The U.S. Presidential Scholars Program annually recognizes 161 graduating high school seniors from a nationwide class of roughly 3.9 million students and is widely regarded as one of the country’s highest academic honors. I was selected as a 2025 U.S. Presidential Scholar. Below is the letter that I sent to U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon, when I returned the medal that accompanied the award because I could not, in good conscience, continue to keep an honor conferred in the name of Donald Trump. The letter has been minorly edited according to The Dartmouth’s style guide.
May 12, 2026
The Honorable Linda McMahon
U.S. Department of Education
The Commission on Presidential Scholars
400 Maryland Ave. S.W.
Washington, D.C. 20202-8173
Dear Secretary McMahon,
I am writing to return my 2025 Presidential Scholar medal.
This is not a decision I made quickly or lightly. When I received this honor last fall, I was a new freshman at Dartmouth College. I was also 17. My parents counseled me to wait until I was an adult before acting on a matter of this weight. Having turned 18 this year and spent months in reflection, I have concluded that loyalty to American ideals must supersede the prestige of an award.
I was proud to receive the U.S. Presidential Scholar Medal. I remain proud of the work that earned it. But an honor conferred in the name of a president is inseparable from that president’s name, and I cannot in good conscience continue to possess a medal bearing the signature of Donald Trump.
First: character and fitness. The president in whose name this honor is given has demonstrated, repeatedly and publicly, a character defined by cruelty, dishonesty and contempt for the institutions and norms that make democratic self-governance possible. He has mocked the vulnerable, demeaned women, attacked the free press and treated the rule of law as an obstacle rather than a foundation. There is also his habitual dishonesty, his juvenile taunts and his reflexive projection of his own vices onto others. These are not isolated incidents; they have consistently defined his public conduct.
Second: his conduct toward children and vulnerable people. I will not attempt to catalogue every grotesque allegation, legal finding or documented instance here. But a nation’s character is revealed by how it treats those least able to protect themselves. Much of what this administration has done and excused — at the border, in the courts, in its tolerance of conduct that should be intolerable — falls below the basic standard that any president should be expected to meet.
Third: corruption. The president has repeatedly blurred the line between public office and personal enrichment in ways that have damaged public trust in the presidency. This includes continued entanglements with his business interests, the appearance of monetizing political access and efforts to weaken oversight mechanisms intended to guard against conflicts of interest.
Fourth: the recklessness with which this administration has approached alliances, international stability and the risk of armed conflict. Military strength and diplomacy are not mutually exclusive. Abandoning allies and destabilizing long-standing alliances and international norms for short-term political gain is not toughness. It is irresponsible. These decisions have contributed to instability abroad and economic consequences that have fallen hardest on vulnerable populations.
I recognize that reasonable people disagree about politics and policy. But the concerns I raise here go beyond ordinary partisan disagreement. They arise from the public record. The presidency is meant to strengthen the country’s civic life. Under Donald Trump, it has too often diminished it.
That Donald Trump occupies the presidency as the nation approaches its 250th anniversary is, in my view, deeply regrettable. The anniversary of America’s founding deserves better than to be presided over by a man who has so consistently betrayed its founding ideals.
I want to be clear that I am not saying that the Presidential Scholars Program has itself been stripped of meaning. I am not rejecting the teachers, mentors and family members whose support made my selection possible. I am not making a statement about any policy disagreement between reasonable people.
I am trying instead to make a distinction that I think matters. Institutions can retain their worth even when the people who temporarily preside over them do not deserve the dignity those institutions confer. There are moments when dissent requires more than criticism. It requires refusing to participate in the normalization of conduct I believe diminishes the office. I still believe this program stands for something admirable. But I do not believe that keeping a medal bearing this president’s name is morally neutral. Returning it is the clearest way I know to refuse that association without surrendering the values that made the honor meaningful in the first place.
I also want to be clear that my hesitation was never about courage. It was about respect: for the program, for the people who supported me and for the weight of the recognition itself. I did not want to treat something meaningful as a prop for protest. But there comes a point where continuing to keep the medal feels inconsistent with the principles the honor was meant to recognize. History will judge this moment. I would rather be found on the right side of it, however small my part.
Presidential Scholars are told we represent America’s promise. I believe in that promise enough to refuse to let it be cheapened by association with a man who has shown such consistent contempt for the values it is supposed to embody. I am returning this medal because that promise belongs to all of us, and I do not want to abandon it.
Respectfully,
Caroline Menna
Presidential Scholar, Class of 2025
Opinion articles represent the views of their author(s), which are not necessarily those of The Dartmouth.
