It has been a very tough week for the University of Pennsylvania. Last month UPenn hosted an event called the Palestine Writes Literature Festival which features some extremely controversial speakers:

Planned speakers such as Roger Waters of Pink Floyd, Palestinian-American author Susan Abulhawa, Australian author Randa Abdel-Fattah, and illustrator and Palestinian author Aya Ghanameh have drawn criticism for previous remarks or actions.

Waters, for example, wore a Nazi-style uniform during a concert in Berlin in May and was accused by Israel of “desecrating the memory of Anne Frank” by projecting the girl’s name during the concert…

Ghanameh has tweeted “Death to Israel” on various occasions. Abdel-Fattah has called Israel a “demonic, sick project” and added that she “can’t wait for the day we commemorate its end.”

Abulhawa has called for the dismantling of Israel, which she called “a colonial nation of degenerates” on her now-suspended account on X, formerly Twitter.

She also said Israel is “one big, militarized tumor” just days after seven Jews were killed in a shooting outside a synagogue.

It’s worth noting that lots of people around Roger Waters have said he’s an anti-Semite, including former bandmate David Gilmour:

Every word demonstrably true https://t.co/KWk4I3bMTN

— David Gilmour (@davidgilmour) February 6, 2023

Waters was eventually forced to make his remarks by Zoom after being told he was not welcome on campus. So this event was getting a lot of pushback even before it happened but as you can imagine, the willingness to tolerate this sort of anti-Semitism dropped to a new low after the Hamas attack on Israel this month.

As Jazz pointed out Monday, donor Jon Huntsman sent a letter to UPenn president Liz Magill saying his family would stop all donations to the school. “Moral relativism has fueled the university’s race to the bottom and sadly now has reached a point where remaining impartial is no longer an option,” he wrote. His family has previously donated tens of millions of dollars ever several decades.

Huntsman isn’t alone in pulling the plug on donations. Another major donor sent a check for $1 and said that would be his annual donation unless and until Liz Magill found another job.

Jonathon Jacobson, a 1983 Wharton graduate and founding member of private investment firm HighSage Ventures LLC, announced his reduced donation in a letter obtained by Fox News, in which he scolded his alma mater for its lack of “moral courage” and inability to distinguish between “what is clearly right and clearly wrong.”

Jacobson, who has previously given “multi-seven figure donations,” to the university in addition to student scholarships and financial support for the school’s sports program, called out UPenn leadership for its “completely inept” handling of the Palestine Writes festival that took place on campus in September and “too little too late” statement on the Hamas terrorist attack which killed at least 1,400 Israelis and 31 Americans.

“Enclosed is a check for $1 which represents the first installment of a multi-year pledge which we will renew until you find employment elsewhere and the board of trustees grows the backbone to fulfill its mission, which is to govern the university according to the principles upon which it was founded,” Jacobson wrote in the letter addressed to Magill.

The idea of big donors sending $1 checks wasn’t original to Jacobson. It was apparently started by Apollo CEO Marc Rowan who suggested it first. Rowan also demanded Magill’s resignation.

Today, CNN reports that Dick Wolf, the creator of Law & Order and all of the Chicago-based TV shows, sent a letter to Magill asking her to step down.

Wolf, the namesake of UPenn’s Wolf Humanities Center, is among a growing list of powerful donors vowing to cut off financial support to the Ivy League school over concerns about a Palestinian literature festival held on campus last month.

“President Magill, I implore you and [chair of the board of trustees] Scott Bok to step down from your UPenn positions before any more unnecessary damage to UPenn,” Wolf wrote in the letter, obtained by CNN on Friday. “There is no hope for unification in our community until you step aside.”

The Emmy award-winning producer said a leadership change is the “only path forward” and he will “end all donations to UPenn” until both leaders resign…

“The notion that the Wolf Humanities Center contributed to this hate fest, otherwise known as the Palestine Writes Festival, is an abomination,” Wolf wrote in the letter, which has not been previously reported.

But so far it appears the Board of Trustees is sticking with Magill even as major donors bail. I guess we’ll have to wait a bit longer to see if opinions on either side change.