There’s a photo of me on the internet with Santa Ono that I regret more than any other in my life.

At the time, I stood beside him with pride. He was a fellow academic, a university president who championed diversity, equity, and inclusion at one of the most visible public institutions in the world—my alma mater, the University of Michigan. A place that shaped my intellectual trajectory, nurtured my sense of justice, and gave me my first real glimpse into the power of public universities to spark social change.

But today, that image no longer reads as solidarity. It reads as a caution sign.

Because Santa Ono didn’t just pivot away from equity. He sprinted away, into the embrace of a political machine designed to dismantle the very values he once claimed to uphold. And then—here’s the twist—even that wasn’t enough.

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The Judas Clause—Now Null and Void

On June 3, 2025, the Florida Board of Governors rejected Santa Ono as the next president of the University of Florida.

This wasn’t a minor hiccup. This was a public spectacle. The board—handpicked largely by Governor Ron DeSantis—grilled Ono for hours over his past support for DEI, his decision to allow pro-Palestinian student protests at Michigan, and his views on holistic admissions and antisemitism.

Never mind that Ono had since reversed course on DEI. Never mind that he had closed Michigan’s diversity office. Never mind that he had already pledged that DEI would “never return” to UF while he was president. He wasn’t being judged on his present loyalty. He was being punished for having ever stood for equity.

This is what happens when you offer your soul to authoritarianism: you’ll still be deemed unworthy unless your record is absolutely spotless in their eyes. You don’t just have to betray your values. You have to burn the evidence. Publicly.

And even then, they might still reject you.

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Let’s Talk About the Deal

Ono’s now-defunct contract was reportedly worth up to $15.4 million. But more shocking than the amount was the content. It included an exhibit—Exhibit A—that tied his bonuses not to academic performance or student success but to political compliance.

He was expected to appoint senior leaders (provosts, deans) aligned with the DeSantis agenda. He was to work hand-in-glove with Florida’s so-called “Office of Government Efficiency,” an entity aimed at rooting out any trace of DEI, justice, or student advocacy. He was expected to scrub the university of dissent—and do so efficiently.

In short, he was to govern not as a scholar, not as a servant of the people, but as a political functionary. His job performance would be graded not by the university community, but by ideological purity tests.

This wasn’t a job. It was a transaction. It was the Judas clause—an explicit loyalty pledge in exchange for political acceptance and personal enrichment.

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Judas Didn’t Just Kiss Jesus—He Took the Bag

This is the second article in a row I’ve released today about betrayal in education. But this one cuts differently.

Because when betrayal is formalized—when it’s literally written into your contract—the symbolic becomes terrifyingly real.

Santa Ono once stood on stages celebrating diversity. He lifted up the voices of faculty of color. He gave speeches about belonging and inclusive excellence. He was lauded nationally as a DEI visionary.

And yet when the political winds shifted—when the right began its calculated assault on equity—he didn’t anchor down. He drifted.

In March 2025, he quietly dissolved Michigan’s DEI office. Then he emerged weeks later as the sole finalist to lead UF—Florida’s flagship university under siege from a state government that views education as enemy territory.

It wasn’t just that he took the job. It’s what he agreed to do to get it.

This wasn’t a man caught in a storm. This was a man who traded his raincoat for thirty silver coins and walked into the downpour anyway.

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I’ve Seen the Playbook Before

Over the course of my academic career, I’ve been in the rooms. The right has courted me too.

They offered speaking fees. Travel. Five-figure honoraria. All I had to do was validate their talking points. Undermine racial justice in their preferred tone. Be their “intellectual” of color—a pawn with polish.

I refused.

I called out the game. I challenged their premises. I even invoked comparisons to 1930s Germany—and just like that, I was disinvited. Unwelcome. Banned.

Even as an undergraduate at the University of Michigan, I was targeted. A conservative think tank offered me a paid summer job—on one condition: I had to publicly oppose affirmative action.

They didn’t care about my mind. They saw my skin. They saw my potential for utility.

But I don’t play utility. I don’t fold for cash. I didn’t then. I won’t now.

Because when you accept their script, you don’t just sell your ideas—you surrender your soul. And you don’t just betray yourself. You betray your community. The very people who once saw you as a symbol of hope.

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The Real Loyalty Test

Santa Ono’s downfall was never about qualifications. It was about trust. And the far right does not trust anyone who has ever shown moral courage. Not even when that courage has long since disappeared.

What they value is loyalty—loyalty above merit, experience, or principle.

That’s how Trump built his administration. That’s how DeSantis runs Florida’s universities. That’s why even the highest-paid university president in the country was forced to pass ideological screening before getting his mansion and $15,000,000.

This isn’t governance. It’s indoctrination.

And here’s the real kicker: the very people demanding ideological obedience are the same ones accusing us—teachers, professors, activists—of “indoctrinating” students.

They cry freedom while writing surveillance into contracts.

They accuse universities of bias while mandating loyalty oaths to governors.

They don’t fear indoctrination—they weaponize it.

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“Efficiency” Is the New Censorship

Let’s unpack the euphemisms in Ono’s proposed contract:

• “Government efficiency” = political surveillance.
• “Low return on investment” = courses that teach history, race, gender, or resistance.
• “Aligned leadership” = loyalty to the governor, not to the university mission.

It’s not about streamlining. It’s about silencing.

It’s not about improving education. It’s about controlling it.

And it’s not about accountability. It’s about obedience.

If this model spreads—and it will if we don’t resist—higher education in America will be unrecognizable. Presidential searches will become political screenings. Curriculum will shrink under legislative threat. And the freedom to think, question, and dissent will become collateral damage in a culture war.

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The Lesson for Students

Imagine being a first-gen student at the University of Florida. Or a queer student. Or a student of color.

You walk past the future president’s portrait and realize: this person is your leader. And they got the job precisely because they agreed to defund your support systems, erase your identity from campus programming, and obey a political agenda that considers your existence an “ideological threat.”

What does that teach you?

That integrity is optional?

That betrayal is rewarded?

That the path to power requires selling out the community?

We owe the next generation better than that.

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The Loyalty Test for the Rest of Us

To every education leader reading this—whether in K–12, higher ed, policy, or nonprofit spaces—this is your moment of reckoning too.

You may not be offered $15 million. But the test will still come.

• Will you delete DEI from your strategic plan?
• Will you decline that equity-oriented educator hire to avoid headlines?
• Will you watch colleagues get attacked by the government—and say nothing?

These small concessions stack up. Over time, they define your leadership. They shape your legacy.

I’ve already made my decision. I chose long ago to lead with integrity, not complicity.

I will not be the face that justifies injustice.

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To My Colleagues in Red States

I know the pressure. I’ve lived it. I’ve stood in front of donors who think equity is a slur. I’ve answered legislators who wanted syllabi censored. I’ve led through retaliation, threats, and whisper campaigns.

I get it.

But please hear me clearly: silence won’t protect you. And compromise won’t save your students.

When one president folds, it makes it harder for the rest of us to stand.

We must be united in our refusal. Our line in the sand has to be bold and immovable:

Not here. Not now. Not ever.

Because education isn’t the governor’s to weaponize. It belongs to the people. To our students. To the truth.

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A Word to Santa

You once stood for something. You once gave us hope.

But when push came to shove, you didn’t just back down. You helped the bulldozer.

And now? Even they’ve turned on you.

You tried to appease a political machine that only rewards total submission—and still, it wasn’t enough. They saw your betrayal of DEI not as proof of your loyalty, but as evidence of your past disloyalty.

You traded your legacy for a mansion. And now you have neither.

I look at that photo of us—not with nostalgia, but as a reminder of everything I will never become.

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In Closing: Keep Your Soul

To every rising leader who’s ever been tempted:

Don’t fold.

Don’t believe the lie that you have to sell out to stay in the room. If the room demands your silence on what matters for academic freedom, opportunity, and liberty, leave—and speak louder outside.

Use your scars to educate. Use your betrayal to fuel truth-telling. Share your experience so others don’t fall for the same trap.

We need leaders who cannot be bought.

We need educators who pledge loyalty not to governors and presidents, but to the students who walk our campuses in search of dignity, opportunity, and truth.

We need institutions that still believe in freedom.

Because in the end, the question isn’t whether you were successful. It’s whether you were faithful—to your mission, to your community, to the truth.

Let us be the ones who never signed the Judas clause.

Let us be the ones who never confused silence for strategy.

Let us be the ones who never mistook obedience for leadership.

I once asked a recent supervisor if he was pleased with my performance as a leader. He paused and said yes. Then he added, “Our politics are different.”

Damn right they are.

And I intend to keep it that way because liberty and freedom matter!

Please share.