U. of Texas Board’s Pick for Chancellor: a Higher-Ed Insider, but a Lone Star Outsider

James B. Milliken has deep experience leading universities. Now the presumptive University of Texas system chancellor, announced Saturday as the board’s sole finalist, must tame a new beast: Texas politics.

In Texas, state ties matter. The chancellors of three other public systems are former state lawmakers. And prominent energy executives with deep Texas ties — including Rex Tillerson, the former U.S. secretary of state — were floated as potential picks for the position.

So to some, the regents’ choice was unexpected, even though Milliken’s CV is ample. He spent years at the helm of the City University of New York and the University of Nebraska.

Upon taking office, he would step into a complex political environment with high stakes: Texas lawmakers are considering overhauling how they finance higher education. The next state legislative session begins in January.

“He’s obviously got to make the rounds and talk to the leadership in Texas and develop relationships with them, but clearly, he’s been able to do it before,” said Raymund Paredes, the state’s higher-education commissioner, adding that recent UT chancellors came from academe despite other systems’ appointments of political insiders.

State law requires a 21-day waiting period before Milliken can be officially appointed, and a UT spokeswoman said he would be unavailable for an interview before he is selected formally.

Regents unanimously voted to name Milliken the sole finalist on Saturday after interviewing multiple candidates, the spokeswoman said.

Milliken said in a written statement Monday that the UT system’s institutions have wide reach in the state and nationally.

“The impact of the system on economic mobility and development; patients, medical research and professional health education; and the general advancement of Texas in the knowledge economy cannot be overestimated,” he said. “I welcome the opportunity to help shape the strategy that will be critical to the UT System’s success.”

‘Strong Connections’

In many respects, Milliken is a traditional pick for a university leadership role. Eighty-five percent of college presidents came from within academe in 2016, according to the American Council on Education.

Still, his lack of apparent connection to Texas politics left some insiders surprised by his appointment.

Milliken earned his bachelor’s degree from the University of Nebraska and his law degree from New York University. After working in law, he worked at Nebraska in various positions before moving to the University of North Carolina system as a senior vice president.

In 2004, he became president of the University of Nebraska, a position he held for a decade. He served as CUNY’s chancellor between 2014 and 2018.

Milliken might not have deep Texas political ties, but he does have at least some connection to Sara Martinez Tucker, the Texas system’s board chair, who led the search committee. They traveled to Chile and Brazil with several other higher-education leaders in 2007 to promote higher-education partnerships and exchanges between the U.S. and Latin America. Tucker was U.S. under secretary of education at that time.

Randa Safady, a UT spokeswoman, said in an email that Milliken’s wife’s family is from Texas, and that family members still live there today. He has a niece at the University of Texas at Austin, she added, and the family has a “deep fondness” for the state.

Milliken’s ability to win the support of elected and campus officials in his prior posts, Tucker said in a written statement, was among the qualities that made him an attractive candidate.

Former colleagues say he’s up to the task in Texas.

Molly Corbett Broad, who was president of the University of North Carolina system when Milliken started there, said he made a significant difference in the university’s effort to pass a $3.1-billion bond referendum, then the largest bond issue for a university in the nation’s history.

Milliken, who Broad said was “not at all” connected to North Carolina state officials before he started, built strong connections quickly. He worked with members of the legislature, faculty, and the governor’s office before the bond was put to a statewide vote, she said.

“He was smashingly successful in helping to increase the number of folks who were supportive of the idea,” Broad said.

One of his former colleagues at CUNY, who asked not to be named because he was not authorized to comment, called Milliken a “very deft” leader who “can navigate a room full of big shots very comfortably.” A challenge of leading CUNY, that person said, is that the university system receives funding from both the city and the state.

At CUNY, Milliken had to navigate a funding battle between Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Bill de Blasio, the city’s mayor, in addition to probes of misuse of foundation finances. Despite those issues, Milliken kept a firm focus on his “real priorities,” particularly increasing completion rates, the official said.

In late 2017, Milliken announced he would leave his role at CUNY at the end of the academic year. He described the challenges of battling throat cancer in a message to campus sharing the news. All major medical issues have been resolved and he has a clean bill of health, said Karen Adler, a UT system spokeswoman.

Following in an Admiral’s Footsteps

His predecessor, William H. McRaven, came from outside academe and Texas politics when he began as chancellor in 2015 — the retired Navy admiral was best known for overseeing the raid that led to Osama bin Laden’s death.

Under his leadership, observers noted a strained relationship between the university system and Texas politicians after the system spent big money on property in a tight state budget cycle.

Unlike Milliken, however, McRaven is an alumnus of the University of Texas at Austin, and he spoke at the university’s commencement in 2014. McRaven will remain in Austin and work at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the Austin campus.

New leadership, including Tucker, has “dissipated” some of the tensions between UT and the legislature, Paredes said.

Paredes said he was “pleased” with Milliken’s appointment and hoped he would bring heightened focus on transfers between community colleges and the universities in the Texas system.

Texas regents plan to meet later this week. Safady, the UT spokeswoman, said she was not sure if Milliken would attend.

Lindsay Ellis is a staff reporter. Follow her on Twitter @lindsayaellis, or email her at lindsay.ellis@chronicle.com.