00:00And now, please welcome the acting president of the university, Blair Shidman.
00:19Parents and families, we have not known them as long as you have, but we have had the privilege
00:34of meeting your young stars in our classrooms, eager to explore new interests and ideas, brilliant
00:41and accomplished.
00:42Our spectacular faculty here have undeniably furthered what is best within them.
00:49Their idealism, their curiosity, their ability to ask the right questions, and their ability
00:56to answer them to your benefit and to the world's.
01:00Families, you have given us a gift.
01:03Thank you.
01:04And graduates, it is time to give the world your gifts.
01:08So with that, let me turn to you, the nearly 16,000 graduates of the Columbia Class of 2025.
01:16You are the best of us.
01:17You are lawyers.
01:18You are linguists, philosophers.
01:19And let me also say that we firmly believe that our international students have the same
01:31rights to freedom of speech as everyone else and that could not be targeted by the government
01:38for exercising that right.
01:40And let me also say that I know many in our community today are mourning the absence of our
01:49graduate, Mahmoud Khalil.
01:56You are exactly what the world needs at this moment.
02:01Not simply because you happen to be graduates of the greatest institution in the world, that helps, of course, but also because the most resilient, visionary, innovative leaders are forged in times of challenge and change.
02:16And you have already navigated your way through considerable turbulence.
02:23I want to offer one observation given the rain to keep in mind as you step out into this world, which is this democracy is not inevitable.
02:38When I left Columbia and began a career in journalism, in a period of sweeping change not unlike this one, I arrived in Moscow in time to experience the final years of an authoritarian state.
02:52The only place that was safe was late at night in private apartments and with enormous caution.
03:12There was nothing in fact that made me appreciate our country more than spending time in the former Soviet Union.
03:21When it all collapsed, not only did a country fall, but so did its monuments.
03:27I remember vividly the graveyards littering the capital full of concrete remnants of Stalin, Lenin, Felix Dzerzhinsky, the infamous KGB boss, ripped down with cranes and even bare hands by a frustrated population, disillusioned with ideology and idolatry.
03:49It was clear to us, the Western reporters and everyone in the West, what would come next, democracy, it would just spread naturally.
03:58Of course, we all know now, it didn't take, not in Russia, not in China, after Tiananmen Square, not in parts of Eastern Europe.
04:08Democracy, it turns out, is work to build and to maintain. Our norms and our systems cannot be taken for granted.
04:21They don't transplant easily, they don't simply spread, they have to be nurtured and repaired over and over.
04:28This is the essential work of your generation and you have the wisdom and the moral clarity to do it.
04:37In my view, for example, nothing is more foundational to democracy, to American strength, than freedom of thought, the training of minds and the unfettered creation and exploration of knowledge.
04:54Academic institutions like ours, and even this moment right now, they're pillars of a healthy, functioning, democratic nation.
05:06They are the basis for American innovation across all disciplines and for our scientific and technological preeminence.
05:15They must be protected and they must also protect themselves by remaining relevant and essential to our current set of challenges.
05:26Congratulations graduates.
05:28Congratulations graduates.
