Penn Carey Law professor Amy Wax spoke at a conference at Harvard.
Credit: Nathaniel SirlinUniversity of Pennsylvania Carey Law School professor Amy Wax spoke on an immigration policy panel at the Harvard Conservative and Republican Student Conference on Feb. 8.
The conference was co-hosted by various conservative and Republican student clubs at Harvard University and The Harvard Salient, a conservative campus publication. The panel also featured right-wing thinkers and legal scholars in addition to Wax including former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon and Garett Jones, an economics professor at George Mason University.
“I think our nation needs a demographically dominant group that represents its culture. That group should be numerically and otherwise dominant — not exclusive, but dominant," said at the conference according to The Harvard Crimson. She went on to attribute the European cultural origin of many Americans as “the secret sauce of our success.”
Requests for comment were left with Wax and her lawyer.
Wax’s appearance at the conference comes after she sued the University last month in challenge of Penn’s speech policies, alleging that they are racially discriminatory and violate core principles of the First Amendment.
The 53-page suit also alleges that Penn is in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act by “failing to accommodate reasonably—or even minimally” Wax’s then-ongoing cancer treatment as well as the University faculty contract that gives employees protection under the First Amendment.
“White speakers are far more likely to be disciplined for ‘harmful’ speech while minority speakers are rarely, if ever, subject to disciplinary procedures for the same," the suit reads.
Wax cited the punishments she has received for her comments, namely a one-year suspension with half pay, the removal of her named chair, and the requirement to clarify she does not speak for Penn Carey Law before speaking during public appearances. Wax's legal team claim these punishments far outweigh any disciplinary action the University has taken against other professors who made controversial and potentially harmful comments.
While Wax’s lawsuit pertains specifically to Penn, Jones reflected similar sentiments about conservative perspectives being suppressed on other campuses.
“I think that there are strong taboos within academia about talking candidly about the things that we have reported,” Jones told The Daily Pennsylvanian. “Part of the reason why I am happy to go to the Harvard conference, is because I say, here's what professors have found even if I know it might not fit your agenda or your friends' agendas.”
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