Candidate for University of Florida president is rejected over his diversity stance

Boston Globe

2 days ago

At Michigan, Ono had presided over a campus that was rife with acrimonious debates over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the role of diversity in higher education. Those issues have been hotly debated in Florida, where Republican leaders have successfully enacted conservative priorities across K-12 schools and in college.
Ono had tried to distance himself from the politics of Michigan as he sought to transition to the Sunshine State. Last month, he wrote an opinion essay disavowing diversity programs, for instance.
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Paul Renner, a member of the Board of Governors who voted against Ono's confirmation, said in an interview Tuesday that Ono had led a university that embraced diversity, equity and inclusion programming. Renner said he did not find Ono's attempt to distance himself from those efforts sincere.
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'The public record completely contradicted what the nominee was telling us,' said Renner, a former speaker of the Florida House.
Republicans celebrated the unexpected move. Ono had already given notice that he would be leaving his job in Michigan.
A Michigan spokesperson did not immediately return a message. But a member of the school's Board of Regents, Jordan Acker, suggested that Ono could not get his old job back. 'Santa Ono tendered his resignation and we accepted it,' Acker said in a brief interview.
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Rebekah Modrak, a recent chair of Michigan's Faculty Senate, called the assertion that Ono was soft on pro-Palestinian activism 'absolutely untrue.' She criticized his decision to close the university's DEI office, which had been known as a national leader in such programming.
'He's a man who witnessed racial bias but closed the office of diversity, equity and inclusion,' Modrak said in an email, adding, 'There's a strong sense of justice in the fact that Santa Ono is now out of a job.'
In Florida, the opposition to Ono was flipped. In recent weeks he had been criticized by some conservatives in the state over his past stances on diversity programming.
'There's too much smoke with Santa Ono,' Rep. Jimmy Patronis, R-Fla., wrote on social media Monday. 'We need a leader, not a DEI acolyte. Leave the Ann Arbor thinking in Ann Arbor.'
Ono had supporters in Florida. The chair of the university's board of trustees, Mori Hosseini, who has aimed to move the university in Gainesville, Florida, up in rankings, had supported Ono.
'He is the right person to accelerate UF's upward trajectory,' Hosseini said in a message to the Florida community last week. He could not be immediately reached for comment.
Ono would have replaced Ben Sasse, a former Nebraska senator who abruptly resigned last summer.
Ono was born to Japanese immigrant parents in Vancouver, British Columbia, and grew up in Pennsylvania and Maryland. Before leading the University of Michigan, he served as president of the University of British Columbia and the University of Cincinnati.
Ono could not be immediately reached for comment. The University of Florida declined to comment.
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