The apparent theft of her work was troubling enough for Dr. Carol Swain, a retired professor of law and political science at Vanderbilt and an outspoken conservative African American.
On Washington Watch Friday, she recounted her experience in learning she had been a victim of plagiarism by Claudine Gay, the now former president of the prestigious Ivy League school.
"It was Dec. 10, and it was a Sunday evening after our Christmas program," Swain told show host Jody Hice. "I came home, and there were messages and a phone call from someone very prominent in the nation that told me that the president of Harvard University had plagiarized her writings … and guess who she plagiarized."
She was "cautious" upon first hearing the news; she wanted to delve deeper into the subject. So, the next day, she began reading Gay's work, starting with her articles and then her dissertation.
"When I look at her work, I feel like her whole research agenda, her whole career, was based on my work," she previously told Christopher F. Rufo, a senior fellow at The Manhattanist.
"I went from a range of emotions," Swain shared on Washington Watch. "First, it was shock. Then it was deep sadness for her and for myself – and then anger, a lot of anger. And I don't get angry easily."
She really struggled with Harvard's acceptance of Gay's actions.
The school's governing board, The Harvard Corporation, announced it was standing unanimously behind Gay, refusing to call her work plagiarism, opting instead for "duplicative language" – which seems to imply that perhaps Gay and Swain just happened to arrive at the same thoughts.
"The anger came when Harvard decided to stand behind her and redefine plagiarism to call it duplicative language," Swain said.
As the university now has 50 or more allegations against Gay to defend, Swain has become deeply involved, not just because of the instances involving her own work, but because she cares about the future of American education.
"I feel strongly that that if Harvard University is able to get away with redefining plagiarism, it will impact every institution in America, and it will be more of the downward slide of American education," the retired professor warns.
Three weeks after Swain, in a Fox News article, called for Gay to step down, Gay left her position on Jan. 2, saying the necessity of the resignation became "clear" to her after consulting with the university's board.
Swain, an outspoken opponent of affirmative action and other race-based preferences, has stated that her own academic star was rising in the early 1990s, but she began "falling out of favor in 1995," when her criticism of race-based affirmative action began.
She believes Gay is "getting a free pass" for being a "product" of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), which is being pushed into America's civil rights laws.
"Obviously, The Harvard Corporation did not have the courage to fire its first black president, someone who should never have been elevated in the first place," Swain told Fox News on Dec. 12.
"DEI Is affirmative action on steroids, and it violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment," she submits. "I believe that the courts should strike it down. They will strike it down, and many companies and organizations are backing away from it."
It is her hope in this case that Harvard University's actions will bring that about.
"They may be the Bud Light of higher education," Swain told Hice.
