Niall Ferguson Resigns From Stanford Speaker Series Post Over Leaked Emails

British historian Niall Ferguson resigned from his senior role in a speaker series called Cardinal Conversations at Stanford University, after leaked emails showed that he’d asked his research assistant and Republican students to conduct “opposition research” on another student activist, SFGate reported.

"I very much regret the publication of these emails," Ferguson wrote in a statement to the Stanford Daily student newspaper. “I also regret having written them.” In a column for the Sunday Times announcing his resignation, Ferguson also said that no action was ever taken against the student activist and that “student politics is best left to students.”

In one of the leaked emails, Ferguson reportedly suggested that Cardinal Conversations committee members “should all be allies against” the student activist in question, and “unite against the SJW [social justice warriors].” Provost Persis Drell has said she accepted Ferguson’s resignation. Ferguson remains a senior fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution, according to SFGate.