Here come those Santa Ono winds again
By 
The more I learn about the story of Ono leaving one of the best academic jobs in the country to wind up with nothing, the more amazing it is. I don’t understand how someone could have so little self-respect to want to leave a an extremely lucrative job at a world-class university to join Ron DeSantis’s atavistic war on higher ed, but hey it’s his funeral. But even on its own terms, I am genuinely baffled by the process here:
State university leaders rejected Santa Ono as the University of Florida’s prospective president Tuesday in a shocking move sparked by conservative outrage over his support of diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives while leading the University of Michigan.
The unprecedented decision by the university system Board of Governors erases a presidential pick that UF trustees expected to propel the school into greater national prominence. But Ono was met with a lukewarm response from Gov. Ron DeSantis, a powerful voice in higher education, and outright opposition from other Republicans including Sen. Rick Scott and Reps. Byron Donalds and Greg Steube.
[…]
To UF trustees, who unanimously backed him, Ono was the “visionary leader that the University of Florida needs at this moment.” They billed the immunologist who has served as Michigan’s president since October 2022 and previously led the University of Cincinnati and the University of British Columbia as a candidate who can propel the school in national rankings and research standings.
The university — and even DeSantis — had touted how Florida was able to lure a sitting president away from a top-ranked university.
And yet Republicans like Donalds, Steube and even Donald Trump Jr. urged state leaders to tank Ono’s nomination, with the president’s son labeling him a “woke psycho.”
[…]
But that wasn’t enough to quell “serious concerns” from critics like Christopher Rufo, an education adviser to DeSantis and the Trump administration, who feared UF was hiring a “DEI acolyte.” Florida’s congressional delegation also put consistent pressure on the Board of Governors to oppose Ono leading up to Tuesday’s vote, with Scott bashing his response to pro-Palestinian protests at Michigan and an encampment that he said illustrated the university president “putting Jewish students in danger and failing to uphold even the most basic standards of leadership.”
DeSantis, for his part, never publicly endorsed Ono — which would have given him support from the state leader who appoints most Board of Governors members. The GOP governor instead backed the presidential search process at UF and warned any DEI policies would be swiftly countered by the state.
“Here’s a novel idea: instead of ‘loyalty pledges’ and $15 million favors, how about UF chooses a president who represents Florida values and rejects divisive progressive ideology like DEI? Just a thought,” Steube wrote on social media ahead of the state board’s final vote.
So let me get this straight — Ono walked away from his job in the most humiliatingly spineless fashion possible, 1)without getting the endorsement of the governor who is intensely interested in (destroying) higher ed, 2)in the face of opposition from several of Florida’s most prominent legislators, and 3)apparently either without even consulting or ignoring the opposition of Chris Rufo, the de facto head of Florida’s university system?
Wild, wild stuff. Give Gordon Gee this, he’s a highly skilled grifter and profit-taker. Making yourself into a pawn for the most anti-intellectual forces in American politics and not even getting the bag is dark comedy even the late David Lodge couldn’t have conceived.