How Penn Tried To Buy Amy Wax’s Silence

The university offered to take a pay cut off the table in exchange for her silence about the proceedings

The University of Pennsylvania tried to cut a deal with Amy Wax, the tenured law professor who endured years of disciplinary proceedings over her controversial remarks. The school offered to water down the sanctions against her if she agreed to stop discussing—and criticizing—her treatment at the hands of the university. She refused.

So Penn announced Tuesday that it was suspending Wax for a year at half pay and stripping her of an endowed chair. The sanctions, which also include a permanent loss of summer pay, were immediately condemned by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), which framed them as a precedent-setting blow to academic freedom.

“After today, any university under pressure to censor a controversial faculty member need only follow Penn’s playbook,” the group wrote in a statement. “Faculty nationwide may now pay a heavy price for Penn’s willingness to undercut academic freedom for all to get at this one professor…