Newsom’s UC regent pick says colleges are too ideologically uniform, not too indoctrinating

Scott Galloway, the NYU marketing professor whom Gov. Gavin Newsom recently appointed to the University of California’s Board of Regents, argued on Friday’s broadcast of HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher” that American higher education suffers less from indoctrination than from a lack of ideological diversity among faculty. 

Mr. Galloway joined Puck correspondent Peter Hamby for the show’s panel discussion, which aired Friday on HBO and HBO Max. Consumer advocate Erin Brockovich appeared separately as the episode’s one-on-one interview guest.

According to an account of the exchange, host Bill Maher asked whether colleges are “the hotbed of indoctrination” or “better than we hear.” Mr. Galloway responded that the bigger problem is homogenization. 

“… four out of five faculty members say a conservative member wouldn’t fit in,” Mr. Galloway continued. “And I think that we’re doing a disservice to young people, whether they adopt a progressive ideology or not, of not providing them with thoughtful opposition that helps them be more critical thinkers.”

That figure tracks with independent polling. A 2024 Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression survey of 6,269 faculty members at 55 universities found that only 20% said a conservative would fit “very” or “somewhat” well in their department, compared with 71% who said the same of a liberal colleague — the inverse of the “four out of five” figure Mr. Galloway is said to have cited.

Mr. Galloway went on to say that the goal should be teaching students that political disagreement doesn’t equate to moral inferiority. He is reported to have closed with a version of a line he has used for years in his newsletter and on past Maher appearances: that universities’ job “is not to create wokesters” but “warriors.”

Mr. Galloway’s Regents appointment, announced last month, still requires confirmation by the state Senate. He has been a vocal, if idiosyncratic, critic of elite higher education — Mr. Newsom described him as a liberal media personality who has appeared on the governor’s own podcast, and Mr. Galloway has separately praised the UC system’s efforts to expand enrollment even as he’s criticized other schools for restricting it.