firm <a href="https://allianceforconsumers.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/AFC_The-Shady-Eight-2026-Final.pdf">known</a> for its strong Democrat connections and left-wing <a href="https://www.lieffcabraser.com/employment/federal-workers-dei-class-action/">agenda</a>, secured a settlement that brought audits and outside oversight of hiring and promotion practices. In a similar case, Disney agreed to pay millions while undertaking an audit and conducting mandatory training led by organizational psychologists. Abercrombie &amp; Fitch agreed to hire diversity recruiters, create a new diversity vice president position, require diversity training, and establish hiring benchmarks. Each of these cases was supported by activist groups that push DEI policies.
What’s concerning about these settlements is that they frequently mandate corporate DEI initiatives that exceed the scope of most legislative proposals.
Trial lawyers have every incentive to keep this machine running. Large settlements mean large fees. Activist organizations can file briefs, organize pressure campaigns, and push courts toward the same political goals case after case. And in turn, the trial lawyers profiting from this litigation feed funding back into the activist infrastructure through political donations. Our report reveals that the trial lawyers behind these cases consistently directed almost all of their FEC-recorded political donations to Democrats and allied groups, illustrating the closely linked incentives between the activists pushing DEI policies and the trial lawyers weaponizing courtrooms to extract DEI commitments from the companies they sue.
Shining a light on the Left’s antics here is important, before this becomes a runaway train.
Americans need to know that litigation is producing policy changes far beyond resolving the underlying claims and that lawfare is reshaping the world around us, often without being noticed.
As a <a href="https://dailycaller.com/2026/07/29/exclusive-trial-lawyers-quietly-using-woke-lawfare-to-hamper-american-businesses/">recent account of this strategy</a> explained, companies face enormous pressure to settle rather than risk years of costly litigation, even when the proposed terms reach deep into their operations. Consumers ultimately shoulder the burden, with fewer product choices, higher costs, and a deeper seepage of woke priorities into the economy and corporate America.
When large corporations agree to spend money on consultants, compliance officers, monitoring systems, legal reviews, and training programs as a part of settlement agreements, they inevitably must divert time and attention from serving customers, developing products, and competing for business. And that is before the new DEI bureaucracy gets around to convincing companies to take away the products people want to buy and replace them with the kinds of options preferred only in DEI utopia and leftist enclaves.
Courts should resolve actual disputes, not serve as a backdoor legislature. Consumers deserve better than a legal system that lets activists and trial lawyers bypass the democratic process, impose their agenda through litigation, and leave everyone else to pay the price. It is time for this lawfare to end.
***
O.H. Skinner is the executive director of Alliance for Consumers.

DEI Diversity, equity, and inclusion policy practice company business organization

The Hidden Way Corporate Lawfare Is Keeping DEI Alive

Corporate America

The Trump administration launched an investigation into an Oregon university over multiple racially focused programs critics say run afoul of civil rights law, The Daily Wire has learned. 
The Office for Civil Rights at the Department of Health and Human Services will investigate accusations that the Portland-based Oregon Health and Science University offers programs with built-in “preferences for non-whites.” The investigation comes after a complaint from the Equal Protection Project, an organization devoted to ensuring people of all races are treated fairly. 
HHS told the Equal Protection Project last week that it had “determined that this office has jurisdiction over your allegations” and that it “will initiate an investigation,” according to a letter obtained by The Daily Wire. The letter added that when HHS “has reached a determination regarding your complaint, we will advise you of our findings.”
Oregon Health and Science University recently <a href="https://news.ohsu.edu/2026/07/29/ohsu-posts-dramatic-financial-turnaround-record-research-funding">announced</a> that it received over $400 million in federal research grants for 2026.
The complaint from the Equal Protection Project took issue with multiple programs offered by the university, including its Jump Start Program, Equity Research Program, Center for Learner Diversity and Inclusion, On Track OHSU, Pay it Forward Mentorship Program, and HealthE STEPS Nursing Workforce Diversity Scholarships.
The Jump Start Program is designed for post=baccalaureate scholars to gain research experience. Those who are <a href="https://archive.ph/401BC">encouraged</a> to apply are those defined as “underrepresented in research,” including “those who identify as minorities.” 
Similarly, the Equity Research Program is for those who come from an &#8220;underrepresented minority group” or have another economic hardship. The <a href="https://archive.ph/IB201#selection-739.47-739.178">university</a>’s Center for Learner Diversity and Inclusion “creates programs to advance the academic, career and personal development of underrepresented minority and disadvantaged students.”
The Daily Wire reached out to Oregon Health and Science University for comment on the investigation. 
Cornell Law School Professor William Jacobson, the founder of the Equal Protection Project, told The Daily Wire that the university was deterring people from applying for certain opportunities because they were advertising them for “being for a certain race or a certain ethnicity.” He said he would like to see the programs reformed, not eliminated. 
“Our goal for every time I challenge a program or a scholarship or goal is not to terminate the program or scholarship, it&#8217;s to terminate the discriminatory aspects of it,” Jacobson told The Daily Wire. “Ideally for us they would have to rework these scholarships and programs, and they would have to eliminate the racial and ethnic descriptors as to who it&#8217;s intended for, and they would have to truly, in real life, open it up to everybody.&#8221;
The Trump administration has taken action against racially focused DEI programs, opening up similar investigations into other entities like Arizona State University and the University of California system.

Department Of Health And Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Announces New Health Care Reform Action

Another University Faces Trump Investigation Over ‘Preferences For Non-Whites’

anti-white

Civil Rights

Department of Health and Human Services

Equal Protection Clause

Oregon

Racial Discrimination

Racial preferences

An office launched by the State of Texas to investigate banned diversity, equity, and inclusion practices at universities has launched its first investigation, according to a complaint obtained by The Daily Wire.
The probe centers on a complaint filed by a former student at Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas, who alleges that the school is operating &#8220;a shadow D.E.I. program in violation of state law.&#8221; The complaint also alleges that university employees &#8220;discriminate against conservatives &#8230; and those that they perceive do not support D.E.I. or leftist political beliefs.&#8221;
The state launched the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board Office of the Ombudsman last year to serve as a watchdog for universities to ensure they are not violating anti-DEI laws. The office has since begun accepting complaints from students, faculty, and employees.
The office can push to withhold state funding from schools found to have violated state law that have failed to address the issues, <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2026/04/03/texas-ombudsman-investigate-university-complaints/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">according</a> to The Texas Tribune.
&#8220;The Office of the Ombudsman enforces key Texas higher education laws that prohibit divisive practices and unconstitutional discrimination as well as ensure accountability for important personnel and curriculum decisions at public universities,&#8221; Brandon L. Simmons, who leads the office, told The Daily Wire.
&#8220;We take every complaint seriously and will fully investigate allegations of potential violations. Our work helps protect a fair learning environment in which Texas students are treated equally under the law,&#8221; Simmons said.
The complaint at the center of the office&#8217;s first investigation is heavily redacted, leaving many details unclear.
In one alleged incident, the former student claimed that a campus peer tutoring office sought &#8220;to restrict political speech following Charlie Kirk&#8217;s assassination.&#8221; After Kirk&#8217;s killing, university staff informed students in the tutoring office that &#8220;we&#8217;re a political free zone,&#8221; the former student&#8217;s attorney, Tanner Franklin, told The Daily Wire.
Franklin is representing the ex-student alongside State Rep. Briscoe Caine.
The ex-student responded to the group message, saying, &#8220;I appreciate &#8230; that we&#8217;re not going to be political, but that&#8217;s not what&#8217;s happening in reality,&#8221; referring to other tutors who wore &#8220;clothing with obvious political slogans such as &#8216;No person can be illegal on stolen land&#8217; and &#8216;From the River to the Sea,'&#8221; a Palestinian chant for wiping Israel off the map.
He was subsequently fired from the tutoring office.
Franklin said that he believes the university retaliated against his client.
&#8220;His point was that&#8217;s fine if you want to be viewpoint neutral, that&#8217;s fine, but you actually have to be viewpoint neutral. And in response, they deleted his comment immediately from the group and basically sent him a message separately, saying, &#8216;Well, we&#8217;ll handle it.&#8217; And that was it. And then a week and a half later, he basically gets fired,&#8221; Franklin said.
In another instance, the ex-student said he was punished for asking a transgender student for their legal name when taking attendance. The transgender student would not provide their name, which was on the class roster, and only gave their preferred name.
&#8220;That student went and complained that my client was essentially being mean to him,&#8221; Franklin said.
The complainant and his attorney subsequently met with university officials to air his concerns.
&#8220;I left the meeting hopeful that SFA took my reports seriously and would take proper, and immediate action to address these serious issues. Unfortunately, that was not the case,&#8221; the student said in the complaint.
The school provided the former student with an &#8220;update&#8221; more than a week after the meeting took place, informing him that they &#8220;would be &#8216;firming up dress code expectations.'&#8221;
The university&#8217;s general counsel also told the former student that university employees &#8220;did not know what &#8216;From the River to the Sea&#8217; meant.&#8221;
&#8220;This fell far short of the full and transparent investigation that I requested and certainly did not hold anyone accountable,&#8221; the complaint reads.
As a result of the university&#8217;s actions and alleged failure to address the situation, the former student chose not to &#8220;walk at his graduation&#8221; out of concern about further retaliation, Franklin said, adding that his client &#8220;was just so disheartened with how the university had handled this process.&#8221;
Franklin hopes that the ombudsman&#8217;s office can push for greater accountability.
“We appreciate the Office of the Ombudsman for taking this complaint seriously and conducting a thorough investigation. Our client’s courageous decision to file this complaint is a critical step toward holding rogue university officials accountable,&#8221; the attorney said.
&#8220;We must ensure that the free speech rights of Texas students are protected and that any restrictions on speech are applied in a viewpoint-neutral manner. The Governor, Lieutenant Governor, and the Legislature’s conservative majority have made it clear: Texans are tired of conservative student voices being silenced and targeted at our taxpayer-funded institutions. When it happens, there will be consequences,&#8221; he added.
In a statement, the university said it &#8220;complies with all state and federal laws,&#8221; adding that &#8220;if there is a governmental investigation, the university will fully cooperate.&#8221;

Untitled design – 2026-07-09T114115.040

EXCLUSIVE: Texas’ Anti-DEI College Crackdown May Have Its First Target

Charlie Kirk

Greg Abbott

Texas

A federal infrastructure program used by the Biden administration to fund bike lanes and “advance equity” will go toward fixing America’s bridges, roads, and shipping ports, The Daily Wire has learned. 
The Trump administration announced Tuesday that it would be awarding $1.73 billion in infrastructure grants through the Department of Transportation to improve roads and bridges. Under Biden, the department focused on fighting “climate change,” pushing DEI, and funding bike lanes. 
“America is fortunate to have a Builder in the White House who knows America is only as great as our infrastructure,” Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told The Daily Wire. “That’s why this Department is investing in repairing critical roads and bridges that connect Americans to job opportunities, port infrastructure that bolsters our national security, and aviation and transit projects that move American families.”
The funding will be awarded through the Better Utilizing Investments to Leverage Development (BUILD) program.
Around 77% of the total grant funding ($1.3 billion) will be allocated to roads and bridges along critical transportation arteries, and another 7% will go toward beefing up the nation’s maritime infrastructure, the Department of Transportation told The Daily Wire. In contrast to Biden, when around 20% of funding went toward pedestrian-bike lane projects, no funds will go toward bike lanes. Just 2% of the funding under Biden went toward maritime projects, according to the Department of Transportation. 
“The impact of these dollars will be felt in communities nationwide for years to come,” Duffy added. 
During the Biden presidency, the BUILD program was renamed Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity (RAISE), but the Trump administration changed the name back to BUILD.
Former Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg focused on pushing DEI and climate-related projects through the program. In November 2021, Buttigieg <a href="https://www.transportation.gov/briefing-room/us-secretary-transportation-buttigieg-announces-nearly-1-billion-grant-awards">declared</a> the program would focus on “equity” and combating “climate change.”
In 2023, the Biden administration <a href="https://www.transportation.gov/briefing-room/us-department-transportation-announces-availability-15-billion-raise-grants-made">said</a> it wanted grant applicants to “consider how their projects can address climate change, ensure racial equity, and remove barriers to opportunity.&#8221; That same year, Buttigieg <a href="https://www.transportation.gov/briefing-room/secretary-buttigieg-appoints-members-advisory-committee-transportation-equity-acte">reestablished</a> an Advisory Committee on Transportation Equity with the purpose of helping the department &#8220;institutionalize equity into Agency programs, policies, regulations, and activities.&#8221;
A <a href="https://nypost.com/2025/07/21/us-news/pete-buttigiegs-dot-spent-80-billion-on-dei-grants-delayed-air-traffic-control-upgrades-records-industry-insiders/">report</a> last year from the New York Post revealed that more than $80 billion was designated to DEI-related projects under Buttigieg’s four years as transportation secretary.
Shortly after taking office, Duffy <a href="https://www.transportation.gov/briefing-room/us-transportation-secretary-sean-duffy-takes-action-rescind-woke-dei-policies-and">moved</a> to implement the Trump administration&#8217;s policy of eliminating DEI from government programs and policies. He directed department officials to rescind any DEI or climate change-related policies.

President Trump Holds Press Briefing

Trump Uses Biden’s Billion-Dollar DEI Bike Lane Program To Fix What Americans Actually Use

Biden Administration

Department of Transportation

Pete Buttigieg

Sean Duffy

Trump Administration

The YMCA deleted a pledge recognizing “gender identity” as one of its priorities for inclusion after a watchdog warned that girls may be forced to share cabins with gender-confused boys at camps across the country. 
The website scrubbing took place after The Daily Wire <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/is-your-childs-summer-camp-safe?author=Leif+Le+Mahieu&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=undefined&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=What+Your+Child%E2%80%99s+Summer+Camp+May+Not+Be+Telling+You">reported</a> on a campaign by the American Parents Coalition urging parents to research their local YMCA’s transgender policies before sending their child to camp. YMCA camps across the country from Colorado to Michigan have policies in place allowing boys who identify as girls to stay in female cabins and use female intimate spaces. 
Before the campaign, the YMCA had a “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20260520192855/https://ds.ymca.org/aboutus">section</a> on its website that highlighted how it worked “to ensure that everyone” regardless of a variety of personal identifiers including “gender identity” and “sexual orientation” had the opportunity to “reach their full potential with dignity.”
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<div id="attachment_1126429" style="width: 2275px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1126429" class="size-full wp-image-1126429" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.22-AM.png" alt="" width="2265" height="517" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.22-AM.png 2265w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.22-AM-300x68.png 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.22-AM-1024x234.png 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.22-AM-768x175.png 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.22-AM-1536x351.png 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.22-AM-2048x467.png 2048w" sizes=" (max-width: 2265px) 100vw, 2265px" />YMCA page prior to Daily Wire report</div>
Now the words “diversity, equity, and inclusion” have been removed, as have all the references to various personal identities.
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<div id="attachment_1126431" style="width: 2071px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1126431" class="size-full wp-image-1126431" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.48-AM.png" alt="" width="2061" height="416" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.48-AM.png 2061w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.48-AM-300x61.png 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.48-AM-1024x207.png 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.48-AM-768x155.png 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.48-AM-1536x310.png 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/07/Screenshot-2026-07-01-at-6.45.48-AM-2048x413.png 2048w" sizes=" (max-width: 2061px) 100vw, 2061px" />Updated YMCA page</div>
A spokesman for the YMCA told The Daily Wire that the digitial services page featuring the DEI statement &#8220;was no longer in use and expires at the end of the year&#8221; and that it reviewed &#8220;all language/content and programs&#8221; based on an executive order from the Trump administration targeting DEI. 
The spokesmean added that &#8220;we revised the language to match existing content across our other channels.&#8221;
Last year, the YMCA <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ymca-scrubs-transgender-guidance-after-parent-group-raises-alarm?author=Leif+Le+Mahieu&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=undefined&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=YMCA+Scrubs+Transgender+Guidance+After+Parent+Group+Raises+Alarm">scrubbed</a> guidance from its website saying that its campers should have access to bathrooms and cabins based on their gender identities after a similar campaign from the American Parents Coalition. 
&#8220;The YMCA continues to get caught embedding gender ideology into its national infrastructure and is desperately trying to scrub the evidence and rebrand overnight. Hiding the language doesn’t erase the policies they are promoting,” Alleigh Marré, the group’s executive director, told The Daily Wire. “Parents deserve the truth, not deletions.”
Local YMCA camps still have posted “gender inclusive” policies disclosing that they will house campers based on gender identity and appear to say they will keep a child’s so-called gender identity a secret from parents. 
“If a camper shares information about their identity while at camp, we respect their privacy and autonomy,” the Sherman Lake YMCA in Michigan <a href="https://www.shermanlakeymca.org/safety-equity-at-sherman-lake-ymca">details</a> online. “We will only share this information with caregivers if the camper gives express consent, unless there is a concern related to the health or safety of the camper or others.”
Similarly in New York, Camp Gorham <a href="https://rochesterymca.org/ymca-camp-gorham-overnight-summer-camp">offers</a> “girl+” cabins as a “space for girls, trans and non-binary campers who feel most comfortable living with girls” and “Boy+ Cabins” for “boys, trans and non-binary campers who feel most comfortable living with boys.”
Marré told The Daily Wire her organization would “continue to highlight the Y for pushing an ideology that compromises fairness, privacy, and safety.”

Logo or sign for the YMCA in the downtown district

YMCA Scrubs ‘Gender Identity’ Pledge After Daily Wire Report

Gender Identity

summer

Transgender

YMCA

If the Karmelo Anthony trial had happened under a Kamala Harris presidency or back in 2020, American cities would likely be burning right now.
Instead, there is near silence. The race-baiting playbook just officially broke.
You&#8217;ve heard me say many times on the show that politics is downstream of culture, meaning that when culture changes, politics follows; that culture is the leader, and politics follows the culture.
But sometimes culture is downstream of politics, meaning that leadership actually matters. And that is particularly true when it comes to race relations in the United States. The leadership of our country matters.
When our leaders promote meritocracy, equal justice before the law, and colorblindness rather than diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), Americans tend to follow.
By contrast, when our leaders promote racial polarization, Americans also tend to follow.
Back to Karmelo Anthony.
A year and a half ago, Karmelo Anthony, a black 17-year-old, stabbed to death 17-year-old Austin Metcalf , who was white. He murdered him in cold blood in front of witnesses. The case was clear from day one.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ben-shapiro-show-ep-2442?elementPosition=1&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=Recent+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-981859" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/ben-banner.avif" alt="" width="1024" height="171" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/ben-banner.avif 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/ben-banner-300x50.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/ben-banner-768x128.jpg 768w" sizes=" (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a>
But Karmelo Anthony&#8217;s family and his spokespeople began retelling a racial narrative in which Anthony was justified, or at least understandable in why he did what he did, because he was the victim.
A victim of what?
Perhaps because of the actual victim, Austin Metcalf, who allegedly threw him out of a track tent; perhaps because of racism; perhaps because of white America more broadly.
None of that worked.
Yesterday, Anthony was convicted of murder. He will see 35 years in prison and be eligible for parole in 17.
There weren&#8217;t any riots, no major protests, not even much of a legacy media response.
That’s because in a sane and rational universe, in which law and order prevail, Americans understand that race has nothing to do with whether murder must be punished. Murder must be punished, no matter who the murderer is and who the victim is.
Would the lack of response have happened if Kamala Harris were president, Joe Biden, or Barack Obama?
I have my doubts.
I&#8217;m old enough to remember the destruction of racial comity in America when Barack Obama got directly involved in the Trayvon Martin case in 2013. That was the case in which Trayvon Martin, a young black teenager, was killed by George Zimmerman under disputed circumstances. There was a long trial; Zimmerman had claimed that it was self-defense, and the prosecution tried to claim that Zimmerman had done it in cold blood.
And Barack Obama got directly involved, saying, if he had a son, he would have looked like Trayvon, which, of course, was not true.
I remember major riots when a white cop shot a black man who had attacked him in Ferguson, Missouri, in 2014. And then the entire legacy media falsified the story, claiming that the cop was racist and that Michael Brown had tried to surrender to him. “Hands up, don&#8217;t shoot!”
Which never happened.
Obama again injected himself and said that nobody in Ferguson would have made something like that up.
It was entirely made up.
It is not a coincidence that race relations in America took a nosedive beginning in 2013-14. Remember 2020, when the death of George Floyd —almost certainly due to drug use combined with excited delirium, not police brutality — led to the most disastrous race riots in modern American history.
So if Kamala Harris were president, what would have happened after the Karmelo Anthony conviction yesterday? Would we be prepping a new round of recriminations over supposed systemic racism in the United States?
That is the question we should be asking, because much of what President Trump&#8217;s presidency is about, his return to power, is about avoiding the worst outcome.
And this is just another example of where the worst outcome has been mitigated or avoided because Americans turned away from the race narrative that was sold by the Democrats.
On the Karmelo Anthony family Give Send Go page, there are comments such as these:
<blockquote>I hope you raise $1 mil. These white people can die mad like they ancestors did. Whites have been obsessed with black people for years.  It&#8217;s 2025. The hate is embedded into their DNA at this point. They don&#8217;t know if they love us or hate us. Lol, too bad we don&#8217;t care.
I am donating again after seeing the need for additional protection/expenses. I am so glad to see him get released on bond. These crackas need to understand we are not our ancestors and they will reap what they sow. I hope that knife made a full recovery. Justice for Karmelo.</blockquote>
There&#8217;s no real allegation that Austin Metcalf&#8217;s behavior was racist in any way. Right from the beginning, the Metcalf family acted with honor. Metcalf&#8217;s father publicly forgave Anthony in a Christian fashion and explicitly stated that this was not a race issue.
The real question is: Why didn&#8217;t this thing explode?
The answer is because you did not have people in prominent positions of power, say, the presidency, trying to facilitate and foster this, because in this moment, the president of the United States we&#8217;ve called upon would say justice was done. A murderer is going to jail.
And that&#8217;s all.
It’s because the American people responded to a decade of racialized politics by saying, “We are tired of this. We don&#8217;t want it. We&#8217;re not interested in a DEI regime that divides Americans by race. We don&#8217;t want that anymore. We want equal justice before the law. We don&#8217;t want every criminal situation to become some sort of referendum on whether America is systemically racist.”
We&#8217;re not interested in that anymore.

karmelo_austin

The Karmelo Anthony Verdict Just Broke The Left’s Favorite Narrative

Ben Shapiro

Karmelo Anthony

Opinion

Race relations

When President Donald Trump signed <a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.justice.gov/ag/media/1388501/dl?inline__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAIaV4wQ0$">his January 2025 Executive Order banning Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI)</a>, Americans cheered the &#8220;end&#8221; of the divisive, hateful ideology. Meanwhile, university administrators rolled their eyes, feigned compliance, and continued advancing their toxic agenda.
Fortunately, the U.S. Department of Justice just announced a Title VI investigation into one of the worst offenders: Arizona State University (ASU). The outcome could have ripple effects throughout the country.
This comes on the heels of Accuracy in Media (AIM) releasing hidden-camera videos from institutions across the country. Our team wanted to determine if the radicals running higher education were actually in compliance with the law. What we discovered was a shell game. DEI offices were renamed, DEI programs were rebranded, DEI job titles were changed, but the activism continued.
If I dropped names like the University of Alabama, <a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://youtu.be/wHSY5Vu5z8k?si=TQMqthyWpX1qUxjV__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKASHdrI6Q$">NC State</a>, the <a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://youtu.be/qTIrC4TmLeg?si=ry3Igbv4j0H-xgs2__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAbqcMnUc$">University of Texas</a>, Louisville, and the <a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://youtu.be/zVMdHjELgTw?si=qXFQLZlpknaAb9Bt__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAnaHMrwg$">University of Kentucky</a>, you’d probably think I was offering a poor prediction of the preseason AP football poll. In fact, these are all universities where we’ve discovered taxpayer-funded DEI activism, often in defiance of state law.
Our investigation would start by examining whether staffers bragged about bending or breaking the law when speaking with someone they believed to be an ideological ally. Then a surprise visit with a cameraman revealed what they’d say when confronted with the reality of the situation.
The resulting videos went viral.
To the surprise of many, some of the worst footage came from ASU. On most campuses, one or two administrators brag about continuing DEI. But at ASU, seven were recorded engaging in such behavior. When more than a half-dozen highly paid staffers are caught, there’s no denying the entire orchard is rotten.
One administrator admitted, “<a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://youtu.be/nWspgS0CvKU__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAtJZXAbs$">We’re doing pretty much what we were doing before</a>.” Another confessed, “<a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://youtu.be/xEiqeRkAFcs__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAmYcWQbk$">&#8230; we are still doing the same thing</a>,” and added, “It’s kind of embedded … this is who we are.” A third summed it up by saying, <a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGbmUGL1hTk__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAraxFc4M$">“We are DEI.”</a> When someone tells you — and shows you — who they are, believe them.
An administrator from ASU’s education college says, “<a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://youtu.be/a853GCbyt5Y__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAL9rL1yI$">I know that the new legislation has asked us to eliminate it, but it’s in our hearts in education, so education has that just naturally.</a>” This is consistent with what we hear in education colleges across the country. When Americans wonder why their child’s school is more focused on indoctrination than education, they need only look at the education colleges.
<iframe loading="lazy" title="YouTube video player" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Sfr6O0tFnLQ?si=RumxHVlqSqcI7Iwt" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>
The same is true for colleges of social work and criminology. If you wonder why social workers sound more like activists, it’s because their colleges require them to be committed to social justice.
I wasn’t taken aback by these results, but I was shocked by the lack of response from ASU’s leadership. The individuals featured in our videos frequently find themselves out of work. A half dozen administrators in North Carolina lost their jobs <a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJHRUVhQTYHqAtc2OH-oOV9n3z-K5DIWl&amp;si=t8fug_1lr_tviPHm__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAlNAd1_c$">after appearing in AIM videos</a> recently, including the <a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://youtu.be/27rMRZLGGEM?si=VgF_sTMueeJm5K-W__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAu9yul34$">dean of students of UNC-Asheville</a>.
<a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJHRUVhQTYHpjNCyKhN8vNI1zT9Lbf747&amp;si=fFWMvPN1gYHfGJiZ__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAMo_vheA$">In Texas, the results are similar</a>. We investigate, and <a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://fortworthreport.org/2026/04/16/uta-staff-member-no-longer-employed-by-the-university-after-hidden-camera-video-of-her-discussing-dei-circulates/__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAprCSg0I$">the offender is</a> fired. I don’t think this is because the university cares about reform. It’s more likely that they’re afraid of Texas’s Attorney General Ken Paxton, who <a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://cbsaustin.com/news/local/paxton-investigates-alleged-illegal-dei-teachings-at-university-of-north-texas__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAbhXVXYA$">regularly investigates the universities we expose</a>.
To be clear, we don’t view the firing of one individual as a victory. These staffers are usually replaced by someone just as radical but aware enough to keep their mouth shut. The reality is that senior administrators who hire and manage these people probably know that lawbreaking is occurring and support this behavior. Alternatively, these executives are so incompetent that they’re unqualified to work for the taxpayers. Either way, they don’t deserve a government paycheck.
The DOJ’s investigation into ASU’s DEI program comes on the heels of its investigation into <a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJHRUVhQTYHrqVniC6IdbUvz73ReeI4Q1&amp;si=g2pXRbcjnlvkypo-__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAG8up0R4$">Ohio State University</a>. These actions are a massive step towards cleaning houses at America’s universities.
The Justice Department is examining whether ASU&#8217;s DEI policies affected admissions, recruitment, scholarships, tutoring, and educational support services. If investigators conclude that ASU&#8217;s DEI programs violate federal civil rights law, political activists masquerading as “educators” will likely begin job searching.
But to truly rid our universities of DEI, each state must enact a <a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.flgov.com/eog/news/press/2023/governor-ron-desantis-signs-legislation-strengthen-floridas-position-national__;!!PxibshUo2Yr_Ta5B!wzMdLk0dBWg5xW7UbVX3oMLaBALlwKKSVCF16lUGRjXf4PRtEuCmIV1zbyVGw2KFQ2oGvvcRiu0E93CAqSKAwEkAvi0$">Florida-style DEI ban</a>, which prohibits administrators and professors from promoting identity politics. Educators are still free to discuss controversial topics in the appropriate courses, but they can’t promote antiracism and social justice in math class.
Arizona State will soon discover that legal compliance isn&#8217;t optional. Other universities would be wise to take notice. My hope is that this DOJ investigation will set the precedent that their divisive politics will no longer be tolerated in taxpayer-funded institutions.
***
Adam Guillette is the president of Accuracy in Media.

University Of Michigan Students Protest Dismantling Of DEI Programs

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University Radicals

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