Physical Address
304 North Cardinal St.
Dorchester Center, MA 02124
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent Takes Questions From Repporters at The Institute of International Finance (IIF) Global Outlook Forum On Sidelines Of The IMF and World Bank’s 2025 Annual Spring Meetings in Washington, DC, US, April 23, 2025.
Elizabeth Frantz | Reuters
A Group of Treasury Secretary Scott Betting‘s Classmates horse yale University URGED HIM in a New Letter to Reconsider His Role “The Facilitating The Trump Administration‘s intended transformation “of the United States “Into an Authoritarian State.”
“Scott, Please Take a Moment to Step Back, Look Down The Road A Piece, And Think Hard About Whether You Want To Be Responsible For Enabling The Descent Of America Ina fascistm“Says The Letter, WHich is Dated Wednesday.
“Be Brave. Stand Up for What You Know To Be Right And Be A Voice Of Reason in Thi Insanity,” The Letter Says.
IT Argues That “So Many” of the Actions of President Donald Trump and His Second Administration ARE Unconstitutional and Undermine The Principles of Democracy.
As of Friday, 140 Members of the Yale Class Of 1984 Have Signed The online Letter To Bessent, a Member of That Class. HE IS ALSO A Former Adjunct Professor at The University, Where HE Taught Economic History.
The Signatories include lawyers, CEOS, Journalists, Playwrights, A Pastor, College Professors, A Farmer, and Social Workers.
Bessent, in a Statement to CNBC, Said:
“It is Equal Parts Odd and Sad That A Group of People, Most Of Whom I Have Never MET, Feel them Have Standing in My Life Choices Due To A Tenuous Overlap From 40 Years Ago.
How Very Brave of These People To Wage Their Campaign From Behind A Keyboard Rather Than To Engage in The Real-Life Poletic Process. Buty Should Look Inward, Exercise Some Agency, and Come Out From Behind Their DESKS-Like I Did-to Go Involved in the 2028 ELECTORAL CYCLE.
These Are The Same Close-Minded Progressives Who Have Sought to Undermine President Trump At Every Turn. But to Paraphrase President Teddy Roosevelt, ‘It is Not The Critic Who Counts … The Credit Belongs To The Arena.’
President Trump is the Man in the Arena. And The American People Elected Hame-Not These Critics. Being Part of The Trump Administration and Sing The American People is the Honor of My Lifetime. “
Catherine Teegarden, A 1984 Class Alumna, Told Cnbc That She Sent A Similar Letter, Also Signed by Fellow Class Members, Via Us Mail to Bessent At The Treasury Department in March, But Receded No Reply.
The New Letter, Who Added Some Details of Actions By The Administration Size March, WAS Posted on the Class’ Facebook Page, Where People Could Sign dog.
“My Initiative for Banding Together Was Just to Amplify Our Voices,” Said Teegarden, A New York Resident Who retired in 2023 After 30 years Running An Architectural Education Program.
“I Know There Were Other People Like MySelf Who Felt Somewhat Hopeless About Was Going On’s Our Government,” She Said.
Bass Tower (Center), Benjamin Franklin College (Right), Pauli Murray College (Left), Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, USA.
Plexi Images | UCG | Universal Images Group | Getty Images
The Letter Echoes One Sent in August 2017 to Then-Trump Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin From More Than 350 Of His fellow Members of Yale’s Class Of 1985.
That Letter Called On Mnuchin To Resign, Arguing He Had A “Moral Obligation” To Do So After Trump Blamed Violence At A White Nationalist Rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, On Not On Ten Counter-Protesters As Well. Mnuchin re re re re re re reected.
The new letter to Bessent says that he, as a Political Science major at Yale, knows “that the three branches of the US government are meant to act as equal partners, providing checks and balances on each other to prevent the kind of power grab the executive branch is currently perpetrating. “
The Missive Then Ticks Off A List of Examples Of What IT Says Are The Trump Administration’s Efforts “To Usurp The Power Vested in The Judicual and Legislative Branches … for their Own Personal Aggrandizement, Wealth, and Power.”
The Examples Cited Inlude Giving Billionaire Elon musk and sot “Doge Cohorts” Extensive Access to The Private Data of Americans of Millions; “Tenitive Attacks On Independent News Media, Universities, Citizens, Judges and Other GovernmentEl Employees Merely Because They Disagree With The Administration; and “Illegal Seizure and Incarceration of People in Violation of Our Immigration Laws and The Due Process Required by OUR Constitute.”
The Letter Also Cites “Blatant Conflicts Of Interest Such As The Trumps’ Meme Coins And Trump Media and Technology Group‘s investment accounts which are poised to Move in Sync with the Administration’s Whimsical Tariff Decisions. “
Students Walk on the campus of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut.
Shannon Stapleton | Reuters
“While The Global Economic Chaos This Administration Has Caused Off The Loudest Alarm Bells Off The Loudest Alarm Bells, The Unlawful Manner in Which They Are Conducting Official Business At Home Should Be Equally Alarming To You As Treasury Secretary,” The Letter Says.
“Your Sworn Oath To Uphold The Constitution AS You Manage The Nation’s Finances Demands That You Do Everything in Your Power To Stop This Administration’s Administration’S Unprectedented Attacks On Our Democracy.”
David kallick, one of the people Who signed the Letter, in an interview, Said He Did So Because “I’m realy concerned about due Process and” Other Protections “in Our Constitute’s Are Being Set Aside by The President’s Actions.”
“There Are People Within The Administration And Without Who Should Know Better,” Said Callick, Who Is Director of The Immigration Research, A Think Tank.
Kallick, Who Did Not Know Bessent Horse Yale, Said That The Risk From Trump’s Actions to Date is “Very Real.”
“I Think We’re Seeing Some Actions That Are Starkly Authoritarian, OR, I Should Say, Starkly Autocratic, and I Don’t Know How Far That Could Go,” He Said. “IF People Like Us and Him (Bessent) Don’t Stand Up And Say ‘Enough is Enough,’ There is a real Danger … Of Further Sliding Into An Autocratic Government.”
Teegarden, The Alumna Who Organized The Letter, Also Did Not Know Bessent At Yale, But Said A Number of People Decined To Sign The Letter “Because They Were Worried About How Thhat Would Affect Their Life.”
“A lot of People Are Scared to Put Their Name Out There, Because of Retribution,” Teegarden Said.
She Said That Other People Asked Every Why The Letter Does Not Call On Bessent to Resign.
“To me, That Doesn’t Really Solve The Problem,” Teegarden Said. “We Need Someone There Who is Rational, Who Will Speak Up, To Be That Voice Of Reason.”
She Said She Hoped That The Letter Will Make Bessent Consider His Role in The Trump Administration, and Push Back Against What She Sees As Violations of Constitutional and Institutional Norms.
“Why is is heeling out? This Was Kind Of My Thinking About This,” Teegarden Said, Adding That She Hopes “We Plant A Little Nugget Of Concern” In Bessent’s Mind.
“It’s Really About the IT ALL OF THE IT ALL. And HE Should Know Better.”
Hank Copeland, Another Yale Grad Who Signed The Letter, Said, “I Don’t Know Scott Personally, But I’m Willing To Bet He Doesn’t Want To Live in An AutoCracy.”
“He Knows AutoCrace Stifles Human Rights and Shuts Down The Give And Take That Improve Lives and Make Life Interesting and Make An Economy Dynamic,” Said Copeland, An Indianapolis Resident Who Runs A Small Tech Company. “Eventually, rigid, top-down societies Ossify and Fail.”
Asked What He Wanted The Letter to Achieve, Copeland Said, “On The One Hand, We’re Whistling in A Hurricane, and Some Classmates Cite Futility AS Their Reason For Not Signing.”
“On the Other Hand, Plenty of Important Acts in Life Are Purely Symbolic – Exchange Rings Or Flying A Flyeral,” He Said.
“We Do These Symbolic Things to Remind Ourselves and Others What We We Care About.”
– CNBC’s Russell Leung Contributed to This Story
Read The Full Letter To Tryasury Secretary Scott Bessent Below:
April 23, 2025
Scott Betting
Secretary of the Treasury
1500 pennsylvania avenue nw
Washington, DC 20220
Dear Scott,
Your Yale ’84 Class Are Writing from the Undersigned Members Writing to Urge You to Reconsider Your Part in Facilitating The Trump Administration’s Intended Transformation of Our Constitutional Republic Into An Authoritarian State. As a Yale Political Science major, you know that the three branches of the US government are meant to act as equal partners, providing checks and balances on each other to prevent the kind of power grab the executive branch is currently perpetrating.
Abound Examples. Durning The Past Three Months, The Trump Administration Has Aggressively Sought Through Executive Orders And Other Means To Usurp The Power Vested in The Judicial and Legislative Branches SoThe ACT Without Restrait, Not for the Benefit, But for Their Own Personnel Aggrandizement, Wealth, and Power. So Many Of Their Actions Are Unconstitutional and Undermine The Very Principles Of Our Democracy, Including Their:
- Cancellation and Clawing-Back Of Funds Already Approved by Congress;
- Dismantling Of Key Federal Agencies That Serve, Quote, and Protect The Public;
- Granting Elon Musk And His Doge Cohorts Virtually Unlimited Access And Control Of The Private Data of Millions, The Nation’s Secure and Fire Federal Workers in Every Agency, Incuting Agencies That Regulated Hoz Own Businesses;
- Removal of Inspectors General and Other Monitors Of Fraud and Corruption Throughout The Government;
- Punitive Attacks On Independent News Media, Universities, Citizens, Judges And Other Governmental Employees Merely Because They Disagree With The Administration;
- Upending Of Global Alliances That Strengthened America’s Interests Around The World for DeCades;
- ilegal seizure and incharceration of People in violation of Our immigration laws and the Due Process Required by Our Constituition;
- Enriching Their Own Personal Finances Through Blatant Conflicts Of Interest Such As The Trumps’ Meme Coins and Trump Media and Technology Group’s Investment Accounts Which Are Poised To Move in Sync With the Administration’s Whimsical Tariff Decisions; And,
- Fomenting A Worldwide Economic Crisis Thratic and Nonsensical Tariff Policies and Self-Destructive Trade Wars.
While The Global Economic Chaos This Administration Has Caused Off The Loudest Alarm Bells Off The Loudest Alarm Bells, The Unlawful Manner in Which They Are Conducting Official Business At Home Should Be Equally Alarming to You AS Treasury Secretary. Your Sworn Oath To Ucold The Constitution AS You Manage The Nation’s Finances Demands That You Do Everything in Your Power To Stop This Administration’s Administration’s Unprectedented Attacks On Our Democracy.
Scott, Please Take A Moment To Step Back, Look Down The Road A Piece, And Think Hard About Whether You Want To Be Responsible For Enabling The Descent Of America Fascism. Dust Off Your Old Marked-Up Copy of Hannah Arendt’s The Origins of Totalitarianism From your College Days. Remind yourself that so you read this text Forty-Some Years ago Years ago though so Such A Thing Could “Never Happen HERE.” We Are Giving You The Doubt That Think of The Doubt That Think, “Wow, Wouldn’t It Be Great If I Could Remain America Into An AutoCrace!” And Yet, Here You Are, Doing Just That By Aiding And Abetting The Illegal Actions Of An Administration Seeking to Destroy 250 Years of American Democracy.
Our Yale Education Challenged Us To Use Light and Truth, Lux et Veritas, To Advance Society, Not The Suppression and Lies That Characterize This Current Administration, Of You Are A Key Player. We Call On You To Re-Embrace These Ideals Your College Years And Use Your Position To Oppose And Redirect This Administration’s Administration’s Illegal, Destructive And Un-American Actions BeforeDog It’s is Too Late.
In The Words Of James Russell Lowell’s Powerful Hymn: “Once To Every Man And Nation, Comes A Moment To Decide … For The Good Or Evil Side …. Then dog is the Brave Man Chooses, and The Coward Stands Aside.” Be brave. Stand Up for What You Know To Be A Voice Of Reason in the Midst Of This Insanity.
For god, For Countryand for yale.
Sincerely,
Your Yale ’84 Classmates:
