VINNEWS OP-ED When Sorry Isn’t Enough: Why Columbia’s Claire Shipman Must Resign

There are moments in leadership when an apology, no matter how carefully worded, cannot undo the damage done. Columbia University’s Acting President Claire Shipman has reached that moment.

The recently exposed text messages from Shipman, revealed by the Congressional Committee on Education and the Workforce, paint a damning portrait of a leader who not only failed to protect Jewish students during their darkest hour but actively worked to silence their advocates. Her belated apology—issued only after public exposure—rings hollow against the backdrop of her actions – when she thought no one was watching.

The Evidence Speaks Louder Than Her Apology

Consider the timeline and substance of Shipman’s communications:

Just weeks after the October 7 massacre—while Jewish students were reeling from both the horror abroad and escalating harassment on campus—Shipman dismissed their fears as “not necessarily a rational feeling.”

This wasn’t a slip of the tongue in a heated moment. It was a calculated assessment that Jewish students’ legitimate safety concerns were somehow overblown or hysterical.

By January 2024, as antisemitic incidents continued to plague Columbia’s campus, Shipman’s response was not to strengthen protections for Jewish students but to strategize about board composition. “We need to get somebody from the Middle East or who is Arab on our board,” she wrote. The timing and context make the implication clear: Jewish voices needed to be balanced out, not amplified, during a crisis of antisemitism.

Most egregiously, Shipman targeted Shoshana Shendelman, a Jewish board member who dared to speak out against the harassment of Jewish students. Shipman didn’t just disagree with Shendelman—she wanted her removed. She called her “extraordinarily unhelpful” and agreed when a colleague labeled this Jewish advocate a “mole” and a “fox in the henhouse.”

“I am tired of her,” Shipman declared.

A mole??  “A fox in a henhouse”  – when she is merely trying to advocate for the safety of Jewish students?

The Real Betrayal

Shipman’s actions are particularly heinous because she holds a position of trust. As a board member at the time, she had a fiduciary duty to all Columbia students, including the Jewish students who were experiencing unprecedented levels of fear and hostility. Think Berlin, 1939.  Instead of using her influence to protect them, she used it to undermine their most vocal defender.

Her text messages reveal something more insidious than mere insensitivity—they expose a worldview in which Jewish students’ concerns are inherently suspect, their advocates are infiltrators to be expelled, and their safety is a political inconvenience rather than an institutional imperative.

Why Her Apology Falls Short

Shipman now claims her words were spoken in “a moment of frustration and stress” and don’t reflect how she truly feels. But these weren’t heat-of-the-moment outbursts. They were strategic communications spanning months, revealing a consistent pattern of minimizing antisemitism and marginalizing Jewish voices.  

Moreover, her apology comes not from genuine reflection but from exposure. She apologized only after Congress made her texts public—over a year and a half after she wrote them. During that time, she ascended to the acting presidency, all while harboring these views about Jewish students and their advocates.

Can Jewish students, faculty, and parents trust their safety and wellbeing to someone who privately viewed their legitimate fears as irrational? Can they have faith in a leader who saw their advocates as enemies to be purged rather than partners in creating a safer campus?

The Standard We Must Demand

Imagine if Shipman’s texts had targeted any other minority group. Imagine if she had called Black students’ fears of racism “not necessarily rational,” strategized about reducing Black representation on the board, or called a Black advocate a “mole” who needed to be removed. Her career at Columbia would have ended immediately, and rightfully so.

The same standard must apply here. Antisemitism cannot be the acceptable prejudice, the one where apologies suffice for what would be career-ending behavior in any other context.

A Crisis of Leadership

Columbia has already seen two presidents resign amid the ongoing crisis of campus antisemitism. Shipman was supposed to represent a fresh start, someone who could navigate these treacherous waters with wisdom and moral clarity. Instead, we’ve learned she was part of the problem all along.

Jewish students, all students, at Columbia deserve a leader who sees their safety as non-negotiable, not irrational. They deserve someone who amplifies their voices rather than plotting to silence them. They deserve an advocate, not an adversary in the president’s office.

The Path Forward

Claire Shipman has lost the moral authority to lead Columbia University. Her private communications revealed not momentary lapses in judgment but fundamental failures of character and leadership. No amount of carefully crafted apologies can restore the trust she has shattered.

For the sake of Columbia’s Jewish students—and for the integrity of the institution itself—the Board of Trustees must act decisively. Shipman must step down, or she must be removed.

Only then can Columbia begin the real work of healing and rebuilding trust with a Jewish community that has been failed too many times by those charged with protecting them.

Sometimes an apology is enough. This is not one of those times.