Michael T. Nietzel
Forbes
November 12, 2021
The national controversy stirred up by the University of Florida’s prohibition of three of its faculty members from testifying in a federal lawsuit shows no signs of abating. Instead, it’s intensifying.
Today, the three professors sent what they characterized as a “demand letter” to the university’s president, W. Kent Fuchs, expressing their “grave concern” about the formation, composition, and scope of the task force that Fuchs appointed in an attempt to stem the continuing uproar caused by the university’s actions in the matter.
Here’s a quick chronology of events.
The flap began when the university barred three of its political science professors from testifying in a federal lawsuit seeking to overturn the state’s new voting law, claiming that because the University of Florida was a state institution, the faculty could not testify as experts because doing so would be “adverse to U.F.’s interests.”
Then, a few days later after the initial ban became public and drew heavy fire from critics, the institution’s leaders took a step back from an outright prohibition and said that the three – Daniel Smith, Michael McDonald and Sharon Wright Austin – could testify as expert witnesses, as long as they were not paid for doing so.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs in the lawsuit have wanted to hire the three faculty as expert witnesses to bolster their case that Florida’s recently passed voting law unconstitutionally discriminates against minorities and other groups because it creates major obstacles to vote-by-mail, limits access to drop boxes, and criminalizes activities such as providing water to citizens who are waiting in line to vote. The law had been enthusiastically promoted by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R).
Last Friday, the university made a sharp U-turn, when University of Florida President Kent Fuchs sent a message to the campus stating that he had asked “UF’s Conflicts of Interest Office to reverse the decisions on recent requests by UF employees to serve as expert witnesses in litigation in which the state of Florida is a party and to approve the requests regardless of personal compensation, assuming the activity is on their own time without using university resources.”
Fuchs also indicated that he had formed a task force to review the university’s policy concerning requests for approval of outside activities that might involve conflicts of interest and conflicts of commitment. He asked it to focus specifically on how the university should respond when employees request approval to serve as expert witnesses in litigation in which the state of Florida is a party.
That all brings us to today, which was when the task force was again meeting after first convening on November, 9. Austin, McDonald and Smith’s letter to President Fuchs, dated November 12, indicates that far from being satisfied with the university’s response to the matter, “what we have seen and heard from the University underscores the importance of the lawsuit we filed.”
The letter cites three objections to the task force.
First, the faculty object to the process by which the task force was formed, referring to it as a “cynical tactic to defuse press attention and stem the reputational damage” that the university has suffered as a result of what many observers see as a violation of free speech and a trampling of academic freedom. They also claim that the idea of a task force did not originate with the faculty itself, but with the administration’s government relations and public relations team.
Second, they claim that the composition of the task force “highlights its illegitimacy and inadequacy” because is excludes any representation from faculty in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, and it includes at least two members – College of Law Dean Laura Rosenbury and Chief Compliance, Ethics, and Privacy Officer Terra DuBois – who should be disqualified “because of their own problematic actions on this very issue.”
The letter continues with the assertion that Fuchs, himself, is “conflicted” because of statements he made in October that suggested that if the university were to challenge state government’s policy decisions, it would “fracture the relationship between the University and state government.”
Finally, the faculty contend that the scope of the task force is insufficient because it is limited to only the expert witness issue. They argue that such a limitation “demonstrates that it is not a serious effort to grapple with the threats to academic freedom that the University’s actions represent.“
The University of Florida’s decision-making in this case is destined to become a lasting lesson in how colleges should not respond to crises of their own making, especially those involving cherished notions of free speech and academic freedom. At every step of the way, the institution looks to have taken hasty, ill-considered actions to attempt to stem the tide of criticisms it now faces.
The quick appointment of the task force is just the latest example. By appointing the group with what appears to be little campus consultation, President Fuchs mis-stepped into “shared governance” territory, an academic minefield that faculty are very adroit in navigating. Predictably, the faculty criticized both the process of forming the task force as well as its composition, two standard objections that administrators should anticipate whenever they “form a committee” in an attempt to quell a campus dispute.
The University of Florida has dug itself a deep hole. It needs to stop digging.