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Fox News
2 days ago
- Politics
- Fox News
House committee demands Brown University hand over memos on student behind DOGE-style email
EXCLUSIVE - The House Judiciary Committee is asking the president of Brown University to hand over all internal memos related to a student who sent a DOGE-style email who subsequently faced disciplinary hearings and had his private information leaked. "We are concerned that Brown's decision to file disciplinary charges against Mr. Shieh and hold a misconduct hearing may serve to suppress free speech and discourage others from coming forward and asking questions related to Brown's rising costs," the Thursday letter from the House Judiciary Committee to Brown University President Christina Paxson said. Alex Shieh, a rising junior who was cleared of wrongdoing by the university on May 14, had previously angered school officials by sending a DOGE-like email to non-faculty employees identifying himself as a journalist for The Brown Spectator and asking them what they do all day to try to determine why the school's tuition has gotten so expensive. The letter, signed by House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, Rep. Scott Fitzgerald, R-Wisc., chairman of the Subcommittee on the Administrative State, Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust and Rep. Troy Nehls, R-Texas, seeks to understand Brown's "rationale for attempting to silence a student raising questions about how student and taxpayer dollars are being used." The Brown Spectator, which has a board of three people, including Shieh, was revived this year after it ceased publication in 2014. The board members faced a disciplinary hearing on May 7 over allegations that they violated Brown University's name, licensing and trademark policies. Shieh previously told Fox News Digital that other campus publications also use the school's name, including "The Brown Daily Herald," another student-run nonprofit newspaper. Shieh and the Spectator faced scrutiny from the university after Shieh, during free weekends in March, began investigating positions he deemed redundant after reviewing 3,805 non-faculty employees who worked at Brown and emailing them to ask, "What do you do all day?" Shieh used AI to try to determine what Brown employees did and why the school, which costs nearly $96,000 a year, was so expensive. When creating his database, he formatted it to identify three particular jobs: "DEI jobs, redundant jobs, and bulls--t jobs." He said that he wanted to investigate DEI because of President Donald Trump's executive orders addressing DEI policies, and his administration threatening to withhold federal funds to universities who employ them. The goal was to get as much data as possible to improve his research. Only 20 of the 3,805 people emailed responded, with many of the responses being profane and hostile, and Shieh's Social Security number was subsequently leaked. On June 4, Shieh testified before the House Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on the Administrative State, Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust for a hearing entitled, "The Elite Universities Cartel: A History of Anticompetitive Collusion Inflating the Cost of Higher Education." The House Judiciary Committee is asking that Paxson, Brown's president, provide all documents and communications between Brown's employees pertaining to Shieh's "investigative inquiry, Brown University's subsequent investigation of Mr. Shieh, Brown University's decision to file disciplinary charges against Mr. Shieh, or Brown University's adjudication of Mr. Shieh's charges." The committee is also asking for all information related to what they call the "unauthorized disclosure of Mr. Shieh's personally identifiable information." "Brown University's decision to file disciplinary charges against students like Alex Shieh, simply for looking into the school's bloated bureaucracy and rising tuition costs, is a clear act of retaliation," Fitzgerald, who signed the letter, told Fox News Digital in a statement. "The Committee shares serious concerns about this troubling response and remains committed to conducting rigorous oversight into whether Brown University and other Ivy League institutions are engaging in anticompetitive pricing practices." In a statement, Brian Clark, vice president for News and Strategic Campus Communications told Fox News Digital that the university "has been cooperating with extensive requests for information from the U.S. House and Senate Committees on the Judiciary since the initial inquiry arrived in April, demonstrating that we have and continue to make decisions on tuition and financial aid independently as part of our commitment to making sure that no student's family socioeconomic circumstances prevent them from accessing the benefits of a Brown education." Clark added, "We'll continue to provide any responses to follow-up requests directly to the committees."
USA Today
04-06-2025
- Business
- USA Today
A student sent DOGE-style emails to Brown administrators. Congress gave him a spotlight.
A student sent DOGE-style emails to Brown administrators. Congress gave him a spotlight. 'Instead of answering, Brown's response was retaliation,' rising junior Alex Shieh told lawmakers during a congressional hearing. Show Caption Hide Caption Is Alex Shieh Brown University's version of Elon Musk? What he has to say Shieh is facing potential discipline after asking Brown staffers about their jobs. WASHINGTON – Congressional Republicans on June 4 rallied to the defense of a Brown University student who was investigated by the Ivy League school after he sent administrators DOGE-style emails asking them to justify their jobs. During a congressional hearing, GOP lawmakers lauded the rising junior, Alex Shieh, for shedding light on what they viewed as administrative bloat at prestigious colleges. Democrats, meanwhile, criticized their counterparts for complaining about college costs while voicing support for President Donald Trump's major domestic policy bill, which would make federal financial aid less available for many students across higher education. Though Shieh was ultimately cleared of student conduct violation charges, his story grabbed national attention. It also underscored widespread debates about free speech on campuses beyond Brown and the high sticker prices of degrees at some universities. The primary focus of the congressional hearing was to discuss whether some of the country's most selective colleges have violated antitrust laws in their financial aid policies. Accusations of malfeasance by financial aid offices have prompted major litigation in recent years, including a 2022 price-fixing lawsuit against more than a dozen prominent schools, including Brown. After a protracted court fight, the Rhode Island university settled with a group of students for nearly $20 million in July 2024. (The school continues to deny any wrongdoing.) Read more: 'Please Admit': Rampant donor preferences alleged in college financial aid lawsuit In February, after Trump regained the White House, he brought in tech billionaire Elon Musk to helm the Department of Government Efficiency. Shock spread through the federal workforce when DOGE abruptly asked nearly every agency employee to provide a list of five things they'd accomplished over the prior week. At the time, Musk warned that those who didn't respond would be "furthering their career elsewhere." In March, Shieh took a page out of Musk's book. As part of an investigation for the Brown Spectator, a conservative and libertarian school publication, he sent similar questions to nearly 4,000 Brown administrators. According to Shieh's website, he asked them to explain their roles, what tasks they had performed over the prior week and how Brown students would be impacted if their positions were eliminated. "Some of them answered, and the ones who answered seemed to have pretty useful jobs," Shieh told lawmakers on June 4. "I guess we can infer that the ones who didn't have jobs that are not so important." In early April, the university launched a preliminary student conduct review of Shieh for improperly using data accessed through a school platform. He was cleared a month later of facing any disciplinary action. In the months since, Shieh's case became a rallying cry for Republicans, who have doubled down on their criticism of Ivy League universities in recent months, as Trump slashed billions in federal funding for schools like Brown, Harvard and Columbia. "Mr. Shieh, thank you for stepping forward and letting the country know what's going on at these elite universities," Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, said at the hearing on Capitol Hill. Brian Clark, a Brown spokesperson, said in a statement that the university has grown its workforce responsibly over time. Its staff members are vital to the school's work, including medical care and scientific research, he said. "While the national conversation about higher education finances and costs is important, it's regrettable that a witness in today's hearing offered so many misrepresentations about Brown's students, employees and efforts to provide an exceptional educational experience and conduct high-impact research," he said. Democrats, including Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, echoed that criticism during the hearing. "This is much ado about nothing," he said. Zachary Schermele is an education reporter for USA TODAY. You can reach him by email at zschermele@ Follow him on X at @ZachSchermele and Bluesky at @
Yahoo
04-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Brown student exposing Ivy League bloat gives House testimony, urges Congress to ‘mandate transparency'
EXCLUSIVE - Brown University student Alex Shieh, who was recently cleared of wrongdoing after he sent campus employees a DOGE-like email, is testifying Wednesday before the House Judiciary Committee on rising costs at elite universities. "Brown University, like many of its Ivy League peers, presents itself as a selective meritocratic institution," reads Shieh's testimony, obtained exclusively by Fox News Digital. "But according to data from The New York Times, the median family income of Brown students is over $200,000 — the highest among Ivy League universities," his prepared statement continues. "Forty-seven percent of the student body comes from the top 5% of earners in the U.S. A study by Brown University economist John Friedman confirms that low and middle-income students remain significantly underrepresented at selective colleges including Brown, even after controlling for academic qualifications." Brown University In Gop Crosshairs After Student's Doge-like Email Kicks Off Frenzy Shieh, a rising junior who was cleared of wrongdoing by the university on May 14, had previously angered school officials by sending a DOGE-like email to non-faculty employees identifying himself as a journalist for The Brown Spectator and asking them what they do all day to try to determine why the school's tuition has gotten so expensive. The Brown Spectator, a right-leaning publication which has a board of three people, including Shieh, was revived this year after it ceased publication in 2014. Read On The Fox News App The board members faced a disciplinary hearing on May 7 over allegations that they violated Brown University's name, licensing and trademark policies. Shieh and the Spectator faced scrutiny from the university after Shieh began investigating positions he deemed redundant after reviewing 3,805 non-faculty employees who worked at Brown and emailing them to ask, "What do you do all day?" "As an investigative reporter for The Brown Spectator, I launched Bloat@Brown, a website that used AI to analyze administrative staff roles and necessity, and a website that performed similar analysis on Columbia University, Cornell University, and the University of Pennsylvania," Shieh said in his prepared remarks. "I emailed each administrator at Brown with a request for comment," Shieh added. "Only 20 responded. One… replied with 'F--k off.' Soon after, the university instructed employees not to respond, and the site was hacked. My social security number was leaked. Associate Dean Kirsten Wolfe initiated a disciplinary process against me, first under charges of 'emotional/psychological harm,' 'misrepresentation,' 'invasion of privacy,' and later for alleged technology policy and alleged trademark policy violations." Shieh sent a follow-up email to Brown administrators on May 27, which Shieh previously told Fox News Digital was "one last opportunity to justify their roles." Ivy League Student Accused Of Causing 'Emotional Harm' To Non-faculty Staff For Sending Doge-like Email In his prepared remarks, Shieh said that tuition and fees at the Ivy League have exceeded $90,000 per year, and that the school is "projected to run a $46 million deficit for the current fiscal year." "According to Brown's own disclosures, the university employs 3,805 full-time non-instructional staff," Shieh will say in his testimony. "With 7,229 undergraduate students, this translates to one non-teaching staff member for every 1.9 undergraduates. These staff do not include faculty members, but rather administrators, consultants, and support staff, many in roles of unclear necessity." Shieh is urging the House Judiciary Committee to look into why his school has become so expensive. His recommendations include subpoenaing Brown University President Christina Paxson "for testimony and documents related to administrative growth, financial aid coordination, and retaliation." He also calls for student journalists and whistleblowers to be protected from "institutional retaliation," a review of financial aid methodology used by Ivy League schools, transparency in "administrative-to-student staffing ratios and compensation for nonprofit universities receiving federal funds," and for higher learning institutions that have large tuition and spending increases to be audited. Click Here For More Coverage Of Media And Culture "Thank you for your attention to these matters," Shieh will say in his prepared remarks. "I respectfully urge this Subcommittee to act in defense of students, families, and the American Dream." A Browkn spokesperson defended university practices in a statement to Fox News Digital. "As Brown has grown over recent decades in both the number of students we teach and the volume and impact of its research, our staff has expanded to support these important goals. In the last 15 years, we have worked responsibly to build a staff infrastructure that enables us to generate medical treatments and scientific breakthroughs that lead to real solutions for real patients and real people. We also added staffing to prepare students for successful lives and careers, which is important to students and families. Brown's staff members are vital — behind every research breakthrough and student success story, non-faculty staff are a quiet force making those accomplishments possible," the spokesperson said. "We continue to see a false 'one administrator for every two students at Brown' claim that misrepresents the university, its mission and its student body. A total of 11,232 students were enrolled at Brown in the academic year that just ended — 7,226 of those students were undergraduates. We take no issue with the 3,800 staff number. However, the false "one administrator for every two students" claim ignores the presence of our approximately 4,000 graduate and medical students. These students make up more than one third of our student body, and the staffing to support their advanced education and research is significant. Our staffing numbers should be understood in the context of the fact that Brown is a major research university that supports both undergraduate and graduate education and research. We're not an undergraduate college." They added that Brown has one of the most robust financial aid programs in the nation, and that "claims that administrative staff growth has not supported the academic experience for students" were article source: Brown student exposing Ivy League bloat gives House testimony, urges Congress to 'mandate transparency'
Fox News
04-06-2025
- Business
- Fox News
Brown student exposing Ivy League bloat gives House testimony, urges Congress to ‘mandate transparency'
EXCLUSIVE - Brown University student Alex Shieh, who was recently cleared of wrongdoing after he sent campus employees a DOGE-like email, is testifying Wednesday before the House Judiciary Committee on rising costs at elite universities. "Brown University, like many of its Ivy League peers, presents itself as a selective meritocratic institution," reads Shieh's testimony, obtained exclusively by Fox News Digital. "But according to data from The New York Times, the median family income of Brown students is over $200,000 — the highest among Ivy League universities," his prepared statement continues. "Forty-seven percent of the student body comes from the top 5% of earners in the U.S. A study by Brown University economist John Friedman confirms that low and middle-income students remain significantly underrepresented at selective colleges including Brown, even after controlling for academic qualifications." Shieh, a rising junior who was cleared of wrongdoing by the university on May 14, had previously angered school officials by sending a DOGE-like email to non-faculty employees identifying himself as a journalist for The Brown Spectator and asking them what they do all day to try to determine why the school's tuition has gotten so expensive. The Brown Spectator, a right-leaning publication which has a board of three people, including Shieh, was revived this year after it ceased publication in 2014. The board members faced a disciplinary hearing on May 7 over allegations that they violated Brown University's name, licensing and trademark policies. Shieh and the Spectator faced scrutiny from the university after Shieh began investigating positions he deemed redundant after reviewing 3,805 non-faculty employees who worked at Brown and emailing them to ask, "What do you do all day?" "As an investigative reporter for The Brown Spectator, I launched Bloat@Brown, a website that used AI to analyze administrative staff roles and necessity, and a website that performed similar analysis on Columbia University, Cornell University, and the University of Pennsylvania," Shieh said in his prepared remarks. "I emailed each administrator at Brown with a request for comment," Shieh added. "Only 20 responded. One… replied with 'F--k off.' Soon after, the university instructed employees not to respond, and the site was hacked. My social security number was leaked. Associate Dean Kirsten Wolfe initiated a disciplinary process against me, first under charges of 'emotional/psychological harm,' 'misrepresentation,' 'invasion of privacy,' and later for alleged technology policy and alleged trademark policy violations." Shieh sent a follow-up email to Brown administrators on May 27, which Shieh previously told Fox News Digital was "one last opportunity to justify their roles." In his prepared remarks, Shieh said that tuition and fees at the Ivy League have exceeded $90,000 per year, and that the school is "projected to run a $46 million deficit for the current fiscal year." "According to Brown's own disclosures, the university employs 3,805 full-time non-instructional staff," Shieh will say in his testimony. "With 7,229 undergraduate students, this translates to one non-teaching staff member for every 1.9 undergraduates. These staff do not include faculty members, but rather administrators, consultants, and support staff, many in roles of unclear necessity." Shieh is urging the House Judiciary Committee to look into why his school has become so expensive. His recommendations include subpoenaing Brown University President Christina Paxson "for testimony and documents related to administrative growth, financial aid coordination, and retaliation." He also calls for student journalists and whistleblowers to be protected from "institutional retaliation," a review of financial aid methodology used by Ivy League schools, transparency in "administrative-to-student staffing ratios and compensation for nonprofit universities receiving federal funds," and for higher learning institutions that have large tuition and spending increases to be audited. "Thank you for your attention to these matters," Shieh will say in his prepared remarks. "I respectfully urge this Subcommittee to act in defense of students, families, and the American Dream." A Browkn spokesperson defended university practices in a statement to Fox News Digital. "As Brown has grown over recent decades in both the number of students we teach and the volume and impact of its research, our staff has expanded to support these important goals. In the last 15 years, we have worked responsibly to build a staff infrastructure that enables us to generate medical treatments and scientific breakthroughs that lead to real solutions for real patients and real people. We also added staffing to prepare students for successful lives and careers, which is important to students and families. Brown's staff members are vital — behind every research breakthrough and student success story, non-faculty staff are a quiet force making those accomplishments possible," the spokesperson said. "We continue to see a false 'one administrator for every two students at Brown' claim that misrepresents the university, its mission and its student body. A total of 11,232 students were enrolled at Brown in the academic year that just ended — 7,226 of those students were undergraduates. We take no issue with the 3,800 staff number. However, the false "one administrator for every two students" claim ignores the presence of our approximately 4,000 graduate and medical students. These students make up more than one third of our student body, and the staffing to support their advanced education and research is significant. Our staffing numbers should be understood in the context of the fact that Brown is a major research university that supports both undergraduate and graduate education and research. We're not an undergraduate college."
New York Times
04-06-2025
- Business
- New York Times
A Student at Brown Channeled Elon Musk. Then He Got in Trouble.
Thousands of administrative employees at Brown University woke up this spring to an email with pointed Elon Musk-like questions about their job responsibilities. Please describe your role, it asked. What tasks have you performed in the past week? How would Brown students be affected if your job didn't exist? The March 18 email was from a sophomore, Alex Shieh, who explained that the responses would be included in a story for The Brown Spectator, a new, as yet unpublished conservative newspaper on campus. His questions were undoubtedly sensitive for elite universities like Brown, where the cost of tuition, housing and other fees has risen to $93,000. Critics, including President Trump, accuse the schools of padding their budgets with redundant layers of deans and associate deans, bloated diversity programs and niche academic divisions. Many recipients of the email, including those in the Office of Student Conduct and Community Standards, were not amused — no doubt aware that Mr. Musk, whose Department of Government Efficiency was ripping like a hacksaw through the federal bureaucracy, had asked government employees similar kinds of questions. Two days later, Brown notified Mr. Shieh that he was under investigation for possible violations of the university's code of student conduct, including its prohibitions on invasion of privacy, misrepresentation and emotional or psychological harm. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
