Money may buy a lot of things, but it won’t buy off UCLA in one case.
UCLA announced Tuesday that it has returned a $425,000 payment made by Donald Sterling to support basic kidney research by the UCLA Division of Nephrology and that it will reject the remainder of the Clippers owner’s $3 million pledge.
Mr. Sterling’s divisive and hurtful comments demonstrate that he does not share UCLA’s core values as a public university that fosters diversity, inclusion and respect. For those reasons, UCLA has decided to return Mr. Sterling’s initial payment of $425,000 and reject the remainder of a $3 million pledge he recently made to support basic kidney research by the UCLA Division of Nephrology. UCLA has received numerous inquiries about an advertisement in Sunday’s Los Angeles Times falsely suggesting that it was UCLA publicly thanking him for the gift. The ad was placed by Mr. Sterling, not the university.
The real gem of this story comes in the last two sentences of that statement. Sterling bought an ad in the LA Times to ensure everyone knew about his donation, and he designed it to make it look like UCLA was thanking him for it.
That ad ran in Sunday’s paper, a little over a day after the audio tapes of him being racist were published.
Way to pat yourself on the back there, Mr. Humble.
Photo: Twitter/David Singer
