The New School, a university that has positioned itself as inclusive and supportive of its Jewish students, has recently come under scrutiny following its decision to hire a controversial professor. Corinna Mullin, a well-known political science professor with a focus on anticolonialism and criticism of Western culture, has joined the faculty amidst controversy surrounding her past activities.
Mullin was a prominent figure in a protest held in April 2024 at City College of New York’s Harlem campus. The demonstration, which she helped lead, ended in chaos with a fire that engulfed the science building, causing damages amounting to $3 million, according to school officials. Her involvement in the protest led to her arrest.
She gained notoriety as one of the “fired four”—a group of adjunct professors at CUNY who claimed they were dismissed in the summer of 2025 due to their vocal support for Palestine. This occurred in the context of an upcoming congressional hearing by the Trump administration addressing antisemitism on college campuses.
While Mullin and two others were reportedly reinstated in January, according to Higher Ed Labor United, her teaching status at CUNY for the recent spring semester remains ambiguous, as her name is absent from the faculty listings.
In the interim, Mullin has taken a position at The New School, which itself has faced controversy. The university’s student senate recently voted to sanction its Hillel chapter, a decision that school officials stated was beyond the student senate’s authority.
Mullin began teaching a course called “Middle East in the World” in Fall 2025 and is scheduled to teach “Decolonizing International Law” in September.
Mullin has called Arab countries normalizing ties with Israel “high treason” — and has worked with the Samidoun network, a sham charity that acts as a front for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine terrorist organization, according to the State Department. She didn’t reply to a request for comment.
The university didn’t answer The Post’s questions about Mullin’s hiring, but it continued to insist every student, regardless of background, was “welcome, valued and respected” at New School and that the move to sanction Hillel was “unacceptable.”
“We are looking carefully at how this situation unfolded, what further actions the university needs to take,” a spokesperson told The Post.
The student senate voted May 1 to end funding for Hillel, claiming its participation in trips that sent students to volunteer on military bases in Israel tied it to “grave violations of international law.”
Hillel said targeting its apolitical organization amounted to attacking Jewish identity on campus, and that the Israel trips were funded by private donations, not through student fees.
“The idea that student money is somehow funding foreign military operations is simply incorrect,” said Michael Valdes, a graduating MFA student and Hillel member, who served on the student senate last year.
“People are entitled to their opinion about Israel, the war and international politics. But political disagreement cannot become the justification for excluding a student club from campus life.”
Only a small source of Hillel’s funding came from the student fees distributed by the student senate, and the organization has not had to cancel any events.
“We will continue to be at this campus,” said Valdes in an address to the student senate Friday.