Seton Hall renews support for school president in wake of POLITICO report
Joseph Reilly was highlighted in an internal investigation on abuse — and then named to lead the university.
Monsignor Joseph R. Reilly is Seton Hall University president. | Seton Hall University via PRWeb
January 23, 2025
By Dustin Racioppi
Seton Hall University is vigorously defending its new president after POLITICO reported he was implicated in a secret report on sexual abuse.
The findings about Monsignor Joseph Reilly prompted calls for his resignation in recent weeks from state lawmakers, and New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy urged the Catholic university to release its internal report on Reilly.
But in a university-wide email on Thursday, the chair of Seton Hall’s Board of Regents said the university’s governing board “continues to stand by” its president.
Seton Hall did not respond to a message asking what specific news stories were false. It has also not sought a correction to POLITICO’s reporting.
Reilly was not accused of abuse himself. But investigators in 2019 recommended, pursuant to a responsive action plan the school’s governing body adopted, that Reilly be removed as a seminary leader and member of university boards, according to interviews and documents previously reviewed by POLITICO.
The university hired two law firms in 2018 to review the “influence and actions” of former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, who was the archbishop of Newark before being named to lead the diocese in Washington, D.C. That followed decades of allegations that he had sexually abused children and seminarians. Since then, he has faced allegations across multiple states, and was stripped of his ministry.
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