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Two-term Poet Laureate and Time Magazine Women of the Year Ada Limón spoke at the Atheneum on February 27th. Speaking on her impact as Poet Laureate, Limón said “because it is sort of a nonpartisan role, you can't advocate for policy.” Nonetheless, she describes herself as “as a political activist,” and shared, “I think of myself as someone who's an artistic activist in my poems.” Nonpartisanship does not prevent her from saying what she means in her poetry. She said, “my politics have always been really open and on the page, and, if you read all six of my books, you pretty much know how I felt.” When you Google “Ada Limón,” one of the first phrases you’ll find is “first Latina Poet Laureate.” When asked about the potential pressure she felt being a first, she said “it's sort of heartbreaking that a first even has to exist.” Limón acknowledged the prevalence of trauma dumping in the works of authors of color. The fact is that trauma sells, and publishers often require trauma dumping from rising writers from minority backgrounds. Limón commented on this phenomenon: “I think it's tricky because we live in a society that monetizes everything, and we also live in a society that would like to keep us all siloed and separate in boxes that we can understand.” But emphasis on identity can be limiting to authors of color. Limón discussed the challenge of meeting publishers’ expectations for what Latina representation should look like. People often expect (or even demand) Latina writers to produce memoirs about their border experiences. “Well, I never crossed the border,” she said. She added, “I'm always very, very cautious when I'm asked to perform my identity… because it's hard to stop once you’ve started.” She concluded her discussion on race and literature saying, “There’s a lot of responsibility with holding that ‘first Latina’ title because I want to make my ancestors proud… But in the same way, I want to show identity as endless possibilities and not as a container for something that people are safe around.” An assignment from NASA prompted Limón to reflect on if and how she could represent all of humanity through her work. On October 10th, NASA will release a space-probe, the Europa Clipper, from the Kennedy Space Center which is decorated with Limón’s poem: “In Praise of Mystery: A Poem for Europa.” During a small discussion at the Gould Center, Limón joked that the 4th grade reading level requirement for the poem was because NASA assumed aliens couldn’t read past a 4th grade level. With a project assignment like this one, Limón was tasked with creating a message from humanity as a whole. She struggled producing this poem. She explained, “I don’t like to work with the word we” because “I'm always interrogating the we. We The People, who does that mean? Does that mean women? Does it mean people that look like me?” She realized she “had to shift my relationship with the word we” because “when I was writing the poem, I realized it was [truly] a we—it's those of us on this planet.” She reflects, “I was focusing so much on the assignment and doing a good job because it was for NASA, that I forgot to write a poem I actually liked.” When a student asked about her writing process generally and how committed she is to a topic beforehand, Límon responded, “things that you already know for certain, generally, aren't the best subjects for poetry because you have to ask to reveal something to yourself.” Límon said poetry is similar to science because “even when you do get any kind of answer, it just leads to more questions.” She warned against trying to explain a poem using the author’s biography, saying sometimes a poem “wash[es] over you” and advises to “let [the poem] be an experience or a feeling or a total shift, as opposed to having to elucidate it.” She reflected on poetry as craft saying “I've always felt that poetry is the voice underneath the voice. Like it's for me, the truest voice that I have.”

On April 9th, CMC announced Cheryl Strayed as the keynote speaker for this year’s commencement ceremony. Strayed is best known for her 2012 New York Times bestseller, Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail. The book’s cultural impact ramped up quickly, landing a coveted spot in Oprah’s 2012 book club, but reached its zenith in 2014 when the film adaptation starring Reese Witherspoon yielded Academy nominations and box office success. Ten years later, as CMC’s class of 2024 prepares to celebrate and commemorate college graduation, Strayed is poised to impart her wisdom on resilience and redemption to hundreds of listeners contemplating the next steps of their lives. Cheryl Strayed is an American writer and podcast host. She received her bachelor’s degree from the University of Minnesota and earned a master of fine arts degree from Syracuse University. Her debut novel, Torch, chronicled a family’s response to sudden grief and caught critics’ attention, becoming a finalist for the Great Lakes Book Award and earning a spot on The Oregonian’s annual top ten book list. After the success of her 2012 memoir, Wild, Strayed’s career shifted toward nonfiction and autobiography. Later in 2012, she published Tiny Beautiful Things, a collection of essays she had originally written for online magazines under a pseudonym. The collection, a combination of self-help, personal essays, and pop philosophy, was widely successful and became the basis of a 2023 Hulu series. In 2015, Strayed published Brave Enough, a collection of short quotes and quips, reflecting her newfound role as an inspirational figure and her growing personal fame. From 2017 to 2018, Strayed co-hosted “Dear Sugars,” an advice podcast based on “radical empathy.” In 2020, she hosted “Sugar Calling,” a New York Times podcast in which Strayed asked older writers to share their wisdom with her and her audience. But Strayed is still best known for her book, Wild. What is Wild? Fans of Gilmore Girls might recognize the name from A Year in the Life and Lorelai’s decision to recreate Strayed’s trek. The memoir describes Strayed’s 1995 experience hiking 1,100 miles on the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT). The PCT runs from Mexico to Canada, passing through the states of California, Oregon, and Washington and traversing 25 national forests and seven national parks. The hike is renowned for its difficulty, with 489,000 feet of elevation gain and conditions ranging from arid desert to snowy peaks. Strayed undertook the physical and emotional challenge of the PCT with no hiking experience. Strayed was reeling from the loss of her mother to lung cancer, a divorce precipitated by her own infidelity and drug use, and a feeling of disconnection with who she was and who her late mother had taught her to be. At age 26, she threw herself into the challenge of the PCT as a last ditch effort to work through what seemed like insurmountable barriers. “What if all those things I did were the things that got me here?” That’s how Reese Witherspoon, portraying Strayed, narrates the end of her journey as she emerges from the forest and reenters society. In many ways, that’s the message of Wild. We all make choices and face circumstances that make us feel lost, but feeling utterly lost prompts us to find ourselves. Not a particularly groundbreaking contribution to our understanding of human nature. Nonetheless, Strayed emphasizes the importance of being wild, which she describes as being one’s “most savage self.” Being wild was unsustainable, and her humbling path not away from wilderness but through it led Strayed to acceptance of the facts of her life. She accepted that parents die, that people suffer, that hearts break, that things are difficult. Far away from civilized society with nothing to do but keep walking, she realized that one always has to keep walking – whether in the forest, desert, city, or anywhere where hardship exists. What can Strayed offer to CMC graduates and their families? Graduating college is a critical juncture. It marks a shift in identity from student to something unknown. The process of discovering that unknown is sure to be a trying experience for many members of the class of 2024, many of whom may feel lost in a transitional state. Presumably, Strayed will remind us all to “keep walking.”

Canadian immigration policy and the Canadian public’s perceptions of migrants are widely touted as an honorable example of welcoming migrants and embracing multiculturalism, one that other immigrant-receiving states ought to follow. At first glance, Canada’s points-based immigration system for highly skilled and educated workers seems objective, meritocratic, and fair. Upon further examination, however, Canada’s scrupulous evaluation of immigrants is no model for equality. Creating the appearance of legitimacy through its quantitative methodology, the points-based system uses educational and professional attainment as new excuses for discrimination, creating a vulnerable, second-class tier of immigrants who enjoy far fewer rights and protections. Canada rates prospective migrants through the Comprehensive Ranking System (CRS). Applicants receive CRS scores out of a maximum 1200 points. Candidates can receive up to 500 points for core human capital factors, including age, educational level, language proficiency, and Canadian work experience. Candidates can receive up to 100 points for skill transferability factors, including educational or professional ties to Canada or similar environments. Then, candidates can receive up to 600 additional points for other advantages like being nominated by a Canadian province or having a pre-arranged employment opportunity in Canada. The Canadian government does not publish an official figure of a minimum CRS score applicants require to stand a reasonable chance of acceptance. When Canada’s points-based immigration system was implemented in 1967, it was applauded as a departure from the country’s previous overtly racist policies. The 1966 White Paper of Immigration that led to the points-based system stated plainly that the selection of immigrants “must involve no discrimination by reason of race, color, or religion.” Factors like education and skill were “universally applicable” ways to screen migrants, according to the White Paper. In this way, the points-based system differed from earlier policies, which used literacy tests in English and French to prevent Southern European migrants from entering the country. This system would select migrants based on supposed merit rather than on the basis of ethnic preferences. Given that educational access and professional experience are often unequally distributed across gender, race, and class, how can Canada purport to select migrants on demographically neutral grounds? Perhaps the implementation of the points-based system is better understood as a shift from de jure to de facto discrimination rather than as a revolutionary transition to equality. Proponents of Canada’s policy would likely defend the system against this claim by highlighting that the points-based system increased migrant diversity with respect to region of origin. However, I am not disputing the fact that the points-based system expanded the range of so-called desirable migrants to include migrants outside of Western Europe. Every country has an educated and professional elite that can benefit from the Canadian points-based system. My argument is rather that the points-based system does discriminate against those who lack educational and professional resources across the globe and that this discrimination is getting more severe. Whereas the original points-based system had relatively meager educational requirements, reforms enacted through the 2002 Immigration and Refugee Protection Act put even greater emphasis on formal education and professional skills than before, making the threat of de facto discrimination even more potent. The gender disparities that result from the points-based system are just one example of the policy’s discriminatory impact. Under the points-based system, primary applicants are those who submit themselves – and their qualifications – to scoring, whereas secondary applicants are typically the primary applicants’ spouses or long-term partners who would accompany the primary applicants into Canada. Feminist scholars highlight that “the distribution of primary applicant skilled migration visas … is skewed in favor of men,” with one study reporting that almost 75 percent of primary applicants to the points-based system were male. This reflects the unequal access of women across the globe to formal education and skilled employment. In addition to this gender disparity, it is likely that the policy also discriminates against people with other demographic characteristics, like low socioeconomic status, that impact their access to educational and professional experience. The points-based system’s problems do not stop here. In addition to determining who succeeds as a primary applicant to the federal high-skilled worker program, the points-based system enables and legitimates comparatively poor treatment of migrants who do not enter Canada as highly educated and highly skilled members of the economy. It creates a second-class tier of migrants who are trapped in unfair relations of dependence due to Canadian migration policy. As education expert Stuart Tannock highlights, education-based discrimination denies uneducated migrants access to civil rights and social protections. The points system legitimates Canada’s differential treatment toward “deserving” and “undeserving” migrants. Most low-skilled migrants enter Canada under the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP). While the TFWP includes both high- and low-skilled migrants who share temporary status, the program’s benefits are stratified by education and skill. High-skilled workers attain work visas easily or in some cases require no work visas at all; they are permitted to bring dependents and spouses into Canada with them; they broadly enjoy more rights than low-skilled workers despite their shared temporary status. On the other hand, low-skilled workers are unable to bring spouses or dependents into Canada with them. They are bound to their Canadian employers and denied access to the general labor market. They are subject to deportation if they lose their jobs, creating an unequal, unbalanced relationship of dependence between low-skilled migrants and their employers. They are unlikely to speak out against unfair labor practices given their utter reliance on their employers for their legal authorization to remain in Canada, which leaves them vulnerable to abuse. A similar relationship of dependence exists between primary and secondary applicants to the high-skilled worker program. When Canada permits a primary and secondary applicant pair to enter the country through the points-based migration system, Canadian authorities expect the couple to remain together for a significant period of time. From the government’s perspective, this policy prevents the use of “sham” marriages to circumvent migration restrictions. However, this policy creates a position of dependence between secondary applicants – who are commonly women – and their primary applicants – who are commonly men. Women whose legal authorization to remain in Canada depends on their continued relationship with their spouses have limited bargaining power in their relationships and experience coercion to remain with their spouses. While the policy makes some exceptions for secondary applicants suffering from domestic abuse, it is likely that many women who enter Canada as secondary applicants are stuck in relationships that are abusive or unequal in nature. The Canadian points-based migration system has many benefits, I admit. Canada is facing a labor shortage due to the death of many skilled workers, and its points-based system to admit highly qualified workers is a significant boon to its economy, allowing Canada to benefit from other countries’ investments in these migrants' education and professional development. 85 percent of Canadians believe migration to be positive to their economy. In stark contrast, only 39 percent of Americans believe migration benefits the American economy. This gap in public opinion is almost certainly related to the different roles of merit in the two countries’ migration schemes. While the Canadian system may be good at channeling economic benefits to Canadian citizens, it is not just enough to be worthy of its international acclaim. The model is clearly unequal – it reflects and exacerbates existing inequalities in the distribution of educational and professional resources. Not only does it accept primary applicants who have already benefited from educational and professional resources; it then grants those migrants the myriad educational and professional benefits Canada has to offer, potentially widening the gap between the global elite and the rest of the world. Furthermore, it creates dangerous relations of dependence in employer-employee relationships and romantic relationships. Canadian migration policy subjects the country’s second-class migrants to significant threats of abuse by those who wield power over them. The system’s meritocratic methodology makes the unequal treatment of different migrants seem legitimate and allows many members of the public to overlook the state’s morally reprehensible treatment of unskilled workers and secondary applicants. The Canadian public is overwhelmingly positive about migration. It is not clear why Canada’s treatment of some migrants as second-class is a necessary condition for the public’s continued support of migration policy. To become deserving of all its international praise, Canada should leverage public support for migration to justify its advocacy for and protection of all migrants, not just those with degrees.

15 million people protested after the murder of George Floyd in May of 2020. Less than three weeks later, protests erupted in Atlanta after police killed Rayshard Brooks. These protests led to the proposal of Cop City, a $90 million, 85-acre police training facility to be built in Atlanta’s Weelaunee Forest. Two-thirds of Cop City’s funding comes from corporations like Delta, Waffle House, and Home Depot, which view Cop City as vital to protecting their property interests. These donations are eerily reminiscent of corporate donations of millions of dollars to militarize New York police during the Occupy Wall Street Movement. Cop City better resembles a military training facility than a police training facility. It includes explosive testing areas, shooting ranges, a Black Hawk helicopter landing pad, and a mock city to practice urban warfare. Georgia police are already dangerously over-militarized, having received tens of millions of dollars worth of military equipment, including 2,700 military rifles and hundreds of armored vehicles. In Georgia, police departments that received military equipment killed four times as many people as departments that did not – likely because militarized police see themselves as combatants, not public servants. The correlation between military equipment and killings holds even after accounting for potential confounding variables like crime rates and poverty. Cop City will cause even more police brutality by teaching police advanced crowd control methods, like using tear gas, and training police to view citizens as enemies. Moreover, many areas outside of Georgia will be impacted as 43% of police trainees will come from out of state. Cop City also contributes to environmental racism. The city is building the complex in Weelaunee Forest, which is near the majority-Black southeastern part of Atlanta. Cop City will destroy much of the forest, which absorbs as much as 19 million pounds of air pollutants annually. The complex will also pollute the South River as toxic metals from munitions seep into it. Because affluent white communities can lobby the government to not place environmental hazards in their communities, the brunt of Cop City’s environmental impacts will affect Black communities. Stop Cop City organizers have good reason to protest, but Atlanta’s response has been violent and authoritarian. In January, climate protests occupied Weelaunee Forest to stall the construction of Cop City. Georgia State Patrol troopers responded by raiding the protesters, including Manuel Esteban Paez Terán, an activist known by the name Tortuguita. Police shot Tortuguita 57 times, claiming that Tortuguita had fired at them first, but autopsies later revealed that Tortuguita did not have gunpowder residue on their hands and had been sitting with their hands in the air. Later, three protesters put up flyers alerting residents that Officer Jonathan Salcedo was involved in killing Tortuguita. Police arrested all three, and Charley Tennenbaum, their leader, was charged with intimidation of a police officer, which has a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison. Police have arrested over one hundred additional protesters, including 42 people charged with domestic terrorism and 61 people charged with racketeering. The indictments are unfounded. For example, the racketeering indictments portray the grassroots organization Defend the Atlanta Forest as a criminal enterprise. This designation means that anyone involved in it can be indicted, including for acts as simple as getting reimbursed for protest supplies. Prosecutors know the indictments are ridiculous, but their goal is not to win the cases. Instead, they mean to illegally hamstring the movement by arresting its most dedicated activists and intimidating anyone who might join them. Stop Cop City protesters need to get 15% of Atlanta’s registered voters, or fifty-eight thousand people, to sign their petition to put Stop Cop City on the ballot. Considering the mayor of Atlanta got the votes of only 11% of registered voters, 15% is no easy threshold. Stop Cop City has more than enough signatures, with over 116,000 so far. The city has responded by desperately trying to deny voters a say. They have instituted a signature-matching process to disenfranchise petition signers for tiny deviations in their signature, and they have attempted to have the referendum ruled invalid in court. This year, Atlanta is spending a third of its general fund, or $235.7 million, on police. Shockingly, that figure includes none of the $90 million being spent to militarize police via Cop City. Atlanta echoes the outrageous police budgets of other cities around the country. Cop City is only the subset of a larger system dedicated to preserving mass incarceration and racial hierarchy. However, a victory here would spell a major victory for the criminal justice reform movement and democracy. The effects would reverberate by motivating people to protest mass incarceration and police brutality in their communities. Already, Stop Cop City is helping to motivate activists because the movement highlights everything wrong with the criminal justice system. Activists allege that police militarization and large police spending harms civil liberties and democracy. The violent and authoritarian crackdown on Stop Cop City protesters proves us right.

Upon learning about Ridley Scott’s upcoming film on Napoleon last summer, I immediately selected a Napoleon biography as part of my summer reading list to acquaint myself with the historical context in expectation of Scott's highly anticipated movie. I was particularly captivated by the monumental work Napoleon: A Life by the prominent British historian Andrew Roberts. Roberts’ meticulous approach painted a comprehensive portrait of Bonaparte, delving into his intellectual development, personal relationships, and military genius. Noteworthy is Roberts’ dedication, having personally visited fifty-three of Napoleon's sixty battle sites during his research. It is regrettable that Scott, a compatriot of Roberts, did not exhibit the same level of professionalism when portraying one of history's most captivating figures on the cinema screen. My visit to Claremont Laemmle theater to watch Scott's Napoleon was approached with skepticism –– given the criticism from Napoleonic Era historians regarding the movie's historical accuracy. Therefore, instead of concentrating on Scott’s lack of knowledge of Bonaparte and his era, I watched the movie to infer Scott’s underlying messages in the film. As you may know, Scott's works typically carry a political undertone. For instance, in the Kingdom of Heaven, which was shot in the post-9/11 political climate where Islamophobia peaked, Scott’s portrayal of Saladin and King Baldwin was interpreted as the director’s call for interfaith dialogue. So, it is inevitable to consider the contemporary political environment's influence on the making of Scott's Napoleon. The intense anti-Putin sentiments in the West following the Russian invasion of Ukraine form the intellectual basis of Scott's work. Portraying Napoleon merely as a power-hungry, ruthless, and evil figure seems to be an attempt to draw parallels between the 19th-century French leader and Vladimir Putin. Scott's explicit comparison of Bonaparte to totalitarian figures like Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin, as revealed in an interview, sheds light on the grand motive behind the movie. One doesn't need to watch the entire film to reach this conclusion; the ending, where Scott attributes all deaths in the Napoleonic wars to Napoleon, is telling. If Scott had presented a more nuanced portrayal, such as showcasing Napoleon's scientific expedition in Egypt instead of fabricating events like the bombardment of the Pyramids, perhaps I could have sympathized with Scott's Anglo-Saxon Grudge to some extent.

Superficially, the two leaders of the conservative movements of their time could not be more different. Barry Goldwater was resolute and well-spoken; Donald Trump is goofy and simplistic. Goldwater would’ve cringed at Trump’s comments about Mexicans or Muslims. And the man that respectfully conceded the 1964 election definitely would not have approved of the January 6th attack. But regardless of Mr. Conservative’s would-be objections, Trump – and his supporters – are a natural result of Goldwater’s influence on the American Right, distrust of the political establishment, “outsider” identity, and emphasis on states’ rights. The clearest parallel between Goldwater and Trump is their tendency to view the establishment in Washington and the other halls of power as corrupt and beholden to pernicious interests. Goldwater disparaged the “radical ideas that were promoted by the New and Fair Deals,” that “dominate the councils of our national government,” in his manifesto Conscience of a Conservative. According to Goldwater, this included a belief in excessive government power and a conciliatory disposition towards the Soviet Union. Trump’s rhetoric of “Drain the Swamp” reflects much the same attitude: that the nation’s capital is overrun with crooked politicians seeking to enlarge their own power and influence at the expense of the American people. When Trump blasts the “Swamp,” he’s not just referring to Democrats – he’s after establishment Republicans too; he has denounced “RINOS,” or “Republicans in name only.” But once again, Goldwater did it first. In Conscience, he criticized the national Republicans for utilizing “the coercive power of the federal government” in tandem with their Democratic counterparts. Their willingness to criticize their own party reflects a common identity of an outsider who promises to save the party and the nation from its corruption. This identity seeks to capitalize on the growing distrust of politicians, especially career politicians, of the American people. They both sought to represent the common American citizen in their fight against an unscrupulous, narrow-minded, and elitist group of federal politicians who were not truly accountable to the people. Because both claimed to represent not just a party, but a movement, neither of them held strong party allegiances that compelled them to withhold their judgment of their fellow members. By appearing non-partisan in their criticisms, they both amassed followers from both major parties, at what they viewed as the temporary – and necessary – expense of the national party apparatus. Goldwater’s “outsider” strategy was indicative of the birth of a modern American conservative populism. Conservative populism stood in contrast to the left-wing populism of the New Deal Coalition and the segregationist – yet still government centered – populism of certain Dixiecrats. Instead of pitting the people against exploitative corporations, the libertarian populist style of Goldwater pitted the common man against the “oppressive federal government.” Arguably, this form of populism was more suited to the America of the 60s: a prosperous nation with a large and growing middle class than that of previous eras. Ronald Reagan did not hesitate to build upon Goldwater’s libertarian populist ideology. In fact, he first gained national attention from his "A Time for Choosing" speech supporting Goldwater. Reagan would go on to launch his 1980 campaign, whistling his support for 'state's-rights,' in front of a crowd of white voters in a Mississippi town where young Black civil rights activists had been violently murdered during the civil rights movement. Of course, those slain in Mississippi had been fighting for the very Civil Rights Act that Goldwater notoriously opposed. Trump represents a revival of not only the “outsider” strategy, but of the same form of anti-establishment populism. Even beyond his “Drain the Swamp” rhetoric, he continues Goldwater’s populist legacy by attempting to address issues facing the working class, such as the outsourcing of manufacturing jobs to foreign countries – but with conservative rhetoric. The campaign promise of “bringing the jobs back” also allows Trump to blame the “Swamp” for “selling out” the United States to foreign nations like China and position himself, the “outsider,” as the one that is “defending American interests.” Even the charge of establishment complicity in Chinese attempts at exploitation is reminiscent of Goldwater’s claim in Conscience that “American leaders … are searching desperately for means of ‘appeasing’ or ‘accommodating’ the Soviet Union.” Beyond identity and rhetoric, Trump and Goldwater still share a commitment to states’ rights: Trump’s view on abortion is remarkably comparable to Goldwater’s regarding civil rights. Recently, Trump, the self-proclaimed “most pro-life president ever,” was rebuked by an anti-abortion group for stating that abortion laws should be determined by individual states after the Dobbs decision. Goldwater, similarly, was supportive of integration, but was “not prepared … to impose that judgment … on the people of Mississippi or South Carolina.” Despite major sections of the Republican Party’s support for federal abortion bans, Trump – whether because of a desire for electability or true personal beliefs – thus maintains the position that would make Goldwater proud. Even Trump’s rise to national leadership mirrored Goldwater’s. At the 1964 Republican National Convention, moderate Nelson Rockefeller, Goldwater’s main competitor for the nomination, stood up and condemned the Arizona senator’s extremism. The crowd booed and heckled him. The American Right was no longer satisfied with lightly tempered spending and careful internationalism. In 2016 Ted Cruz gave a similarly poorly received Republican Convention speech failing to endorse Trump, the newly selected nominee. Once again, amidst the crowd’s jeers, the nation realized that its right wing hungered for a more conservative, populist vision. Both Goldwater and Trump successfully led an internal movement that usurped the dominant perspective of the party – only Trump actually achieved the presidency. If Goldwater lived to see what became of his party, he probably would have made a few horrified comments to the press about Trump’s antics. But secretly, inside, he might’ve wanted to give a smile of approval.

Not far from the Claremont Colleges sits an ideological mecca of Trump’s populist brand of conservatism. A think tank that grabbed headlines over the last eight years through numerous mishaps, including an infamous comparison of Trump’s 2016 campaign to Flight 93 passengers fighting back against Al-Qaeda on 9/11. They awarded Jack Posobiec, who initiated the Pizzagate conspiracy, a fellowship in 2019. They stood by when Senior Fellow John Eastman spearheaded Trump’s fraudulent election challenge on Jan 6th. The “West Coast Straussians'' at the Claremont Institute once commanded respect among conservative intellectuals. Now they are synonymous with conspiracy and the far right of the Republican party’s schism. Harry V. Jaffa, a former CMC professor known for his application of Straussian philosophy to American political thought and Lincoln, taught the four students who founded the Institute. Their mission was to establish a holdout against historicism, statism, and relativism. The founders of the Claremont Institute’s rejection of Hegelian thought and postmodern philosophy laid the foundation for their mission “to restore the principles of the American Founding to their rightful, preeminent authority in our national life.” One might believe that those who place such value in the Nation’s founding principles — and in the republican institutions the Framers built —- would reject political figures who advocate for their erosion. But the Claremont Institute continues to surprise us, even after the entire John Eastman January 6th debacle. In January, the New York Times published ‘America Is Under Attack’: Inside the Anti-D.E.I. Crusade, recounting a systematic right-wing effort to dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs at universities and schools. At the heart of this thrust against DEI is the Claremont Institute. The Times gathered evidence of the Claremont Institute’s involvement in a campaign to pass legislation and spur movements that cleanse education of what they categorize as ‘woke indoctrination.’ Successful bans on DEI offices, programs, and training in Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas, North Carolina, and Florida are early crusades in what is shaping up to be a prolonged battle over school curriculums. Despite publicly advocating for academic freedom, the Institute’s movement covertly seeks to rid university systems of left-wing professors. While organizing the defense of Amy Wax, a University of Pennsylvania Professor accused of racism, the Claremont Institute worked with their established allies at Hillsdale College — another bastion of Trump’s conservatism. They grounded their arguments in stirring liberal fears that firing the professor would “only embolden red-state lawmakers to fire controversial left-wing professors.” Inquiring about the strategy, Dr. Azerrad, a Hillsdale professor, asked over email: “But don’t we want this to happen?” “Yes,” replied Claremont Fellow Dr. Yenor, “But your audience doesn’t want it to happen.” The emails shared by the Times reveal, among other things, a prejudiced coalition of people leading advocacy that is dubious as it is deceitful. Following the release of the article, and others by Vox and The New Republic, the Claremont Institute issued a response: Why America’s “Anti-Discrimination” Regime Needs to Be Dismantled. In the article, they laid out their opposition to DEI programs and America’s “reigning civil rights ideology,” which they regard as a “grave threat to free speech and free elections,” that has the potential to bring about the “end of liberty and republican self-government” and is “a mortal threat to the American Way of Life.” The Institute points to DEI as a means for bureaucracies and businesses to undermine traditional American values, gain more power, and violate principles of equal protection under the law. Notably missing from the response is any acknowledgment of their eager challenges to the censorship of conservatives while they covertly campaign to censor liberals. Claremont’s actions expose plainly hypocritical views on academic freedom and the First Amendment. Recently, The Guardian reported that emails and donation records connect Ryan P. Williams, the Claremont Institute’s president, and Fellow Scott Yenor, to an all-male fraternal organization called the Society for American Renewal (SACR). The organization’s internal mission statement outlines a desire to uproot the multiracial, multicultural American republic and install a renewed patriarchal regime grounded in Christian nationalism. Membership entails pursuing numerous objectives that will bring about a new “aligned regime,” such as “collect, curate, and document a list of potential appointees and hires for a renewed American regime.” Members must also “understand the nature of authority and its legitimate forceful exercise.” In their own words: President Ryan Williams also responded to questions about what a new regime may look like: “it would, more likely than not, be some form of the US constitutional order, but with much higher fidelity to that order before it was corrupted and subverted by modern progressivism.” This connection between Claremont and SARC unveils a concerted effort to undermine the very identity of America as a pluralistic democracy, which underscores the Institute's radical philosophical pivot.

I am writing this piece not with frustration but with disappointment in myself. Following the events after October 7th, 2023, in Gaza, I realized that I had to spend four years of my undergraduate education at Claremont McKenna College to discover that our region’s salvation does not rest in the American way but in itself. How naïve I am! Perhaps if I had given an ear to İsmet Özel, I would not have had to spare four years of my life in California away from my loved ones to reach this conclusion. Nevertheless, let us accept what I will tell you as an experience that helped a young man find the truth about himself, his region, and his belief: Almost like Joyce’s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man! After I completed my high school education in Istanbul, Turkey, I decided to continue my higher education at Claremont McKenna College, a prestigious liberal arts college based in Claremont, California. I thought an interdisciplinary education at Claremont McKenna could mold me into the knowledgeable and well-rounded politician I want to become someday. However, as an international relations and economics major, my recent experiences at CMC made me sure that my mission catastrophically failed. On October 23rd, more than sixty CMC faculty members signed a letter titled “Statement on the Hamas terrorist attack of October 7, 2023.” Naturally, the Professors paid respect to the lost Israeli lives following Hamas’ incursion; however, many students were shocked by the statement’s complete disregard for lost lives in Gaza. I had to read the statement several times to be convinced that faculty members did not show the courtesy to mention the lost Palestinian lives in Gaza, as I would have never guessed this disrespect from my professors. In response to the student backlash against the faculty statement, faculty members had to write another statement, but again, this time, they did not use the word Palestinian. Instead, they decided to call Palestinians “innocent people who just happen to be living in the wrong place.” Later, much more provoking and disrespectful things happened on the CMC campus. In an event about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict hosted by CMC’s Keck Center, CMC’s Middle Eastern Politics Professor Bou Nassif, who is also a politician in Lebanon, gave a keynote about the ongoing conflict while Phalangist militant Bachir Gemayel’s picture in his background. Those who are knowledgeable enough about Middle East politics know that Bachir Gemayel is the figurehead of Phalangist radicalism, which is the fundamentalist ideology behind massacres in which Gemayel and his troops killed thousands of Palestinian refugees. The Keck Center’s event was a depiction of utmost hypocrisy on the CMC campus as Hicham Bou Nassif was criticizing Hamas’ fundamentalism while, at the same time, glorifying an ethnic cleanser. When I reached out to the Keck Center regarding the professor’s insensitivity, the Center’s director, Hillary Appel, thanked me for my input and disregarded Bou Nassif’s disgraceful display. Furthermore, she allowed Bou Nassif to keep Gemayel’s image in his background for the professor’s second event on the ongoing conflict in Gaza. Some may argue that Bou Nassif is entitled to glorify a fascist figure. I agree with this viewpoint. However, we – CMC students interested in Middle Eastern politics – are also entitled to take Middle East politics classes from a different professor. The CMC administration should ensure faculty viewpoint diversity instead of showcasing a radical and mediocre politician. Although, as I have previously mentioned, I am disappointed in myself since it took four years for me to realize the salvation for the Middle East does not rest in the West, I still want to thank Claremont McKenna for helping me to understand why Sayyid Qutb did not become an Islamist in Cairo but in Greenly, Colorado.

On April 11, more than two-thirds of voting Pomona College faculty supported a motion to condemn and reverse the college’s response to the April 5 student protests. The motion is non-binding. On Monday, earlier in the week, Pomona professors called an emergency faculty meeting to discuss the student arrests and suspensions. At the meeting, which was open to all faculty, President Starr explained that she had been in contact with Claremont Police the week before the protestors’ occupation of Alexander Hall. Professors considered a motion but ultimately did not vote on it. On Thursday, around 140 faculty reconvened to discuss the administrative response. During the meeting, 68 percent of the faculty members approved the following resolution: The faculty condemns the present and future militarization and use of police on the campus. It insists that the College immediately drop criminal charges and reverse the suspensions and all related consequences against student protesters for their actions of civil disobedience. Faculty passed the resolution as hundreds of students marched across the Claremont Colleges.

At the time of writing this, Los Angeles has zero percent I.C.U. capacity. Roughly 1 in 5 people in Los Angeles County have been infected with COVID-19. The state of California cannot handle the number of bodies from COVID-19 related fatalities. Concurrently, more students than last semester are planning on moving to Claremont and the greater Los Angeles area for the spring semester. Donnie Denome and Becca Zimmerman of TSL wrote on why students shouldn’t move back to Claremont. Uma Nagarajan-Swenson of TSL warned of the tragedy that could come with irresponsibility. Despite their dire pleas, people aren’t listening. There are several reasons students are moving back to Southern California. Their mental health might be suffering at home. Time zones might conflict with classes. First-generation and low-income students might struggle to succeed in online school at home. I understand the frustration that comes with remote learning, especially for first-years. They were robbed of the freshman experience; the first taste of being on their own. They missed WOA, their first Toga party and Collin’s late-night snack. They simply missed having their first year on campus. Many of us are lonely and fatigued. Even so, every single student moving to SoCal this semester has a moral obligation to be safe and responsible. Young people can still have fatal symptoms. A quick Google search of “college student dies from COVID” shows us the grim reality that active and young people can die from complications. Even if you don't have severe symptoms, you will still impact the surrounding community. You might unknowingly spread the virus to a grocery store cashier, or a fellow shopper that takes care of elderly parents. A brief exchange with someone in the Village might mean that they infect their whole family. There is so much at stake. Failing to recognize the responsibility that we have to keep ourselves and the community safe stems from a position of privilege. It is an attack on working-class families and communities of color that are especially suffering during the pandemic. Spreading this virus will cause more unprecedented death and destruction. Several students tested positive for COVID-19 this past fall semester, including from Halloween parties in Claremont. It’s clear that some are not being responsible guests in the community. Many have already signed leases and are on their way to move into their apartments. This week, Dean of Students Dianna “DT” Graves noted, “Thus far, just over 800 students have provided a spring address. Among those, nearly half plan to live in southern California, and around 200 plan to live in or within 4 miles of Claremont. It is critical that students familiarize themselves with and follow the public health guidelines in their community.” It is futile to expect that people won’t move to Claremont. We attend a school that prides itself on integrity and social responsibility. Do better.

When I arrived at Claremont McKenna College my first year, I felt the way many students feel when they get to college: overwhelmed. But as I settled into my new home in Fawcett 503, I soon found an abundance of things I loved about living at CMC: an amazing roommate, a quick two minute walk to 6 a.m. cross country practice, a prime view of the sunset every night from the fifth floor, and the quiet study space just a few floors down. Yet, as my highly anticipated and idealized expectations of the “college experience” began to meet the reality of being an introverted person in a new place surrounded by (mostly extroverted) people I had only known for a couple months, I found myself feeling more and more isolated and unhappy. By the end of the fall semester, I was opting for green to-go boxes from Collins instead of eating with others, and spending most of my free time alone in my room. Luckily, in the spring things began to look up. I grew closer with my teammates, joined a new club, and took my first class in CMC’s literature department. My closest friends soon became the amazing ladies in my year on my cross country team, most of whom attend Scripps College. I found myself spending most nights studying and hanging out at Scripps, always followed by the trek back to my South Quad dorm. The walk was nothing to complain about, but it was lonely. I don’t quite remember how I first found out about the 5C Housing Exchange Program, but what I do remember is, for the first time, genuinely looking forward to living at school. I found someone from Scripps who wanted to live at CMC, went through the Scripps room draw process, and ended up in a quad with three of my closest friends. My sophomore year was one of the best of my life. While a lot of factors went into that, I believe the biggest was that I finally felt at ease in the space I was living. People generally seem to experience a lot of confusion when I tell them that I have spent half of my time at CMC living on a different campus. It is shocking how often I’ve been asked the question, ‘Are you glad you came to CMC?’ My answer is, without hesitation, yes. I love being at CMC academically (special shoutout to the Literature department!). I have been very active on campus all four years, from Amnesty International club, to the Mgrublian Center for Human Rights, to writing for The CMC Forum. As it turns out, it is entirely possible to love the education and resources you are receiving, without loving the campus dorm culture (and honestly, the aesthetic). In fact, I believe it is the duty of a college to be cognizant of the fact that not every student is going to love every aspect of the school they are attending, and to provide resources for students to find a situation that works best for them. For me, that situation was living at Scripps, with or near my best friends, in a quiet and low-key environment, surrounded by fruit trees (sounds nice, right?). I don’t see how that preference has much to do with my personal academic and extracurricular fulfillment. All this to say, when I heard the news that the Claremont Colleges ResDeans have decided to “discontinue” the 5C Housing Exchange Program, I felt shocked and gravely upset. Obviously as a senior this will not affect me in any great way. I am graduating soon, and will live out the last months of my college experience in my happy place: a spacious single room in Toll Hall, a few doors down from my best friend, with a window view of the Scripps rose garden. Yet, I couldn’t help but imagine how my first-year self would have felt if the 5C Exchange Program had been shut down that year instead. There were indeed some “complications” (to quote the February 16 email) that I had to traverse over the years: finding someone to switch with can be a trial, there was a fair amount of paperwork, somehow my key card never worked the first fews days, or perhaps my name was wrong on my door. But complications aside, I cannot even begin to describe how vital the program was to my overall enjoyment of my experience at CMC. The reality of the Claremont Colleges is that students come here because they value the benefits of attending a Consortium: classes, or even majoring, at other colleges, shared resources, the feeling of a medium-sized college, and of course the absurd number of dining hall choices. The vast majority of students here have close friends from schools other than their home institution, are involved with 5C or multi-C activities, regularly attend classes with 5C students, and make constant use of the shared resources we have here. I don’t believe that students should be barred from making a mutually beneficial decision with another student to switch rooms. I have witnessed the process time and time again, and while I understand that the program does create some complications for the Colleges’ ResDeans, I certainly do not agree with the assertion that the program “posed more complications than benefits to all involved.” To assert that the benefits for all involved were outweighed by the complications of the program, is to assert that one of the most important parts of my— and many other students’ — college experience was not worth a 30-minute student-Dean meeting to fill out paperwork, and the time it takes to add the Scripps dorms to my key card access. But the Colleges’ ResDeans wouldn’t know the impact that this program has had on me, because they’ve never asked me about it. In light of other recent announcements made by the Colleges— such as CMC’s withdrawal from the Keck Science Center, or even the not-so-subtle name change from “The Claremont Consortium” to “The Claremont Colleges”— it’s hard not to feel that this is just another move in the direction of disintegration. While I never anticipated living off of CMC’s campus before coming here, I applied knowing that I loved the idea of studying at a Consortium. We all use the benefits of the Consortium, some of us perhaps in more unique ways. Not all of us can fit perfectly with all the aspects of our home institutions, but that’s the beauty of studying here: students can pick and choose what works best for them. It might create some “complications,” but in my opinion, it’s what makes the Claremont Colleges special.

“Cases and Controversies: Pivotal Legal Questions of Our Times” Thursday, Jan. 25, 2018 As the senior legal analyst for CNN, staff writer for The New Yorker and Supreme Court aficionado, Jeffrey Toobin had a lot to say. On a general level, Mr. Toobin gave a very engaging talk. He’s clearly comfortable in front of crowds and definitely had the audience laughing throughout the talk. Many times that laughter could be attributed to how unapologetic and unrestrained he was in his opinions. (Impromptu third-party rant I’m looking at you). The actual talk served as a quick but fairly substantial history lesson on the U.S. Supreme Court. As a Government major who powered through a semester of Constitutional Law, his content wasn’t really anything new. However, those who have escaped Con Law found it to be both interesting and enlightening. The political leanings of the various justices that have served on the Supreme Court over the last 100 years, and the kinds of effects it had on American political life in general, were the focus. The “pivotal legal questions” that the title of the talk alluded to are essentially the cases that would be brought under review should any of the Chief Justices, such as Ginsburg or Kennedy, step down during the Trump presidency. Reversing Roe v Wade and lowering restrictions on campaign finance are just a couple of the laws Toobin predicts would come under review in the event that Trump appoints another conservative justice to the court. Part of the reason he focused so much on the history of the Supreme Court was to demonstrate that there are no moderate conservatives like there used to be. Adding a Trump appointed justice would create an overwhelmingly extreme conservative-leaning Supreme Court. It was kind of sobering to be reminded of the things that would change drastically should that occur, and also kind of cathartic because he’s funny. Overall, the talk didn’t offer any major revelations or change my worldview. However, it was a very entertaining talk from someone who is clearly passionate about the Supreme Court. Best Moments of the Night He most definitely launched into a hysterically passionate rant about why the third party system is essentially pointless. The words “is of no consequence in American political life” were said. It’s worth mentioning twice. His genuine consternation that Donald Trump is the president. Same Mr. Toobin, same. Saying that California is closer to Puerto Rico than to an actual state. This somehow came from a question about state vs federal power and the legalization of marijuana. Crediting Miranda v. Arizona with forever changing the landscape of police procedurals. The thought of supreme court justices arguing over the artistic merit of putting the icing on a cake is just too good. Food Review Overall, I was unimpressed by the Salmon. The French Onion soup contained an excessive amount of onion, but the Ath did serve a lovely French clafoutis for dessert, which I now know is a buttery cake with blueberries (or maybe black cherries?). Also, apparently a semester abroad means that I forgot which way to turn my cup at the Ath to get tea.