Bill: Colleges Should Consider Political Views When Hiring

An Iowa Republican in the state senate has filed legislation that would require public universities to make sure there is a reasonable balance of partisan ideology among the faculty. Sen. Mark Chelgren’s bill would force Iowa’s state board of regents to use an applicant’s party affiliation as one of their considerations when hiring new professors. If the faculty at a particular school leans Republican or Democrat by more than a 10% margin, the school would be barred from hiring any more members of the dominant party.

Chelgren told the Des Moines Register that students “should be able to go to their professors, ask opinions, and they should know publicly whether that professor is a Republican or Democrat or no party affiliation, and therefore they can expect their answers to be given in as honest a way as possible.”

But Democrats say that it’s an excuse to freeze liberal academics out of a job.

“If you took a survey right now, it’s highly likely that Iowa professors are registered as Democrats at a much higher rate than Republicans,” wrote liberal Iowan Pat Rynard. “So any new hires would be strictly limited to Republican or No Party voters.”

Well, isn’t that kinda the point? Why is it that there are so many more Democrats in academia? Is that just because more Democrats tend to go into that line of work, or is it because Republicans are currently being discouraged from working at state universities?

We don’t imagine that Chelgren’s bill will ever become law, but at least he’s shining a spotlight on an issue that most universities would prefer to keep safely ensconced in the shadows. Once you realize that the vast majority of professors at these schools are dedicated liberal Democrats, you realize that their political views color everything they convey to their students. That realization may not change anything, but it will at least start chipping away at the illusion of intellectual superiority we tend to give professional academics.

Then, perhaps, we can begin having a real national conversation about how liberal bias infects everything generated from these universities, including science, history, economics, social issues, and more. We are drowning in a tide of normalized insanity and the onslaught is so relentless that most people don’t even notice it. A bill like this one may be doomed politically, but if it makes anyone pause and think, “Hmm…” for even a second, it will have done its job.