The news of University President Jim Ryan’s resignation stunned the community — students were “devastated,” faculty were concerned, politicians planned for a fight and many alumni were critical of the Justice Department’s actions.
But for the Jefferson Council, a conservative alumni group that has advocated for Ryan’s removal for years, the resignation symbolized a victory over what they viewed as Ryan’s attempt to push far-left ideologies onto the University. Now, Jefferson Council President Joel Gardner hopes that this “turning point” brings a new style of leadership to the University.
“This is an important and positive step for the University,” Gardner said. “For years, we've been raising issues that [Ryan] hadn't addressed, particularly issues of politicizing the University, the lack of intellectual diversity at the University, the fact that different groups of students were not treated equally and [Ryan] didn't seem to make any move to address those issues.”
The Jefferson Council was established in 2020 by former Board member Bert Ellis and co-founder Thomas Neale, aiming to preserve Thomas Jefferson’s legacy and call for a stronger Honor system. Leaders of the group did not originally intend to play such a strong role in calling for Ryan’s resignation or removal.
“I've always thought Jim Ryan is a very personable, wonderful man, and he is a very good leader. He was just leading [the University] in the wrong direction,” Ellis said. “The Jefferson Council’s [goal] was not regime change … Removing Jim Ryan was … not in the cards when we put the Jefferson Council together.”
Although Ryan’s resignation was not initially the organization’s goal, Gardner said they slowly became disillusioned with the president over the past two years. The group felt that Ryan had ignored or mishandled issues, including leadership challenges within the U.Va. Health System and the investigation into the 2022 shooting which produced two highly redacted reports.
Following a March 7 vote by the Board of Visitors to dissolve the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, the Council launched its DEI at UVA website, aiming to highlight areas where they felt Ryan had failed to fully eliminate DEI structures.
Later, the Council also launched ResetUVA, calling for new leadership and outlining a variety of issues they believed Ryan had not effectively addressed, including concerns about leadership at U.Va. Health and his handling of the report investigating the Nov. 13, 2022 shooting.
Eventually, the Jefferson Council spoke out publicly against Ryan with their ResetUVA site.
“[Our discontent with Ryan] developed over time, as he pushed an ideological agenda which we felt was very damaging to the University community,” Gardner said. “And he allowed these double standards in the way students were treated, which we found [to be] very much against what a university should be.”
Ellis, who was appointed to the Board of Visitors in 2022 after serving as The Jefferson Council’s president for a few years, told The Cavalier Daily in May that one of his goals during his time on the Board had been to fire President Ryan, for many of the same reasons brought up by the Jefferson Council.
During his time on the Board, Ellis said he stepped away from the Jefferson Council at Governor Glenn Youngkin’s request but had remained supportive of the group’s values. Now, since his removal from the Board, Ellis has become an active member of the Jefferson Council again.
In a release following Ryan’s resignation, the Jefferson Council highlighted its “investigative work” to reveal how University policies under Ryan’s leadership had encouraged, in their view, discrimination and a lack of intellectual diversity at the University. The release also noted that all findings from this research had been published publicly on the DEI at UVA and ResetUVA websites.
Gardner said that he is particularly concerned about DEI programs at the University, saying that these policies encourage discrimination against some groups of students and faculty. Gardner declined to elaborate on which specific groups he was referring to.
“There are those groups which [Ryan] considered underrepresented or marginalized, [but they] were very well represented and were definitely not marginalized,” Gardner said.
For years, the Jefferson Council has called for the removal of affirmative action from admissions processes and the dissolution of all DEI hiring practices, scholarship programs and course content. In their view, admissions decisions and scholarships should be based solely on merit, and DEI practices encourage discrimination against majority groups.
Class of 1997 and 2000 alumnus Sam Waxman, who is not a member of the Jefferson Council but is supportive of many of its efforts, said that he had slowly begun to doubt Ryan’s leadership after seeing the then-president’s handling of antisemitism on Grounds — one of many issues the Jefferson Council has advocated for in recent years.
“For me, what really was most shocking and disappointing was [Ryan’s] lack of leadership when it came to antisemitism at U.Va., something that is incredibly important to me as an alum, as a Jew, as a supporter of the Jewish Studies Program,” Waxman said.
Waxman — a former student of Ryan’s at the School of Law — noted he had spoken to Jewish students about negative experiences they had at the University, and attempted to bring this issue directly to Ryan last spring. However, Waxman described Ryan’s reaction to this issue as “aloof.”
Some letters sent to Ryan by the Justice Department revealed similar allegations — one sent May 2 detailed allegations against the University for retaliation against a Jewish student who was the victim of hate-based misconduct last October. Another lawsuit alleging “virulent antisemitism” was filed in May 2024 and was ultimately dismissed by a judge in December after a settlement was reached.
In a report from the 2024 Student Experience at a Research University survey, conducted last fall, findings suggested that both Jewish and Muslim students had experienced a decrease in the extent to which they felt their religious beliefs were respected at the University between 2022 and 2024. Only 52 percent of Jewish students and 66 percent of Muslim students responded positively to this prompt, with other religious groups reporting similar or slightly higher levels.
When asked why, as an alumnus, his concerns regarding Ryan were so important to him, Waxman noted the unique culture that is cultivated at the University and the close relationship many alumni still maintain with the school.
“For myself, and for many of us, it's a lifelong relationship with [U.Va.],” Waxman said. “You never stop paying a certain amount of attention … you never stop thinking about the place and being aware of what's happening on Grounds.”
Moving forward, the Board — currently entirely Youngkin-appointed — will begin the process of choosing the next University President. The three University alumni have varying hopes for the University — Waxman, who noted that while he supports the Jefferson Council on many issues, he does not agree with all of the organization’s views, sees this as a moment for the Board to take its responsibilities to the University community and the federal government more seriously.
“University boards tend to be populated by politically active, large donors and state institutions,” Waxman said. “… the responsibility is not often taken particularly seriously, which I think is wrong, because the role of a board … is to play an important oversight role over current management, and that has been sorely lacking.”
Gardner, who viewed Ryan as a leader ideologically skewed to the left, is focused more on who the next President will be. He is hoping for an apolitical leader.
“We're not advocating for a conservative President,” Gardner said. “We're advocating for a president who … [believes] a university shall not take an institutional position on social or political agendas. I think that is key.”
Ellis, on the other hand, is looking for a more conservative president than Ryan. Although he noted that he does not want the University to become entirely conservative, he hopes a more conservative president will help bring a more political balance in the University’s hiring.
“I have no notion of turning U.Va. into [a conservative school],” Ellis said. “But we are way disproportionately skewed towards very liberal professors, teachings and thinking. And I want somebody that's going to put some more balance into our hiring and what we teach at the University of Virginia.”
According to OpenSecrets, 93 percent of political donations to federal candidates from employees at the University were to Democratic candidates, while 7 percent were to Republican candidates. However, Sarah Turner, University professor of economics and education, noted in an opinion piece submitted to The Cavalier Daily that 84 percent of University faculty do not make political donations.
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