“Drill, baby, drill!”— to quote President Donald Trump’s inaugural address — is an acute synopsis of the Trump administration’s environmental policy. In just four months, Trump has gutted the Environmental Protection Agency, dismantled federal environmental justice initiatives, reinvigorated coal mining and unlawfully blocked clean energy funding. Critically, he has done this with the support of fossil fuel executives he has placed in positions of power such as Department of Energy secretary Chris Wright, the CEO of fracking company Liberty Energy. He has doubled down on utilizing oil and gas, despite the scientific consensus on the need for a reduction in the use of fossil fuels. His administration cut nearly $4 million in funding to Princeton University on the absurd premise that climate research is adding to climate anxiety. In reality it is inaction by those in power that keeps us up at night — not scientists doing their best to understand, solve and communicate the problem.
What will institutions like Dartmouth College do in response? And what will we, as a student body, do to safeguard our futures?
In a time of mounting authoritarian pressures, Dartmouth has chosen the path of least resistance by hiring former chief counsel at the Republican National Committee Matthew Raymer ’03 as general counsel. Further, the administration has also failed to proclaim its support for those continually being threatened by Trump’s agenda: students who are not citizens of the U.S. Such a move seems like an obvious ploy to appease Trump and ward off demands seen at other universities. In a letter to Harvard University last week, the Trump administration called for “viewpoint diversity in admissions and hiring.” They wrote, “Every department or field found to lack viewpoint diversity must be reformed by hiring a critical mass of new faculty within that department or field who will provide viewpoint diversity…” We cannot help but draw parallels between this action and Dartmouth’s new policy of institutional restraint which states: “To provide space for diverse viewpoints to be raised and fully considered, Dartmouth should exercise general restraint in issuing institutional statements.” This policy is a droplet in the rising wave of both-sideism that declares topics such as human rights and climate change as debatable and political: therefore, issues upon which the College should refrain from staking a claim.
We ask: what does “institutional restraint” mean in the context of the climate crisis? The attack on international students? The unveiled violence towards queer and trans communities? The silencing of pro-Palestinian activists?
Does “viewpoint diversity” connote continuing to platform oil executives, including members with ties to ExxonMobil and the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company on the Irving Institute’s Advisory Board, and lending legitimacy to companies with a track record of disinformation and undermining climate science?
In this critical moment, we must not shy away from standing for justice, science, human dignity and equity. An educational institution of such power like Dartmouth must stand and lead with morals, with the clear recognition that Trump’s policies have caused, and will cause, irreparable damage.
When the status quo is violent injustice, “restraint” is tacit approval. If — or when — the Trump administration comes knocking on Dartmouth’s door with a list of demands, the College must not slide down the slippery slope from “institutional restraint” to embrace Trump’s warped version of “viewpoint diversity.”
We recognize that this is a terrifying time across the country. With universities in the spotlight, it is difficult to navigate for administrators, professors, researchers and students alike. But that is precisely the goal: to create a chilling effect. From mass deportations to slashing jobs and federal funding, Trump is rapidly shrinking space for dissent, including scientific research that does not align with his agenda. We see Trump’s authoritarian playbook clearly — and we must push back. Students and researchers must be able to speak and write freely about climate, sustainability and justice.
How we choose to respond to Trump’s policies today will have immeasurable implications for the future of civic and political freedom in the United States.
Perhaps most importantly, we must not conflate a desire for “viewpoint diversity” with the undermining of science and morality. The science of climate change or the right to protest, for instance, cannot be up for “dialogue.”
This year, as we celebrate Earth Day on trembling ground, we call on Dartmouth to hold fast to these guidelines: to not silence or back down from aggressive climate action; to commit to climate research and campus decarbonization efforts — including devoting additional resources if or when federal funding is cut; to recognize that climate action means nothing if it does not also center justice and equity.
To our peers, we say: stand for and with your friends, speak even when you do not think your voice will be heard, and act for justice, remembering that does not always equate with law. Trump’s active repression can only be subverted by active and robust resistance. To sit idly by only accelerates the ticking clock to ecological and political disaster.
Harper Richardson is a member of the Class of 2027 and Maya Beauvineau is a member of the Class of 2026. Guest columns represent the views of their author(s), which are not necessarily those of The Dartmouth.
