A liberal arts women’s college has come under fire for awarding former President Biden’s transgender health secretary with an honorary degree.
Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, announced it would be giving Admiral Rachel Levine an honorary degree.
On Sunday, Levine was formally given the award – causing a protest on campus over the fact she is transgender.
The college said it handed the award down for her work as an ‘accomplished physician, public health expert, and LGBTQ+ advocate’.
She was one of four honorees selected by the college to speak at their commencement ceremony.
Feminist group the Women’s Declaration International had protested the decision last weekend prior to the ceremony.
In a post to its X account they said: ‘Tomorrow, Smith College – a historically women’s college – will award Richard “Rachel” Levine an honorary degree.
‘Levine, who pretends to be a woman, will then speak at commencement. We’re on the ground in Northampton, MA to show our support for women.’
On Sunday, Levine, seen here in 2022, was formally given the award – causing a protest on campus over the fact she is transgender
The college said they handed the award down for her work as an ‘accomplished physician, public health expert, and LGBTQ + advocate’
Prominent anti-trans activist Riley Gaines had also posted about the decision to hand Levine the degree.
She wrote: ‘Smith college, a private *women’s* college in Massachusetts, awarded Rachel (Richard) Levine an honorary degree today.
‘He then delivered the commencement address. Ladies, congratulations — your graduation was led by the very thing feminism was allegedly fighting.’
While Biden’s health secretary Levine had been pushing to make it easier for children under the age of 18 to change genders.
Levine began her transition in 2011, when she was 54. She’d already been married for 23 years and raised two children, both of whom are now young adults.
Levine has sparked controversy on multiple occasions as she endorsed providing to offer gender-affirming care to minors.
She praised an Alaska gender-affirming care clinic in August of 2023, asserting the treatment it offered was ‘lifesaving medical care.’
The company she praised promotes ideas that children should learn that doctors ‘assign’ gender to babies by making a ‘guess’ – while also promoting the use of ‘gender-inclusive biology.’
Teachers and educators need to speak to children ‘without assuming that there are only two sexes and that everyone within a particular sex is the same’, they said.
Feminist group the Women’s Declaration International, seen here, had protested the decision last weekend prior to the ceremony
Prominent anti-trans activist Riley Gaines had also posted about the decision to hand Levine the degree
Levine began her transition in 2011, when she was 54. She’d already been married for 23 years and raised two children, both of whom are now young adults
Instead of using the word ‘mother’ in these conversations, they also recommend using terms such as ‘egg producer’ or ‘carrier.’
After word of the degree was spread on social media, users attacked the decision to hand it to Levine.
One person posted: ‘What a tragedy to have a man pretending to be a women receive an honorary degree at a woman’s college.’
Another commented: ‘That’s not progressive that’s a slap to the face of all women. Educated women.’
The commencement ceremony appears to have been plagued with problems, with fellow honoree Evelyn Harris, a musician, agreeing to give her degree back already.
Smith College President Sarah Willie-LeBreton said in a letter on Tuesday, only two days after the ceremony, that Harris had been found to plagiarize her speech.
The letter, seen by People, she said: ‘It has come to our attention that one of our honorary degree recipients, musician Evelyn M. Harris, borrowed much of her speech to graduates and their families from the commencement speeches of others without the attribution typical of and central to the ideals of academic integrity.
‘Ms. Harris was forthcoming about her choices while also acknowledging that she sought to infuse the words of others with her own emotional valence.’
