Can’t believe something like this happened at a big public university
Ms. McElroy ultimately turned down the one-year contract, she said, and the episode became a full-blown crisis for Texas A&M after The Texas Tribune first reported on the conflict. Ms. McElroy described a series of conversations in which the Arts and Sciences dean told her that there was political pushback to her appointment.
“I said, ‘What’s wrong?’” Ms. McElroy recalled of her conversation with the dean, José Luis Bermúdez. “He said, ‘You’re a Black woman who was at The New York Times and, to these folks, that’s like working for Pravda.’” Ms. McElroy, who left The Times in 2011, did not immediately return a call seeking comment on Friday.