House committee demands Brown University hand over memos on student behind DOGE-style email

UNIQUE - The House Judiciary Committee is asking the president of Brown University to hand over all internal memos related to a aspirant who sent a DOGE-style email who subsequently faced disciplinary hearings and had his private information leaked We are concerned that Brown s decision to file disciplinary charges against Mr Shieh and hold a misconduct hearing may serve to suppress free speech and discourage others from coming forward and asking questions related to Brown s rising costs the Thursday letter from the House Judiciary Committee to Brown University President Christina Paxson disclosed Alex Shieh a rising junior who was cleared of wrongdoing by the university on May had previously angered school leaders by sending a DOGE-like email to non-faculty employees identifying himself as a journalist for The Brown Spectator and asking them what they do all day to try to determine why the school's tuition has gotten so expensive BROWN UNIVERSITY CLEARS LEARNER OF WRONGDOING AFTER HE SENT CAMPUS EMPLOYEES DOGE-LIKE EMAILThe letter signed by House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan R-Ohio Rep Scott Fitzgerald R-Wisc chairman of the Subcommittee on the Administrative State Regulatory Improvement and Antitrust and Rep Troy Nehls R-Texas seeks to understand Brown s rationale for attempting to silence a participant raising questions about how apprentice and taxpayer dollars are being used The Brown Spectator which has a board of three people including Shieh was revived this year after it ceased publication in The board members faced a disciplinary hearing on May over statements that they violated Brown University s name licensing and trademark policies Shieh previously informed Fox News Digital that other campus publications also use the school s name including The Brown Daily Herald another student-run nonprofit newspaper Shieh and the Spectator faced scrutiny from the university after Shieh during free weekends in March began probing positions he deemed redundant after reviewing non-faculty employees who worked at Brown and emailing them to ask What do you do all day Shieh used AI to try to determine what Brown employees did and why the school which costs nearly a year was so expensive BROWN UNIVERSITY SCHOLAR WHO ANGERED NON-FACULTY EMPLOYEES FOR DOGE-LIKE EMAIL FACES PUNISHMENT FROM SCHOOLWhen creating his database he formatted it to identify three particular jobs DEI jobs redundant jobs and bulls--t jobs He revealed that he requested to investigate DEI because of President Donald Trump's executive orders addressing DEI policies and his administration threatening to withhold federal funds to universities who employ them The goal was to get as much information as feasible to improve his research Only of the people emailed responded with various of the responses being profane and hostile and Shieh s Social Defense number was subsequently leaked On June Shieh testified before the House Judiciary Committee s Subcommittee on the Administrative State Regulatory Amendment and Antitrust for a hearing entitled The Elite Universities Cartel A History of Anticompetitive Collusion Inflating the Cost of Higher Development The House Judiciary Committee is asking that Paxson Brown s president provide all documents and communications between Brown's employees pertaining to Shieh s investigative inquiry Brown University s subsequent review of Mr Shieh Brown University s decision to file disciplinary charges against Mr Shieh or Brown University s adjudication of Mr Shieh s charges The committee is also asking for all information related to what they call the unauthorized disclosure of Mr Shieh s personally identifiable information Brown University s decision to file disciplinary charges against students like Alex Shieh exclusively for looking into the school s bloated bureaucracy and rising tuition costs is a clear act of retaliation Fitzgerald who signed the letter recounted Fox News Digital in a message The Committee shares serious concerns about this troubling response and remains committed to conducting rigorous oversight into whether Brown University and other Ivy League institutions are engaging in anticompetitive pricing practices In a message Brian Clark vice president for News and Strategic Campus Communications advised Fox News Digital that the university has been cooperating with extensive requests for information from the U S House and Senate Committees on the Judiciary since the initial inquiry arrived in April demonstrating that we have and continue to make decisions on tuition and financial aid independently as part of our commitment to making sure that no attendee s family socioeconomic circumstances prevent them from accessing the benefits of a Brown mentoring Clark added We ll continue to provide any responses to follow-up requests directly to the committees