The president of Harvard University, Claudine Gay, faced escalating pressure on Sunday to resign as prominent alumni, donors and politicians called for her ouster. However, a group of faculty members rallied to support her, arguing that she was being railroaded for a moment of poorly worded remarks about antisemitism. The body that has the power to decide Dr. Gay’s fate, the Harvard Corporation, is scheduled to meet on Monday. As critics of Dr. Gay doubled down, an effort to save her job was underway. As of Sunday evening, more than 500 members of the Harvard faculty had signed a petition urging “in the strongest possible terms” to “resist political pressures that are at odds with Harvard’s commitment to academic freedom.” Dr. Gay has apologised for her remarks before a congressional committee last Tuesday, which she acknowledged were inadequate.

“I am sorry,” Dr. Gay said in an interview that the campus newspaper, The Harvard Crimson, published on Friday. Within the last several days, Congressional Republicans have opened an investigation into the three institutions and major donors have threatened to rescind multimillion-dollar gifts — a rapid turn of events that has stunned academia and emboldened critics of elite universities who argue that campuses are not confronting antisemitic rhetoric in the wake of the Hamas attack on Israel on Oct. 7, and the subsequent Israeli invasion of Gaza.