Summer News Roundup: The Group Chat Gets Leaked
Turns out sending vomit emojis during a panel on campus antisemitism isn’t the best way to keep your college administrator job.
The following was published as part of Sundial’s Summer 2024 News Roundup, a collection of humorous takes on the news you missed.
→ The group chat gets leaked
Deans caught red-handed sending sneering texts about Jewish experiences at Columbia.
I may not be the most well-versed in Columbia’s HR policies, but one of the gazillion required DEI trainings must have covered that there is a limit to the amount of antisemitism you are legally allowed to espouse at a work event, right?
In true Columbia fashion—AKA practicing zero social awareness—four deans were caught exchanging dismissive and sarcastic texts about the experiences of Columbia’s Jewish community at an event literally titled “Jewish Life on Campus.” The event, held on May 31, was part of Columbia’s alumni weekend programming.
An anonymous alumnus seated behind Dean Susan Chang-Kim, then-vice dean of Columbia College, took pictures of her phone screen as she was texting Josef Sorett, dean of Columbia College, Cristen Kromm, then-dean of undergraduate student life, and Matthew Patashnick, then-associate dean for student and family support. The Washington Free Beacon obtained the images and broke the story June 12. The report prompted an investigation from the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, who demanded Columbia release the full text exchange on June 17.
Kromm sent vomit emojis—“🤢🤮”—roughly at the same time the daughter of a Holocaust survivor was describing how her own daughter said she was “hiding in plain sight” at Columbia after October 7. “I’m going to throw up,” Chang-Kim texted.
“Amazing what can do,” Kromm replied.
“He knows exactly what he's doing and how to take full advantage of this moment. Huge fund raising potential,” Patashnick texted about panelist Brian Cohen, the executive director of Columbia/Barnard Hillel.
“He is our hero,” Chang-Kim texted sarcastically about Cohen, to which Sorett simply replied, “Lmao.”
Kromm also texted the group that the panel was “blind to the idea that non-Israel supporting Jews have no space to come together,” which is weird because I thought that was what the People’s University for Palestine, West Lawn Campus was all about.
After the House pushed Columbia to take the incident seriously, the school suspended Chang-Kim, Kromm, and Patashnick on July 8. While the Free Beacon reported that they were set to be shuffled around to different administrative positions, the three of them were confirmed to have resigned on August 8. I know the entire Columbia community will take months to heal from the loss of whatever the hell they did around here.
The University must think Sorett is the only administrator whose position is important enough, as he left the incident unscathed (he’s also tenured). All he had to do was send an unnecessarily long self-flagellating email committing himself to doing “the work of healing and repair.” I’ll take “Things Both Josef Sorett and My CorePower Yoga Instructor Are Forced to Say” for $200.
The skeptic in me believes Chang-Kim set her colleagues up, potentially in hopes of freeing up her dream position of Dean of Columbia College. Because really, I thought everyone checks for opps before texting at the function? Or at least turns their brightness down?
Columbia’s recent Student Intifadas™ Pts. One, Two, and Three must have really fired up our deans, who seem to have forgotten they weren’t employees of the Houthi-run, Iran-backed Sanaa University, which is offering admission to American students suspended for pro-Palestinian protests. But maybe they did just slip up and forget to exercise discretion when accusing Jewish students of using their “,” in the eloquent words of Dean Kromm, to create fake panic about campus antisemitism. As one does.
Sorett was unfortunately not impressed with the alumnus’s digital eavesdropping, accusing the “unknown third parties” of an “invasion of privacy” in a June 14 email to the Board of Visitors.
According to his email, the texts do not “indicate the views of any individual or the team,” which is totally believable because when I want to shit talk that one annoying friend but accidentally send the text to the group chat that has the friend in question, I follow up with “sry, doesn’t indicate the views of any individual or the team” and all is well.
Sorett was evidently also not impressed by a visit from a Free Beacon reporter to his Morningside Heights home on June 21. He called Columbia Public Safety on her, who showed up with multiple NYPD officers within 15 minutes, which to Public Safety’s credit is faster than their response time to, say, I don’t know, an illegal encampment.
In July, University President Minouche Shafik’s office announced plans for new orientation programming and “new antidiscrimination training” for faculty, staff, and students. We should, however, be hesitant of top-down values enforcement: It will require much more than clicking “TRUE” on “Calling Jews money hungry is antisemitic” to reverse our University’s deep moral rot.
Freshmen, have thoughts on NSOP programming or the new antisemitism training? Join Sundial at sundial-cu.org or write to us at columbia.sundial@gmail.com!
Ms. Chaudhry is a staff editor for Sundial and a junior studying history.