Contact list and example email / call language

We encourage every one looking to defend higher education to reach out to their representatives, senators, the governor, and other officials with authority over higher education in the United States and New York State.

We encourage you also to reach out to the leadership of Cornell University, including its president and the Board of Trustees. If you are faculty and have not yet signed the letter to the board of trustees, please do so.

For communications with university leadership and state and federal officials, here’s some potential language that might be helpful. This is only a suggestion, and it is always best when expressed in your own words with your own stories and perspectives behind it.

Dear —-:

The Trump administration is following the example of authoritarian regimes such as Russia, Hungary, and Turkey in attacking higher education. The goal is to suppress universities and colleges as sites of free expression and open inquiry, as part of a broader assault on civil society.

I am asking you to do everything in your power to resist this.

For University leadership [THIS LANGUAGE IS FROM HERE; see below for STATE OFFICIALS AND MEMBERS OF CONGRESS]:

Refuse to comply with illegal governmental overreach that undermines a university’s academic decision-making and self-governance
Defend freedom of inquiry by faculty and researchers from government censorship.
Provide full legal representation for all illegally detained or targeted international students.
Refuse to share student records or immigration information—to the extent that is legally permissible—with federal authorities seeking to suppress legal dissent.
Engage local, regional, national and international media to expose these abuses of power.
Lobby state legislators to enact protective laws safeguarding university autonomy and international members of our communities.
Lobby our federal representatives to assert their constitutional powers to check transgressions by the executive branch.
Engage alumni of the university to defend the institution that supported their life opportunities.
Build alliances across red, blue, and purple states, across local and national unions, employers and other institutions that benefit from what universities contribute to society.
Publicly affirm that universities will not tolerate intimidation of students—domestic or international, Jewish, Palestinian or otherwise—exercising their free speech rights.
Begin a campaign of joint op-eds signed by college presidents and chancellors to reaffirm our institutional commitments and defend our peers when they come under attack.

For STATE OFFICIALS

In many areas, such as the lawless orders on diversity, equity, and inclusion, this is a direct assault on State authority, a demand that universities and colleges comply with illegal federal orders rather than with its own laws and policy. The example from Columbia University and others suggests that the Trump Administration is going to try to force changes to educational policy on these schools, which by New York State law is set by the University Faculty, the New York State Department of Education, and the New York State Board of Regents.

Join existing lawsuits, by the AAUP and others, against attacks on higher education. The State is directly impacted by the loss of revenue and by the undermining of State educational institutions
Examine any federally mandated changes to education policy for constitutionality and legality, and contest these through litigation
Remind educational institutions within the State of their legal obligations under State law, and inform them that if they were comply to federal demands in violation of State law or policy that State investigations would be opened. Our institutions will be less likely to comply if they recognize there are costs to doing so.
Help organized and join the proposed Mutual Academic Defense Compacts for public (land grant) universities and for private universities and colleges called on by UMass Amherst, Rutgers University, and others.
Explicitly denounce the Trump administration’s assault on higher education, and use whatever agenda setting, investigatory, lawmaking, or media platform influence you have to raise public awareness and opposition.

For MEMBERS OF CONGRESS

Federal assaults on universities and colleges are in clear violation of statutes, and are thus not only illegal or lawless but an attack on Congress’s legislative power and its role as the Article 1 branch established by the Constitution. Whether Republican or Democrat, all members of Congress have an interest in defending the law and Congress’s institutional status. The assaults on universities and colleges are thus not only an attack on a free society, but an unconstitutional disregard for the separation of powers.

I am asking you to do everything in your power to resist this:

Explicitly denounce the Trump administration’s assault on higher education, and use whatever agenda setting, investigatory, lawmaking, or media platform influence you have to raise public awareness and opposition.
Advance legislation – including by insertion into appropriations bills – prohibiting the Trump administration from canceling funding without following, to the letter, established statutory processes for doing so.
Vote against – and for Senators refuse to vote for cloture – any appropriations bill or increase to the debt ceiling that does not include a prohibition on the Trump administration’s lawless assault on higher education.

Opposing the authoritarian suppression of higher education will require all of our elected officials as well as our organizational leadership to draw the line and resist.

Contact List

Cornell President: (607) 255-5201 president@cornell.edu

Board of Trustees: (607) 255-5127 trustees@cornell.edu

Donica T. Varner – VP and General Counsel: (607) 255-5124 dtv26@cornell.edu

Governor Hochul: 518-474-8390 https://www.governor.ny.gov/content/governor-contact-form

Betty A. Rosa, Commissioner of Education commissioner@nysed.gov

Board of Regents: Chancellor L.W. Young Regent.Young@nysed.gov,

Vice Chancellor J. Finn Regent.Finn@nysed.gov

Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie: 518-455-3791 speaker@assembly.state.ny.us

Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins: 518-455-2585 MajorityLeaderCommunications@nysenate.gov

Assembly Standing Committee on Education Chair, Michael Benedetto 518-455-5296 benedettom@nyassembly.gov

Senate Committee on Education, Shelley B. Mayer 518-455-2031 smayer@nysenate.gov