May 18, 2026

Photo by Lance King/Getty Images

Conservatives’ two most consequential domestic policy successes in recent memory—reforming welfare and K-12 education—were spearheaded by Republican governors. Andy Smarick argues that GOP state leaders now have a similar opportunity to push for reforms in American higher education.

“Recent public-opinion surveys reveal that trust in higher education has collapsed,” writes Smarick. Americans are frustrated with universities for several reasons: high costs, questionable return on investment, mounting political radicalism, and lack of viewpoint diversity.

Governors are ideally situated to make changes. Nearly 90 percent of students in public four-year institutions attend schools where a governor controls the board, and nearly two-thirds of these students attend schools in states that Donald Trump won in 2024.

“An agenda created and executed by reform-minded red state governors could be far-reaching,” writes Smarick.

Read more.

Like many universities around the country, the University of Wisconsin–Madison adopted an institutional neutrality policy in 2024. The school has also made a marketing push to counter public perceptions that it is too left-wing and radical.

But the university still has a long way to go in restoring its credibility with the public, observes Neetu Arnold. She describes one parent’s discovery of a “disturbing exhibit” in the college’s main concourse that contained messages such as “All White People Are Racist” and “UW’s Free Speech = White Supremacy,” as well as a “sweatshirt showing the severed heads of Donald Trump and Mike Pence.”

“Universities will struggle to earn back public trust when official units continue to promote one-sided ideological views and fail to take ownership of those decisions,” Arnold writes.

Despite shifting evidence about gender medicine, the Texas Medical Association’s 2026 “TexMed” conference reveals an organization that is maintaining its ideological commitment to “affirming care.”

“The TMA should follow other organizations in updating its view of the evidence,” writes Manhattan Institute Policy Analyst Joseph Figliolia. “Its failure to do so suggests the need for regulators to act.”

At the conference, the TMA’s Reference Committee on Science and Public Health recommended voting against a proposal for a comprehensive review of the Trump administration’s report on pediatric gender dysphoria. The TMA even urged delegates to vote against a transparency proposal for reference committees, which prescreen resolutions.

“Medical groups like the TMA have an obligation to inform members of what the best evidence says—and doesn’t say,” Figliolia observes. “When they refuse to do so, they’re not just advancing ideological goals; they’re also putting patients at risk.”