CHAPEL HILL (June 6, 2024) – After clashes with protesters and a “symbolic” vote by trustees to transfer funds out of diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, “What I say is that all are welcome here, and that this university is for everybody,” says UNC Chapel Hill’s interim chancellor.

Leoneda Inge, co-host of WUNC’s Due South, conducted an excellent interview recently with Interim Chancellor Lee Roberts. We republish it here, with permission from WUNC – you can click here to hear the entire interview.

A few excerpts:

• On his status as a Duke graduate: “I have seen the light…. We don’t have a more important institution in the state than Carolina. That’s been true since we started 229 years ago… The future of the state has always been closely intertwined with the future of this institution. So if you care about the state, you have to care about what happens here.”
• On students’/faculty’s/alumni’s “deep passion” for Carolina: “It has to preserved, because it’s not easily replicated.”
• On the political nature of his job: “It’s a nonpartisan job, and I’ve said before – and I meant it – that I intend to do it in a nonpartisan way.”
• On the arrests of pro-Palestinian protesters: “The truth is, if your objective is to get arrested, you can keep escalating until you have no other option – you leave the authorities no other choice.”
• On walking onto the quad to see the American flag restored: “It was very much a spur-of-the-moment decision. Nobody told me to do it… It really did just seem like the right thing to do. The American flag had been taken down. The Palestinian flag had been put up. It didn’t seem right for me to ask somebody else to go put the American flag up if I wasn’t willing to go out there myself. And (in retrospect) I gotta tell you, I think I would do it more or less the same way.”
• On his late mother, NPR broadcaster Cokie Roberts, and two grandparents who served in Congress: “They always made clear that what politicians do … is help people.” Roberts recalls his grandmother Lindy Boggs (who spent 18 years in Congress) on the phone helping people with their Social Security checks and veterans’ benefits.
• On the UNC System’s repeal of its diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policy and representation of the state’s Black population: “We clearly have more work to do on that front… You never accomplish the goal of reflecting the state. It’s always going to be a moving target. And we always have to make sure we’re working as hard as possible to fulfill that objective. And it’s not enough just to reflect the state on paper. We need to make sure that when students get here – when anyone gets here – they feel welcome, as though this is a place for them, and we need to make sure we’re helping them thrive.”

“What I say is that all are welcome here, and that this university is for everybody.”

• On the Board of Trustees’ vote to divert $2.3 million from DEI to public safety: “That was the Board of Trustees… It was more of a symbolic effort.” The UNC System has made clear that any savings on reductions in DEI should go to “student success” programs, he says, not public safety.
• On whether he will seek to become Carolina’s permanent chancellor: “I’ve been saying, ‘Let’s get through graduation,’ but now graduation was three weeks ago. So I’ll have to come up with another way to dodge that question.”

To hear the full interview, listen here on WUNC.