Billionaire investor Bill Ackman has been leading the charge in calling for Harvard president Claudine Gay to resign, after a widely panned congressional hearing about antisemitism on university campuses.
According to a New York Times article published on Tuesday, Ackman has had “years of resentment” against Harvard. The article detailed a previously unreported incident in which Ackman disagreed with the school over how it handled a donation he made, citing two people with knowledge of the exchange.
In response to the Times article, Ackman penned a 1,600-word post on X, formerly known as Twitter, outlining his years of grievances with the university as a donor, while stating that he has “held no resentment toward Harvard ever.”
The @nytimes published a story today with the headline: “Bill Ackman’s Campaign Against Harvard Followed Years of Resentment.”
The premise of the story is false. I have held no resentment toward Harvard ever. And I have none now.
The story gives the impression that my…
— Bill Ackman (@BillAckman) December 12, 2023
In 2017, Ackman donated $10 million in Coupang stock to Harvard to support the university’s hiring of economist Raj Chetty, Ackman wrote on X. His agreement with the university was that if the stock exceeded $15 million in value, he’d direct the surplus to a Harvard project of his choice. If the value was under $10 million, he would make up the difference.
In 2021, after Coupang went public, Ackman learned that Harvard had sold the stock back to Coupang for $10 million in 2020, losing out on a potential $75 million in value, he wrote on X.
“It made no economic sense whatsoever for Harvard to have sold,” wrote Ackman.
At the time, Coupang was the biggest foreign IPO since Alibaba, raising $4.6 billion at a market cap of over $80 billion. Coupang’s value has plunged over 60% since.
“All Harvard has to do is honor the agreement it had made with me,” wrote Ackman. “That is, to grant me the right I bargained for: The right to allocate the $70m of excess proceeds to the Harvard-related initiative of my choice.”
Ackman added that his recent actions are unrelated to his experience as a donor.
“To be extremely clear, my advocacy on behalf of antisemitism, free speech on campus, and my concerns with DEI at Harvard have absolutely nothing to do with my unfortunate experience as a donor to the University,” wrote Ackman.
Ackman, a former Harvard graduate, has separately accused Gay of plagiarizing research and claimed she was a diversity hire.
Harvard, however, is standing behind its president.
On Tuesday, the university cleared Gay of plagiarism charges; a day earlier, Harvard announced that she would stay in her post as president. The announcement came after over 500 faculty members signed a letter to the school’s governing body defending Gay.
Gay apologized for her remarks during the congressional hearing in an interview with the Harvard Crimson on Thursday.
Harvard did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider, sent outside regular business hours.
