Over 1,000 scholars demand Northwestern apologize for treatment of late professor

More than 1,000 scholars nationwide sent a letter Thursday urging Northwestern University to apologize for its treatment of late Feinberg School of Medicine Professor Jane Wu, who died by suicide in July 2024 following years of institutional scrutiny.

Catch up: Wu, a naturalized U.S. citizen, spent 19 years at Northwestern where she published 176 peer-reviewed articles and maintained an endowed professorship. In 2019, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) opened an investigation examining her alleged China connections as part of the first Trump administration’s China Initiative, but closed the probe in 2023 with no charges filed.

Despite being cleared, Northwestern restricted her research activities, slashed her pay starting January 2024 and closed her laboratory by May 2024. Later that month, police handcuffed and escorted Wu from her workspace before involuntarily admitting her to a psychiatric facility. On July 10, 2024, she died by suicide. “A great injustice was done to my mom,” her daughter Elizabeth Rao noted. Last June, Wu’s estate filed a lawsuit claiming the university discriminated against her based on race, gender, national origin and disability.

What they’re saying: The Asian American Scholar Forum (AASF) and Federation of Asian Professor Associations organized the letter, which gathered signatures from scholars across 44 states, Washington, D.C. and more than 300 academic institutions. It states that “Northwestern and Northwestern Memorial Hospital’s (NMH) treatment of Dr. Wu has shocked many in the research community and resulted in fear within the academic and research community, especially those of Asian descent.”

The document also warns that Wu’s experience represents a troubling pattern of “unjust scrutiny of Asian American researchers” driven by ethnicity The signatories demand Northwestern publicly apologize and reform internal policies to safeguard faculty and staff from similar tragedies.

Why this matters: The tragedy goes beyond one scholar’s experience and reveals systemic problems with how academic institutions treat Asian American faculty. The China Initiative, whose revival was recently dropped by lawmakers, created a climate of fear that extended beyond Chinese Americans to anyone believed to be of Chinese descent. Research shows discrimination increases Asian Americans’ risk of major depressive disorder, anxiety and suicidal thoughts, with particularly severe impacts on older Chinese Americans and non-male Asian Americans.

These mental health dangers are made worse by a leadership gap. Asian Americans occupy far fewer senior positions relative to their research presence, limiting their ability to report and confront discriminatory treatment. Wu’s case illustrates this institutional failure. Rather than supporting a faculty member who had been cleared of wrongdoing, Northwestern continued restricting her work and ultimately closed her laboratory.

Northwestern, for its part, has denied the allegations and filed a motion to dismiss the suit.