The New York Times article, “Trump Officials Blame Mistake for Setting Off Confrontation With Harvard: An official on the administration’s antisemitism task force told the university that a letter of demands had been sent without authorization,” tells a very different story than its title and subhead, one which suggests that Harvard’s arrogance might be leading it down a dark path.
The title claims “Trump Officials Blame Mistake,” yet no quoted official uses “mistake,” and the plural “officials” is deceptive—only one official, Josh Gruenbaum, hints at an issue, noting a letter was sent “without authorization.” The subhead states, “An official on the administration’s antisemitism task force told the university that a letter of demands had been sent without authorization.” But “without authorization” differs sharply from “mistake,” and the singular “official” contradicts the title’s plural “officials.”
The article’s key players are Harvard, represented by newly hired attorneys William Burck and Robert Hur, and the Trump administration, represented by Sean Keveney (Health and Human Services), Josh Gruenbaum (General Services Administration), and Thomas Wheeler (Department of Education), all signatories on the letters and members of the Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism.
To understand what is going on, we must go through the article in detail. Start with some actual news:
The letter was sent by the acting general counsel of the Department of Health and Human Services, Sean Keveney, according to three other people, who were briefed on the matter.
This is useful information for those interested in fights within the Trump Administration.
Mr. Gruenbaum called one of Harvard’s lawyers, according to two people with knowledge of the calls. At first he said he and Mr. Wheeler had not authorized the sending of the letter. Mr. Gruenbaum then slightly changed his story, saying the letter was supposed to be sent at some point, just not on Friday when the dialogue between the two sides was still constructive, one of the people said.
First, in this discussion with Burck or Hur, we have no direct quotes of Gruenbaum. We just have Burck and Hur’s characterization of that conversation, or maybe even the characterization by two Harvard officials of Burck and Hur’s characterization.
Second, does Harvard’s own attorneys’ behavior spoil their relationship with the Trump Administration? Why should anyone trust Burck or Hur to keep a private conversation private in the future? Since Burck and Hur are professionals, it was probably their client, Harvard, who, having heard about the conversation from them, authorized—or perhaps instructed—them to speak to the Times or not complain when Harvard officials did so.
Third, it follows that the “two people with knowledge of the calls” are almost certainly the Harvard people who work with Burck and Hur. But why are they leaking the contents of a private conversation to the Times?
[RELATED: ‘New York Times Is Pure Propaganda.’ Agreed.]
Fourth, this brand-new committee does not have specific procedures by which a letter is “authorized” or “unauthorized.” Gruenbaum, presumably, is not denying that the letter is accurate nor that he signed it. He just believes that it should not have been sent on the 11th. I bet Keveney feels differently, that a signed letter does not require authorization from Gruenbaum and/or Wheeler. Who gets to define what is “authorized” and what is not?
Fifth, I bet that Gruenbaum has a different recollection of this conversation, one in which he never “changed his story.” Do you think he now has warm feelings toward Harvard, after being made to look like an amateur in the Times?
[A]lmost immediately, came a frantic call from a Trump official.
So now Gruenbaum is “frantic,” as well as incompetent for allowing the letter to be sent?
A lawyer for Columbia University received a similar call from Mr. Gruenbaum around the same time, two people with knowledge of the call said. He, Mr. Wheeler and Mr. Keveney had also been engaged with Columbia about changes the task force wanted that university to adopt, and Mr. Gruenbaum wanted the Columbia lawyer to know that the letter to Harvard was ‘unauthorized,’ the two people with knowledge of the call said.
What sort of sourcing is this? This is the only time in the article that “unauthorized” appears in quotes, so presumably, someone actually claimed that Gruenbaum used that exact word. But the quote does not come from Gruenbaum. Nor does it come from the Columbia lawyer he spoke with. The Times reporters get this quote third-hand, not from the person who spoke it, nor from the person who heard it, but from “the two people with knowledge of the call.” These are, presumably, the same “two people” discussed above. Indeed, the phrase “two people” appears four times in the article.
In summary, two (senior) Harvard people wanted a story about (alleged) Trump Administration incompetence to appear in the New York Times. Mission accomplished!?
We have gone from a claim in the headline that the letter was a “mistake”—as if Keveney clicked send by dropping a coffee cup on his keyboard—to a description in the subhead of the letter as “not authorized”—as if a Trump official failed to follow a specific procedure—to a 3rd hand claim from unnamed sources that Gruenbaum used the word “unauthorized.” Those sources are almost certainly on Harvard’s side of the battle, and their claim that a Columbia lawyer claimed Gruenbaum said “unauthorized” does not provide much useful evidence as to any “mistake” claimed in the headline.
None of this media criticism is important, though, unless it gives us some insights about Harvard’s strategy. Consider:
‘It was malpractice on the side of Harvard’s lawyers not to pick up the phone and call the members of the antisemitism task force who they had been talking to for weeks,’ said May Mailman, the White House senior policy strategist. ‘Instead, Harvard went on a victimhood campaign.’
There were and are two plausible strategies for Harvard to follow in its epic confrontation with the Trump administration: conciliation or defiance. After the first letter back on April 3, conciliation was the order of the day. But that has now changed, which may help explain why Harvard is leaking stories that make the Trump administration look clueless.
Still, Ms. Mailman said, there is a potential pathway to resume discussions if the university, among other measures, follows through on what Mr. Trump wants and apologizes to its students for fostering a campus where there was antisemitism.
That was days ago. Has Harvard or Garber apologized? No. In fact, Harvard and Garber seem to be relishing their roles as leaders of the Resistance. To quote the movie Dodgeball, “It’s a bold strategy, Cotton, let’s see if it pays off for them.”
Photo by JavierDo — Wikimedia Commons
This article was originally published at www.mindingthecampus.org
