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U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent takes questions from journalists on the Institute of International Finance (IIF) Global Outlook Forum on sidelines of the IMF and World Bank’s 2025 annual Spring Meetings in Washington, D.C., U.S., April 23, 2025.
Elizabeth Frantz | Reuters
A gaggle of Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent‘s classmates at Yale University advised him in a brand new letter to rethink his position “in facilitating the Trump management‘s supposed transformation” of the United States “into an authoritarian state.”
“Scott, please take a moment to step back, look down the road a piece, and think hard about whether you want to be responsible for enabling the descent of America into fascism,” says the letter, which is dated Wednesday.
“Be brave. Stand up for what you know to be right and be a voice of reason in the midst of this insanity,” the letter says.
It argues that “so many” of the movements of President Donald Trump and his 2nd management are unconstitutional and undermine the foundations of democracy.
As of Friday, 140 contributors of the Yale Class of 1984 have signed the web letter to Bessent, a member of that magnificence. He may be a former adjunct professor on the college, the place he taught financial historical past.
The signatories come with legal professionals, CEOs, newshounds, playwrights, a pastor, faculty professors, a farmer, and social staff.
Bessent, in a commentary to CNBC, stated:
“It is equal parts odd and sad that a group of people, most of whom I have never met, feel they have standing in my life choices due to a tenuous overlap from 40 years ago.
How very brave of these people to wage their campaign from behind a keyboard rather than to engage in the real-life political process. They should look inward, exercise some agency, and come out from behind their desks—like I did—to get involved in the 2028 electoral cycle.
These are the same close-minded progressives who have sought to undermine President Trump at every turn. But to paraphrase President Teddy Roosevelt, ‘It is not the critic who counts… the credit belongs to the man in the arena.’
President Trump is the man in the arena. And the American people elected him—not these critics. Being part of the Trump Administration and serving the American people is the honor of my lifetime.”
Catherine Teegarden, a 1984 Class alumna, informed CNBC that she despatched a an identical letter, additionally signed via fellow magnificence contributors, by the use of U.S. Mail to Bessent on the Treasury Department in March, however won no answer.
The new letter, which added some main points of movements via the management since March, was once posted at the magnificence’ Facebook web page, the place other folks may just signal it.
“My initiative for banding together was just to amplify our voices,” stated Teegarden, a New York resident who retired in 2023 after 30 years working an architectural schooling program.
“I know there were other people like myself who felt somewhat hopeless about what was going on in our government,” she stated.
Bass Tower (middle), Benjamin Franklin College (proper), Pauli Murray College (left), Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, USA.
Plexi Images | Ucg | Universal Images Group | Getty Images
The letter echoes one despatched in August 2017 to then-Trump Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin from greater than 350 of his fellow contributors of Yale’s Class of 1985.
That letter known as on Mnuchin to surrender, arguing he had a “moral obligation” to take action after Trump blamed violence at a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, on now not best the organizers however on counter-protesters as smartly. Mnuchin rejected that call for.
The new letter to Bessent says that he, as a Political Science primary at Yale, is aware of “that the three branches of the U.S. government are meant to act as equal partners, providing checks and balances on each other to prevent the kind of power grab the executive branch is currently perpetrating.”
The missive then ticks off a listing of examples of what it says are the Trump management’s efforts “to usurp the power vested in the judicial and legislative branches … for their own personal aggrandizement, wealth, and power.”
The examples cited come with giving billionaire Elon Musk and his “DOGE cohorts” intensive get entry to to the personal knowledge of thousands and thousands of Americans; “punitive attacks on independent news media, universities, citizens, judges and other governmental employees merely because they disagree with the administration;” and “illegal seizure and incarceration of people in violation of our immigration laws and the due process required by our Constitution.”
The letter additionally cites “blatant conflicts of hobby such because the Trumps’ meme cash and Trump Media and Technology Group‘s investment accounts which are poised to move in sync with the administration’s whimsical tariff decisions.”
Students stroll at the campus of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut.
Shannon Stapleton | Reuters
“While the global economic chaos this administration has caused may have set off the loudest alarm bells, the unlawful manner in which they are conducting official business at home should be equally alarming to you as Treasury Secretary,” the letter says.
“Your sworn oath to uphold the Constitution as you manage the nation’s finances demands that you do everything in your power to stop this administration’s unprecedented attacks on our democracy.”
David Kallick, one of the vital individuals who signed the letter, in an interview, stated he did so as a result of “I’m really concerned about due process and” different protections “in our Constitution that are being set aside by the president’s actions.”
“There are people within the administration and without who should know better,” stated Kallick, who’s director of the Immigration Research Initiative, a suppose tank.
Kallick, who didn’t know Bessent at Yale, stated that the danger from Trump’s movements so far is “very real.”
“I think we’re seeing some actions that are starkly authoritarian, or, I should say, starkly autocratic, and I don’t know how far that could go,” he stated. “If people like us and him [Bessent] don’t stand up and say ‘Enough is enough,’ there is a real danger … of further sliding into an autocratic government.”
Teegarden, the alumna who arranged the letter, additionally didn’t know Bessent at Yale, however stated a lot of other folks declined to signal the letter “because they were worried about how that would affect their life.”
“A lot of people are scared to put their name out there, because of retribution,” Teegarden stated.
She stated that folks requested her why the letter does now not name on Bessent to surrender.
“To me, that doesn’t really solve the problem,” Teegarden stated. “We need someone there who is rational, who will speak up, to be that voice of reason.”
She stated she was hoping that the letter will make Bessent believe his position within the Trump management, and chase away in opposition to what she sees as violations of constitutional and institutional norms.
“Why is he selling out? This was kind of my thinking about this,” Teegarden stated, including that she hopes “we plant a little nugget of concern” in Bessent’s thoughts.
“It’s really about the illegality of it all. And he should know better.”
Hank Copeland, every other Yale grad who signed the letter, stated, “I don’t know Scott personally, but I’m willing to bet he doesn’t want to live in an autocracy.”
“He knows autocracy stifles human rights and shuts down the give and take that improve lives and make life interesting and make an economy dynamic,” stated Copeland, an Indianapolis resident who runs a small tech corporate. “Eventually, rigid, top-down societies ossify and fail.”
Asked what he sought after the letter to succeed in, Copeland stated, “On the one hand, we’re whistling in a hurricane, and some classmates cite futility as their reason for not signing.”
“On the other hand, plenty of important acts in life are purely symbolic — exchanging rings or flying a flag or attending a funeral,” he stated.
“We do these symbolic things to remind ourselves and others what we care about.”
— CNBC’s Russell Leung contributed to this tale
Read the total letter to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent beneath:
April 23, 2025
Scott Bessent
Secretary of the Treasury
1500 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20220
Dear Scott,
The undersigned contributors of your Yale ’84 magnificence are writing to induce you to rethink your section in facilitating the Trump management’s supposed transformation of our constitutional republic into an authoritarian state. As a Yale Political Science primary, you understand that the 3 branches of the U.S. executive are supposed to act as equivalent companions, offering tests and balances on every different to forestall the type of energy snatch the manager department is lately perpetrating.
Examples abound. During the previous 3 months, the Trump management has aggressively sought thru government orders and different approach to usurp the facility vested within the judicial and legislative branches so they are able to act with out restraint, now not for the good thing about the American other folks, however for their very own non-public aggrandizement, wealth, and gear. So many in their movements are unconstitutional and undermine the very ideas of our democracy, together with their:
- cancellation and clawing-back of finances already licensed and appropriated via Congress;
- dismantling of key federal businesses that serve, tell, and offer protection to the general public;
- granting Elon Musk and his DOGE cohorts nearly limitless get entry to and regulate over the personal knowledge of thousands and thousands of US electorate, the country’s protected monetary programs, and the facility to rent and hearth federal staff in each and every company, together with businesses that keep an eye on his personal companies;
- elimination of Inspectors General and different displays of fraud and corruption all over the federal government;
- punitive assaults on unbiased information media, universities, electorate, judges and different governmental workers simply as a result of they disagree with the management;
- upending of world alliances that bolstered America’s pursuits world wide for many years;
- unlawful seizure and incarceration of other folks in violation of our immigration rules and the due procedure required via our Constitution;
- enriching their very own non-public budget thru blatant conflicts of hobby such because the Trumps’ meme cash and Trump Media and Technology Group’s funding accounts that are poised to transport in sync with the management’s whimsical tariff choices; and,
- fomenting a world financial disaster thru erratic and nonsensical tariff insurance policies and self-destructive business wars.
While the worldwide financial chaos this management has led to can have spark off the loudest alarm bells, the illegal means wherein they’re undertaking professional industry at house will have to be similarly alarming to you as Treasury Secretary. Your sworn oath to uphold the Constitution as you set up the country’s budget calls for that you simply do the whole lot on your energy to prevent this management’s remarkable assaults on our democracy.
Scott, please take a second to step again, glance down the street a work, and suppose exhausting about whether or not you need to be accountable for enabling the descent of America into fascism. Dust off your outdated marked-up replica of Hannah Arendt’s The Origins of Totalitarianism out of your faculty days. Remind your self that whilst you learn this newsletter forty-some years in the past you concept that the sort of factor may just “never happen here.” We are providing you with the good thing about the doubt that you simply did not suppose, “Wow, wouldn’t it be great if I could remake America into an autocracy!” And but, right here you’re, doing simply that via assisting and abetting the unlawful movements of an management looking for to break 250 years of American democracy.
Our Yale schooling challenged us to make use of mild and fact, lux et veritas, to advance society, now not the suppression and lies that represent this present management, of which you’re a key participant. We name on you to re-embrace those beliefs out of your faculty years and use your place to oppose and redirect this management’s unlawful, damaging and un-American movements prior to it’s too past due.
In the phrases of James Russell Lowell’s tough hymn: “Once to every man and nation, comes a moment to decide… for the good or evil side…. Then it is the brave man chooses, and the coward stands aside.” Be courageous. Stand up for what you understand to be proper and be a voice of reason why in the course of this madness.
For God, FOR COUNTRY, and for Yale.
Sincerely,
Your Yale ’84 classmates:
