It may only be the second day of 2024, but reporter Matt Egan joined Tuesday’s CNN News Central and got in an early contender for quote of the year when he claimed that resigning Harvard President Claudine Gay has not been accused of “stealing anyone’s ideas” just “copying other people’s writings without attribution” because that, apparently, is a big difference.
After going through Gay’s inglorious last couple of months including her testimony on Capitol Hill where she couldn’t say definitively that calling for the genocide of Jews would violating Harvard’s code of conduct, Egan moved on to the plagiarism allegations.
He unintentionally hilariously claimed that, “then you layer on top of these plagiarism allegations where Claudine Gay has had to issue corrections, multiple corrections. Now, we should note that Claudine Gay has not been accused of stealing anyone's ideas in any of her writings. She’s been accused of, sort of, more like copying other people’s writings without attribution. So it's been more sloppy attribution than stealing anyone’s ideas, but nonetheless, you put all that together and you throw on top the political pressure and also the pressure from donors.”
Egan then moved on to discuss how donors are threatening to withhold money and Gay’s resignation is “a tough moment for one of the most prestigious universities in America. Its brand has clearly taken a very big hit in just the past few months.”
Returning to the issue of Gay’s plagiarism, undergraduates face greater scrutiny than Egan provided when he tried to insist that copying words is somehow different than ideas. The scandal was so serious that Gay had to resign, but the traditional media didn't find it noteworthy enough to do any original reporting, that job fell to conservative media.
Here is a transcript for the January 2 show:
CNN News Central
1/2/2024
1:19 PM ET
MATT EGAN: As you mentioned, this is really a combination of multiple factors, right? It was the fact that the university's response to October 7 was criticized as not condemning Hamas forcefully enough. The Harvard Corporation actually criticized Claudine Gay’s initial response and then you throw on top of that the testimony, right?
That-- it was more than four hours of testimony before lawmakers but it really just came down to a precious few minutes where Claudine Gay and the leaders of the University of Pennsylvania and MIT, they struggled to answer a question that a lot of people thought would be simple one to answer: is calling for the genocide of Jews against the school's code of conduct and they all fumbled that response and then you layer on top of these plagiarism allegations where Claudine Gay has had to issue corrections, multiple corrections.
Now, we should note that Claudine Gay has not been accused of stealing anyone's ideas in any of her writings. She’s been accused of, sort of, more like copying other people’s writings without attribution. So it's been more sloppy attribution than stealing anyone’s ideas, but nonetheless, you put all that together and you throw on top the political pressure and also the pressure from donors. In just the last few days, we've heard from another powerful donor threatening to-- actually promising to hold off donations to the school. So when you add all of that up, it seems as though it's been more than Claudine Gay's presidency could survive and, you know, this is a tough moment for one of the most prestigious universities in America. Its brand has clearly taken a very big hit in just the past few months.
