A Stanford University historian told conservative student leaders to conduct “opposition research” against a liberal student leader, according to emails from February obtained by The Stanford Daily, the campus newspaper.
In the emails, Niall Ferguson, a senior fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution, told two conservative student activists, John Rice-Cameron and Max Minshull, to investigate Michael Ocon, a progressive student leader. At the time, Ferguson held a leadership post in Cardinal Conversations, a program he had helped create in order to foster diverse perspectives on the campus.
In February, Rice-Cameron, president of Stanford’s College Republicans chapter, emailed Minshull and Ferguson after Charles Murray, a controversial social scientist best known for his book The Bell Curve, spoke on the campus. Rice-Cameron wrote that “last night’s event appears to be a clear victory,” referring to the way protesters were limited to an outdoor demonstration.
“Slowly,” Rice-Cameron wrote in emails obtained by the Daily, “we will crush the Left’s will to resist, as they will crack under pressure.”
Ferguson responded to Rice-Cameron and Minshull by encouraging the students to “turn to the more subtle game of grinding them down.” He added that “opposition research on Mr. O,” referring to Ocon, “might be worthwhile.”
After Minshull agreed to “get on the opposition research for Mr. O,” Ferguson replied with a list of members of the Cardinal Conversations student steering committee who he said would be “allies” against Ocon.
“Whatever your past differences [with the committee members], bury them,” Ferguson wrote to Minshull and Rice-Cameron. Using an abbreviation for “social-justice warrior,” he urged the two to “unite against the SJWs.”
Ferguson, who is also a senior fellow at Harvard, stirred controversy in March when he planned a history conference at Stanford featuring 30 presenters, all of whom were white men.
In a statement to the Daily, Ferguson said he regretted writing the emails.
After Persis Drell, Stanford’s provost, learned of the messages, Ferguson resigned from his leadership post in the Cardinal Conversations program, the Daily reported.
In an email to The Chronicle, Lisa Lapin, a spokeswoman for the university, confirmed that Ferguson was no longer affiliated with Cardinal Conversations, writing that his actions had contradicted the program’s purpose.
“The emails were brought to the attention of the university and are not in keeping with the spirit or intent of our Cardinal Conversations program, which seeks to encourage the respectful sharing of contrasting views on consequential topics,” Lapin wrote in the email.
Minshull declined to comment in an email to The Chronicle. Ferguson, Rice-Cameron, and Ocon did not respond to requests for comment.
