A health care company’s stock dove on Friday, shedding nearly $210 million in value in one day, after its CEO said he and other corporate leaders would be “eager” to hire anti-Israel protesters who’ve faced disciplinary measures for their campus disruption.
The stock price of health-care company Hims & Hers, which offers products for erectile dysfunction, hair, and mental health for men in addition to a female line, fell 8 percent on Friday from its opening price of $12.24 to $11.26. A couple days before, Palestinian-American CEO Andrew Dudum encouraged college activists to continue causing mayhem for the anti-Israel cause.
“Moral courage > College degree,” Dudum tweeted Wednesday. “If you’re currently protesting against the genocide of the Palestinian people & for your university’s divestment from Israel, keep going. It’s working. There are plenty of companies & CEOs eager to hire you, regardless of university discipline.”
In his tweet, he linked to job openings at Hims. By midday Thursday, the company’s stock had dipped 4 percent.
Dudum’s comments sparked backlash on Twitter, where some users threatened to boycott the company. Some corporate bosses had the opposite reaction as Dudum to the chaotic demonstrations, however.
Alex Karp, the CEO of software technology firm Palantir, who is pro-Israel, blasted anti-Israel protesters on Wednesday for their riotous displays, saying they should be sent to North Korea to get a taste of real authoritarianism.
“We’re gonna do an exchange program sponsored by Karp,” he said at the Hill and Valley Forum in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday, Politico first reported. “A couple months in North Korea, nice-tasting flavored bark. See how you feel about that.”
“Look at Columbia,” Karp said. “There is literally no way to explain the investment in our elite schools, and the output is a pagan religion — a pagan religion of mediocrity, and discrimination, and intolerance, and violence.”
Joe Lonsdale, co-founder of Palantir, slammed Dudum for egging on campus unrest.
“Real moral courage doesn’t involve joining a mindless mob, chanting anti-US and other woke Pablum, following instructions not to debate or discuss your positions at all yet being indignantly righteous, while large numbers in the mob chant for violence and block Jewish students,” he said.
Dudum has, since Hamas’s invasion of Israel, condemned the Jewish state for inflicting a large death toll in its Gaza military operation to destroy the terrorist group. He wrote a blog post in November demanding a ceasefire, the Daily Mail found.
“Now, a month past the October 7th attack, we find ourselves in a world where Israel has killed an estimated 10,000 Palestinians with over 4,000 innocent children in a military response that nearly all international experts decry as violations of international law and human rights,” he wrote.
American billionaire hedge fund manager and Harvard grad Bill Ackman has also this week continued his criticisms of the anti-Israel protests. Since the campus fallout following October 7, which included the ouster of former Harvard president Claudine Gay, the founder and CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management has challenged DEI and the leftist takeover of academia. Earlier this week, Ackman donated $10,000 to a GoFundMe raising money for fraternity members at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to throw a party after they claimed to stand for an hour to prevent the American flag from touching the ground at an anti-Israel protest.
On Friday, Columbia University president Minouche Shafik shared her first public message about the protests, arguing that the pro-Palestinian activists escalated their movement to a reckless level by capturing an academic building. That decision, which involved protesters smashing windows, preventing movement of staff, and barricading themselves in, prompted NYPD police intervention.
“These past two weeks have been among the most difficult in Columbia’s history,” Shafik said. “The turmoil and tension, division and disruption have impacted the entire community. A group of protesters crossed a new line with the occupation of Hamilton Hall. It was a violent act that put our students at risk, as well as putting the protesters at risk. I walked through the building and saw the damage which was distressing.”