George Mason president resists federal pressure

After federal pressure from the Trump administration led to the stunning resignation of University of Virginia President Jim Ryan, political watchers wondered which college leader would be next in the hot seat.

They merely had to look a couple hours north to George Mason University and its president, Gregory Washington.

As of early September, the state’s largest and most diverse public university is in negotiations with the U.S. Department of Education, which announced in August that George Mason was in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by “illegally using race and other immutable characteristics in university practices and policies, including hiring and promotion.”

In essence, the federal government has concluded that George Mason committed acts of “reverse racism” by showing preference for people of color in hiring and promotions.

That was the finding in just one of four federal investigations into Mason launched in July by the DOE’s Office for Civil Rights and the Department of Justice’s civil rights division. Three of the investigations are related to hiring and promotions practices that the federal government alleges are discriminatory against white and male employment candidates and employees, and the DOE is also examining allegations of antisemitism on campus.

So far, Washington has kept his job, despite a conservative-leaning board of visitors appointed by Gov. Glenn Youngkin and the added pressure of the investigations.

Through his lawyer, Washington has said he will not publicly apologize to the university as demanded by the Department of Education. An apology, Washington’s attorney has counseled, would place George Mason in future legal jeopardy.

Ryan, by contrast, resigned in June weeks after the DOJ opened an investigation into U.Va.’s diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. In his farewell letter, Ryan said he was resigning to try to preserve research jobs and student financial aid, which he said would be removed if he stayed.

So far, though, George Mason’s Washington is fighting the coordinated efforts to oust him, which critics of President Donald Trump say is part of a larger politically motivated initiative to gain conservative influence over universities and eliminate what the administration decries as an epidemic of “wokeism” on college campuses.

Discrimination and antisemitism charges brought by the DOE and DOJ, they say, are part of a playbook to remove university presidents that the administration disagrees with, along with threatening federal funding at universities. For example, Northwestern University President Michael Schill resigned in August amid a federal freeze on Northwestern’s research funding. The Jewish descendant of Holocaust survivors, Schill had been the target of heavy criticism by Republicans for not taking strong enough action against alleged antisemitism by student protesters of the war in Gaza.

Strong conservative ties

Some observers are asking why George Mason University, which is not as famous or as well-resourced as Harvard and Columbia universities, or even U.Va. or Northwestern, is now a federal target.

The answer may lie in its proximity to D.C. and the university’s long conservative ties.

For instance, several of Mason’s past and present board members are connected to the Heritage Foundation, the organization that created Project 2025. The university’s rector, Charles “Cully” Stimson, is deputy director of the Heritage Foundation’s Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies, and the Charles Koch Foundation has been a notable backer of the university. Additionally, the university’s law school was renamed for the late conservative Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia in 2016 in response to a $20 million gift from an anonymous donor, and in September, former Vice President Mike Pence was named a distinguished professor at GMU’s Schar School of Policy and Government.

Ironically, George Mason was a staging ground for dismantling diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives long before Trump took office in January. Mason’s board and Washington began taking actions to end George Mason’s DEI programs a year-and-a-half ago.

Still, the federal government has found significant fault with Washington’s leadership.

According to Craig Trainor, the DOE’s acting assistant secretary for civil rights, “Washington [in 2020] called for expunging the so-called ‘racist vestiges’ from GMU’s campus. Without a hint of self-awareness, President Washington then waged a universitywide campaign to implement unlawful DEI policies that intentionally discriminate on the basis of race. You can’t make this up.”

The university’s first Black president, Washington arrived at George Mason in July 2020, a time when racial justice protests were taking place nationwide, sparking conversations in board rooms and public agencies over how to respond. One of Washington’s first official actions was to host a video town hall to discuss how the university would address racial inequities through DEI initiatives. He also announced a series of actions “to advance systemic and cultural anti-racism at George Mason University,” ranging from oversight of university police to examining faculty pay equity and the naming of buildings.
“As part of addressing this national reckoning, we were examining ourselves, looking for ways to become better,” he wrote this summer, addressing the federal investigations.

As a state institution, the university was directed by then-Gov. Ralph Northam to expand access to diverse job candidates and vendors. And in 2021, the state legislature enacted amendments to the state code that required public institutions to integrate DEI goals into their missions and operations — which continues to be state law, Washington has noted.

Starting in late 2023, after the election of Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, Washington complied with direction from the university’s more conservative board of visitors to “review and scale back DEI efforts,” he wrote. “By 2025, after a year of study from two university committees whose membership included board members and staff, … the board instructed us to dismantle programs and reassign or eliminate staff, which we have done.”

The first federal investigation into George Mason, opened July 1 by the DOE, is examining allegations that the university didn’t do enough to protect Jewish students and staff from antisemitism associated with pro-Palestine protests over the past two years.

Washington has denied the allegations, and some of his faculty champions have criticized how he and his administration handled protests at GMU, deeming the approach overly harsh toward student protesters. Late last year, the university suspended the Students for Justice in Palestine group for several months, barred three students from campus for their activities during protests and expelled a fourth. Campus police also searched the home of two SJP leaders in November 2024.

And in September, the university issued a statement about an Instagram video posted by SJP that “raised safety fears and alarm among members of the university community,” noting that SJP removed the video “at the university’s insistence, citing its nondiscrimination policy.”

Despite differing opinions over his administration’s response to student protesters, Washington has many defenders, particularly among faculty and Virginia Democratic lawmakers. A group of Northern Virginia business leaders and chambers also issued a public letter of support for him.

U.S. Sens. Tim Kaine and Mark Warner wrote in a July op-ed published in the Richmond Times-Dispatch that they viewed Washington as the Trump White House’s next academic target after Ryan’s resignation.

In a letter this summer, the university’s faculty senate urged the board of visitors to protect academic freedom and oppose overreaches by the White House. And George Mason’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors went further, passing a vote of “no confidence” in the board, which is now entirely composed of Youngkin appointees.

“Against this politicized backdrop, Washington and his administration have walked a tightrope, responding to claims of antisemitism and to conservative anti-wokeness pearl-clutching with a combination of rational arguments and capitulation to the board’s political and partisan interference in George Mason’s curriculum and day-to-day operations,” wrote the president and vice president of Mason’s AAUP chapter and a retired public policy professor in an op-ed published in The Chronicle of Higher Education.

‘Departure from the norm’

On July 8, state Attorney General Jason Miyares’ office sent a letter to Torridon Law partner Michael Fragoso to appoint the Republican-affiliated law firm to advise the GMU board on compliance with federal executive orders and antidiscrimination law.

In early July emails, board members discussed the optics of hiring Torridon Law, founded by former Trump administration Attorney General Bill Barr, rather than relying on the university’s general counsel. Virginia Business received these emails via a Freedom of Information Act query, although Stimson’s writings were redacted.

Vice Rector Michael Meese, in a July 11 email responding to Stimson, wrote, “As we discussed and you wrote, this action is taken ‘in the best interest of the university for the board, through the rector, to direct and manage the interaction with the Department of Education.’ As you explained to me, this is intended to put GMU and our actions in the best possible light and minimize legal jeopardy (given the truth/facts) and will be a good thing for the university.”

Meese noted, however, that “it would be very easy for someone to think that the board and Torridon Law [PLLC] (and by implication you, me and others on the executive committee) are trying to throw the school and Greg under the bus as the DOE is driving the bus. I know that is not our intent, but I suspect that is how some people may interpret what you wrote. When you talk with Greg to explain this, I just wanted you to understand that alternative interpretation and be sensitive to it.”

Paul G. Allvin, George Mason’s vice president and chief brand officer, wrote to Meese on July 12 that hiring outside counsel “does represent a significant departure from the norm, in fact an action without precedent at this university. I think this is why it is being greeted with such surprise and concern. The board should be ready for the public to react very skeptically to this, as news coverage is already focused more on questions about the process than the accusations. You don’t want to be blindsided by that.”

The Mason AAUP chapter’s no-confidence resolution against the board labels the hiring of Torridon Law to speak for the university “like hiring a wolf to protect the sheep.”

In September, both the AAUP chapter and state Senate Democratic leaders called for Stimson to either resign as rector or recuse himself from discussions and votes regarding Washington’s job performance and any university responses to federal DEI investigations or compliance matters. The senators also noted that the six-member board does not currently have a quorum required by state law, after a Senate committee voted not to confirm 22 Youngkin university board appointees this summer.

Stimson and Fragoso have not responded to messages from Virginia Business seeking comment, and the university’s communications department has responded to requests for interviews with Mason officials by referring to public statements made by Washington and the board.

Meanwhile, Washington has hired former Maryland Attorney General Douglas Gansler with Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft’s law office in Washington, D.C., as his legal counsel. Gansler and Fragoso are both involved in negotiations with the DOE, according to the board.

In a letter to the board, Gansler called the DOE’s findings “incomplete” and containing “gross mischaracterizations” of Washington’s statements, as well as “outright omissions” regarding the university’s nearly two-year DEI review process. He added that if Washington apologized, as the DOE has called for, the university would be legally vulnerable.

In the bigger picture, Gansler’s letter indicates Washington’s different tack from other university presidents, including U.Va.’s Ryan and Northwestern’s Schill, in dealing with pressure from the Trump administration.

On Aug. 1, as the GMU board met privately with Washington to discuss his job performance, the president’s supporters steeled themselves for his possible firing, showing up with protest signs on campus. In the end, Washington received a state-approved 1.5% raise and a reprieve, at least for now.

But the question of Washington’s future could come down to money, as the Trump administration has control of the federal research purse strings, which Washington acknowledged in his letter to the campus.

“Being under such federal investigations is not familiar territory to George Mason, and I understand how this can be upsetting and distractive to so many who work or study here,” Washington wrote. “As we work through this, it is my hope that we will be granted due process.”

George Mason University at a glance

Founded
Originally formed in 1949 as an extension of the University of Virginia, George Mason University became an independent institution in 1972.

Campuses
George Mason’s footprint covers 848 acres in Northern Virginia. In addition to its Fairfax campus, this includes the Mason Square campus in Arlington, the Science and Technology campus in Manassas, and the Smithsonian-Mason School of Conservation in Front Royal.

The Fairfax campus, with a residential student population of about 6,000, is home to seven colleges, including the state’s first College of Public Health, as well as the university’s 22 men’s and women’s Division I athletics teams.

Located in the Rosslyn-Ballston corridor, Mason Square is home to the Antonin Scalia Law School; the Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution; the Schar School of Policy and Government; and classes for the College of Engineering and Computing, the Donald G. Costello College of Business, and the College of Visual and Performing Arts. In 2024, the new Fuse at Mason Square building, a collaborative hub uniting scholars, students, researchers, policymakers and business developers, opened in Arlington.

George Mason’s SciTech Campus serves more than 4,000 students in five innovative facilities specially designed for classrooms, laboratories, libraries, recreation, the arts and other uses. And the Mason Korea campus in Songdo, South Korea, celebrated its 10th anniversary in 2024.

Enrollment*
40,449

Student profile**
Female: 51%
Male: 49%
In-state: 78%
Minority: 51%

Academic programs
George Mason offers more than 200 degree programs, including 78 undergraduate degree programs, 94 master’s degree programs, 38 doctoral degree programs and a juris doctorate.

Faculty
1,705 full-time

Tuition, fees, housing and dining
In-state tuition and fees: $14,220
Out-of-state tuition and fees: $38,688
Room and board: $14,090

*Including Mason Korea campus, fall 2024
**U.S. campuses only, fall 2024