We have previously reported how University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill has completely fouled up the school’s response to the antiSemitism on campus, costing the Ivy League university the good will of its many deep-pocket alumni donors.

Well, she may have just fired herself! From The Philadelphia Inquirer:

Penn president Liz Magill got grilled by Congressional committee over the university’s response to antisemitism

Magill was joined by Harvard President Claudine Gay and MIT President Sally Kornbluth at the hearing in Washington.

by Susan Snyder | Tuesday, December 5, 2023 | 5:22 PM EST

For more than four hours Tuesday, members of Congress grilled — and in some cases berated — three college presidents, including the University of Pennsylvania’s Liz Magill, over their handling of antisemitism on campus following Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel.

The 40-plus-member House Committee on Education and the Workforce peppered Magill, Harvard president Claudine Gay and Massachusetts Institute of Technology president Sally Kornbluth — all relative newcomers to their presidencies — with questions that sometimes barely allowed for a chance to answer. In one case, U.S. Rep. Glenn Grothman of Wisconsin cut off Gay because he said he wanted to hear from the “gal from Penn,” referring to Magill.

When given the chance, though, the presidents at times didn’t directly answer, struggling to explain the point at which hate speech rises to the level of incitement of violence — or, when students or faculty should be disciplined for it.

And this is where our “gal from Penn” absolutely stepped in it.

“It is a context-dependent decision, congresswoman,” Magill said when asked repeatedly if calling for the genocide of Jews violates Penn’s rules or code of conduct.

What? If the question had been about calling for the killing of blacks or Hispanics or homosexuals, is there any doubt, any doubt at all, that Dr Magill’s answer would not have been that it was a “context-dependent decision”?

Dr Magill is an attorney, but not just any attorney. She worked as a law clerk for Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit from 1995 until 1996, and then worked as a clerk for left-wing United States Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg from 1996 until 1997. She then became a law professor at the University of Virginia, and later Vice Dean of the Law School there. She was then recruited to become Dean of Stanford University’s law school, then Provost back at UVa, before finally, in 2022, becoming President of the University of Pennsylvania. She can’t be that stupid.

“That is not bullying or harassment?” Congresswoman Elise M. Stefanik of New York shot back. “That is the easiest question to answer yes, Ms. Magill.”

“If the speech becomes conduct,” Magill said, “it can be harassment.”

“Conduct, meaning committing the act of genocide?” Stefanik asked. “The speech is not harassment?”

Repeatedly pressed, Magill answered, “It can be harassment.”

OK, maybe she can be that stupid. When called out on her ridiculous answer, rather than trying to backtrack, to frame her answer better, she doubled down. She’s not just toast, but toast which has fallen on the floor, buttered side down.

Dr Magill was trying to be nuanced, and couched her further remarks in terms of freedom of speech, but while speech is free, freedom of speech is not a shield from the consequences of what you say. Penn is supposed to provide a safe environment for its faculty, staff, and students, and there is exactly zero doubt that were there demonstrations and statements on that campus which called for the killing of blacks or homosexuals, the school would have taken swift action to preserve a safe environment. While Dr Magill defended some programs put in place, nothing she said rose to the level of discipling or expelling those who chanted for killing Jews, the way the school would have when any other group was the target.

Marc Rowan, a Wharton graduate and multi-million dollar donor to the school, called on alumni and supporters to “close their checkbooks” until President Liz Magill and Chairman Scott L. Bok step down, he wrote in a letter published online on October 11^th. It’s difficult to see how Dr Magill survives in office after Tuesday’s testimony.

But hey, she still has her law license; she can always go out and chase ambulances!