Major Donor Lobbied Against UNC Hiring Nikole Hannah-Jones Over ‘1619 Project’: Report
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Walter Hussman, whose $25 million donation resulted in his name on the school, said the journalist didn't meet his standards of objectivity, The Assembly...
The top donor to the University of North Carolina’s journalism school reportedly lobbied against its hiring of Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones, arguing that her prolific “1619 Project” didn’t give enough credit to white people and was not what he considered objective journalism. Walter Hussman ― an alumni whose $25 million donation to the school resulted in his name on the institution ― reached out to at least one Board of Trustees member, senior administrative officials and at least one other donor about his concerns with UNC hiring Hannah-Jones, according to obtained emails and reporting by North Carolina digital magazine The Assembly. “I worry about the controversy of tying the UNC journalism school to the 1619 project,” Hussman, who is white, allegedly wrote in a December email to the school Dean Susan King. “I find myself more in agreement with Pulitzer prize winning historians like James McPherson and Gordon Wood than I do Nikole Hannah-Jones.”More Related News