With Harvard’s Gay gone, billionaire speculator Bill Ackman shifts crosshairs to MIT president—and DEI

Pershing Square hedge fund investor Bill Ackman (Credit: Jeenah Moon—Bloomberg/Getty Images)

Harvard president Claudine Gay may be gone, but billionaire investor Bill Ackman has already aimed his ire at a new target in the heated row over American universities’ response to the Israel-Hamas war.

The activist investor behind hedge fund Pershing Square has waged a campaign against leadership at his alma mater, Harvard, in the wake of the Oct. 7th terrorist attack by Hamas. Ackman has also pushed for the removal of leading figures at two other elite universities which have been accused of tolerating hate speech against Jews—an allegation the universities vehemently deny.