June 12, 2026

Photo credit: The Washington Post / Contributor / The Washington Post via Getty Images

Over the past several years, dozens of universities have created “Civics Centers,” which work to teach a classically oriented curriculum and encourage viewpoint diversity.

Now, a progressive group for professors wants to undermine the centers. Created in 2024, the Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom (CDAF) appears to prioritize institutional autonomy above all. It opened thanks to a $1.5 million grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, which has funded a massive public-relations campaign to block higher education reform.

John D. Sailer acquired emails, documents, and agendas to learn more about the CDAF, which he says has an “idiosyncratic understanding of academic freedom.” The group’s “efforts do little to protect what many people consider a core pillar of academic freedom: free expression,” he writes.

Read on to learn what Sailer uncovered.

New York State lawmakers have passed a bill that, if Governor Kathy Hochul signs it into law, will put a one-year moratorium on data-center construction and permanently increase the cost of deploying even small facilities in the state. These “edge” facilities are necessary for everything from home communications devices to autonomous vehicles; making it harder for them to get up and running will only penalize the public.

“Arguably the bill’s most cynical cost-increasing measure is the requirement for data centers, which rely on uninterrupted electricity supplies, to get ‘as much of [their] energy needs as is technologically, environmentally, and practically feasible through on-site renewable energy generation,’” Ken Girardin writes. “New York’s definition of ‘renewable’ excludes nuclear power, and the state has separately barred construction of new hydroelectric dams. That would leave data centers relying on intermittent sources such as wind and solar, presumably backed by costly amounts of battery storage.”

Read more about the bill.