Mann is a professor at the University of Pennsylvania since 2022 in the Department of Earth and Environmental Science as the director of the Penn Center for Science, Sustainability, and the Media. For almost the past 11 months, he has also worked at the vice provost for climate science, policy, and action.
On September 29, Mann posted on his website that he will be resigning from his post of vice provost. He is still employed at the university but will no longer continue in that specific position.
“I have reluctantly come to the position that the science policy advocacy work I am doing… at times feels in conflict with the nonpartisan role demanded of me as an administrator at a university with an established institutional neutrality policy,” wrote Mann.
The Daily Pennsylvania reports that this change comes after Senator Dave McCormick (R-Pennsylvania) pressured the college to do something against Mann because of social media posts against Charlie Kirk. As Fox News reports, Mann posted on X that “the white on white violence has gotten out of hand,” which has since been deleted, and he retweeted multiple posts that were bashing Charlie Kirk, including one that called Kirk “the head of Trump’s Hitler Youth.”
Craig Rucker, president of the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), says undoubtedly the school is not unhappy with the professor's decision.
“For a long time, he has been a divisive figure that it can't be good for possible funding episodes that they would want to get down the road," says Rucker.
Mann says he voluntarily stepped away as vice provost, but Rucker thinks there's more to the story.
"I think everybody can see that, behind the scenes, pressure was likely applied to him to step down because it's not by coincidence that this would occur right after he makes these comments," says Rucker.
Rucker says Mann's new book, "Science Under Siege," which attacks his opponents, may be a desperation move because the climate scenario is starting to crumble from within.
