“Hi, I’m Paul.”

If You Give a Mako Pinstripes…

If you don’t catch him right away—don’t grasp what shape cuts through the layabouts and lawn blankets like the short-finned Mako shark—then chances are you’ll lose track, lose interest, forget about him altogether. But here’s your chance. Right there, under Pavilion shade, Paul Mahoney has stopped his evening stroll.

Black pinstripes, shined oxfords, steel-framed readers, and a candy-apple red tie: Paul quits his wandering and lurches to a standstill. He waits with hands clasped as his students, three hundred of them, appear on the Lawn in plumes of cross-legged listeners, picnic baskets, and backpack pillows. 

It’s the annual “Rotunda Sings!” Fifteen A cappella groups to ring in the school year. Students toss footballs over beach chairs as the University Singers slowstep Rotunda marble, tuning their tracheas in dresses and shirtsleeves. The singers breathe before beginning their first number: “Virginia Hail, O Hail!” in piqued falsetto. Everyone’s looking around, but not a soul notices Paul Mahoney in trim, tailor-made suit coat, towering over their solo cups.

Mahoney smiles, subtle and folksy. He listens to the pure, little tenors rising over the cicada buzz as the U-Singers close their tune. Paul gives a cufflink clap. From the left, a wanderer, barreling, clips his shoulder and sends the President stumbling in place. 

“My bad,” the kid says, completely oblivious. Mahoney absolves with a nod, then slips back into the music. A sweet folk traditional: “Will the Circle be Unbroken.” The falsettos pique in D# again, swing the song across the marble for the low-down, baritone bullfrog. Will the circle be unbroken?…if we try Lord…if we try…

Mahoney smirks. Classy. He listens. Refined. But he won’t be staying much longer. In fact, once the song is over, he’ll heel-toe back across the cobblestone in a Breathe-It-In-While-I-Can type stride and disappear. He won’t see Hoos in the Stairwell don calico scarves and beatbox their way through “Am I a Muppet or a Man?” He’ll never catch the Harmonious Hoos whisper-croon “Copa-Copa-Copa-Cabanna” by strobe light. He might not see that, but, right now, as the U-Singers start their clap routine, as the crowd picks it up and the ice-clear choir angels drop to a common man swoon (If we tryyyy Lord. If. We. TRY!): the kids stomp the grass, the free rhythm revival breaks across the Lawn and…is that? The resolute drifter? The double-breasted spector? Could that be Everyman Mahoney in his candy-apple red tie….tapping a foot?

Portrait of a President

Madison Hall. 

The waiting room appears as dueling leather couches (rarely sat) in the foreground of a fireplace (never lit) — watching over a table of “Free Speech Handbooks,” printed and stapled in stacks. The grandfather clock introduces a wallward procession of painted birds, of quails from the Audubon and hawks on the dive, before the looming letters OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT and a portrait of Madison himself. His visage, drawn from the deathbed by James Borton Longacre, peers upon the room with skull-sunk eyes and Dickens nightcap—an Ebenezer Scrooge before the Ghost of University Yet To Come…as Paul Mahoney, cruising spectacularly through the double doors, beams, lurches, quick-thrusts his hand for you to shake. 

“Hi, I’m Paul,” he says.

The introduction is one of habit. A routine he follows daily, shuffling and smiling in and out of his Madison Hall office, rarely finding a moment of rest. On any given school day, Mahoney will trudge through meeting after meeting with the BOV, with donors, alumni, professors, staff, administrators, reporters, coaches. He sits down with students regularly. Coffee chats with leaders from Student Council, UJC, L2K, or a meet and greet with the captain of the Ultimate Frisbee team. That’s where he finds his stride—less comfortable in large crowds and keeping public remarks to a relative minimum.

“I think my style tends to be a little more one-on-one,” Mahoney says, “small groups as opposed to big, massive events.”

Unlike his predecessor, there are no early-bird jogs or branded T-shirts. No podcasts with athletes or presidential Instagram accounts. Fans will step over him in soccer game bleachers, completely unaware. “Perhaps I should wear a shirt saying ‘I’m with President,” remarked one of his colleagues. Mostly, he just invites visitors to his office. In a little archipelago of couches beside his wide, mahogany desk, Paul will sit pole-straight in a leather armchair, listening and nodding as a staffer jots notes from his flank. 

Some find him to be understanding, inquisitive, and remarkably approachable. “Mahoney’s a chiller,” remarked one fourth year in Student Council. Others feel more removed. 

“I met him at convocation,” commented a third year in the college, “He kinda reminded me of a flounder.”

Regardless of impression, Mahoney is professional, head-to-toe. To see him behind the office curtain of Oz is to see him in sharp seersucker or freshly-pressed pinstripes. “Jim Ryan made a clearer effort to engage,” said fourth year, Sterling Peterson. But Mahoney fits the role of Even-Keel. Of a man laser-focused on weathering the storm. 

“The biggest thing I need to do is bring a sense of stability to UVA,” he says. His hands are folded on the tongue of an argyle, red tie and he watches with the polished stiffness of The Man in Charge. There is no confusion between the office and The Man, the role and the persona.

“My main goal is to let the faculty, students, staff, and parents all know that we’re moving ahead,” he says to you from the crook of his leatherback chair. “That things are going to be okay.” 

The Great American Thing

Mahoney was born in 1959, St. Louis—a time and place when the Mom-and-Pop, Mississippi Rivertown shifted into full-scale Midwest metropolis. St. Louis in the 60s was the era of Boom or Bust, of urban renewal and pipedreams, shifting from chuckwagon pioneers to industry that would rival Chicago. 

“Almost everyone who says ‘I’m from Saint Louis’ really means they’re one of the suburbs,” Mahoney begins, “But I grew up right in the city.” He speaks in a metronomical, judicial drawl. Training himself into slow, exact speech is one of the ways he has learned to succeed in this world. He has had a career spanning four decades: first as lawyer, then professor, dean, and now interim president. He’s devoted 35 years to UVA alone. But the lessons of his life began in St. Louis, Missouri. 

“My neighborhood was one of German-Irish-Italian immigrants [where] fathers worked construction and mothers, basically, stayed at home.” 

Construction was king, the engine of innovation and the language of honor. Thousands of able-bodied men worked as riveters, carpenters, wrecking ballers, and engineers. In ‘63, they raised the iconic Gateway Arch, 17,000 tons of welded steel with a keystone dropped two years later—dedicated to “The American People.” Gussie Busch drained his private fortune into a new home for the St. Louis Cardinals, neighborhoods spread, the Poplar Street Bridge materialized, connecting the pulsing downtown with a rapidly replicating suburban grid-work. In ‘66, the gleaming Busch Stadium hosted the Beatles. A year later, the MLB All-Star Game. Mayor Alfonso J. Cervantes would declare, “The rebirth of St. Louis!” The spark, The Great American Thing, had throttled the Last Leap of the East. No longer a glance back for trappers and settlers sculling Northwest: the St. Louis of young Paul Mahoney developed at the speed of his future. 

“My father worked construction,” Mahoney says, “So I always assumed that’s what I would do.”

He trucked through Catholic, parochial education with this plan calcified in his mind. But as an eighth grader, he caught the eye of the much-lauded Jesuit institution, Saint Louis University High School. They saw something unique in young Paul. His family could not afford tuition, so they offered him a generous scholarship to attend. In High School, he joined Track and Field, running the 110-meter hurdles, the triple jump. He sprang and leaped and slammed his bones against the hurdle bars—learning what he loved, and what he could live without. 

“[In High School] I got very interested in STEM,” he says, “I decided I would go to an engineering school, so I applied early decision to MIT and got in.” He says this in the same level-breath drawl—not one syllable stressed or shifted for inflection. Mahoney’s uncle, an engineer, was the only college graduate he knew. He had been an aeronautics technician for McDonald Douglas, the same powerhouse that built for the US during World War II and Korea, that shot the first Americans into space with the Mercury capsule.

“A role model? Oh yes.”

In his uncle, he saw The Great American Thing beating once again. With substantial financial aid to MIT, Mahoney hoped to follow in his footsteps, to learn with zeal and break beyond his working-class background. 

“My time at MIT,” he says, “really impressed upon me how universities can be an engine of socio-economic mobility. To me, that’s one of the most important parts of the American experience—that people can work hard, pursue their passions and succeed, regardless of their background.” 

At the “sports powerhouse of MIT,” Mahoney continued his foray in Track and Field. He balanced two separate bachelor’s degrees, one in electrical engineering, one in political science. While in Boston, he also fostered a deep interest in defense policy—which he saw as “the intersection of the two”—and hoped to broaden his understanding of government and the ways humans organize. 

“I decided that a law degree would be really useful.”

Yale, for his JD in 1984, would eventually lead to a promising career at Sullivan and Cromwell, working on financial markets. But while still in school, Mahoney took a class in corporate securities, taught by future Supreme Court Justice Ralph Winter. He would later clerk for Winter, a man Mahoney believed to be “one of the kindest, most thoughtful people” he had ever met, and then for Thurgood Marshall, whom Mahoney described as one of his “heroes” and “arguably the greatest lawyer of the 20th century.”

“The clerkships were very formative,” Mahoney says, “I clerked for Ralph Winter, who’s very conservative, then I clerked for Thurgood Marshall, who’s very liberal. I discovered that I didn’t fully agree with either of them all the time. But just the ability to converse with people of differing viewpoints was another very eye-opening moment for me.”

After four years at Sullivan and Cromwell, Mahoney discovered how deeply he missed the academic environment. 

“When you’re a practicing lawyer,” he says, “you’re not being paid to sit and think about what is interesting to you. It’s a somewhat solitary job.” 

So he called a few Yale buddies who had slipped back into teaching after some time in the real world. They gave him advice on where to apply and made a few calls. After a slew of interviews, Mahoney settled on the University of Virginia because, in his mind, “it took the teaching part most seriously.”

For decades, he taught students at UVA law, leading courses in contracts, securities regulations, derivative markets, corporate law, quantitative methods, and corporate finance. He joined the Federalist Society as a faculty advisor and eventually became Associate Dean. On July 1, 2008, Mahoney was appointed Dean of the UVA Law School—just as Americans fell into fear and instability during the Great Recession. The job markets for law graduates had dwindled significantly and, within his first year as dean, Mahoney was faced with the incredible difficulty of shepherding his students into the workforce. 

“I learned very quickly that you have to be ready to pivot as circumstances change,” he says, “Regardless of what I thought my priorities would be, I needed to put substantial resources into helping our graduates get jobs.”

In 2009, the national average for law graduates with job commitments was 88.3%. For UVA, that number reached about 90%.

“Our graduates really did as well as any law school in navigating that tricky job market,” he says, “That would be the thing that I am most proud of.”

Mahoney remained dean until 2016, publishing the book Wasting a Crisis: Why Securities Regulation Fails in 2015. Michael Horvitz, a former member of the law school foundation board, told Virginia Magazine that Mahoney was a “very strong leader” and a “reasonable person.”

“This strength,” said Horvitiz, “comes more from his intellectual capacity than from any sort of outgoing personality.”

After that, Mahoney returned to the classroom, continuing where he felt most comfortable. The path he had planned as a young boy in St. Louis had deviated beyond proportion. And, in August 2025, it was about to swerve completely…to reach for the keystone, slyly, of that Great American Thing: opportunity. 

Better Call Paul

“On August 4th, I received a phone call asking if I would be willing to step in as Interim President,” Mahoney says. He still sits in his smooth, leather throne—the pinstripes burning in a slant autumn light that crosses his up-drawn standing desk and portrait of the Pratt Ginkgo in Black and White. 

“Well—I said yes.”

On June 27, 2025, Jim Ryan, UVA’s ninth President, resigned. He had opposed the Trump Administration’s crackdown on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs and, after a long clash with the Department of Justice, the Board of Visitors, and other forces, Ryan was left with no other choice. With the position of Provost vacant as well, the role of Acting President fell to Jennifer Wagner Davis, UVA’s Chief Operating Officer, whom students simply called the “Snow Day Lady.” 

Then came Paul.

Mahoney had emerged, first and foremost, as a level-headed choice for the Board. Someone who could steady the ship without rocking it: a modest conservative who could live and breathe the role of “Interim.” And, to their certain glee, Mahoney latched onto the role with ease. Always hesitant to speak about his aspirations and hopes. Unsurpassable in his ability to dodge speculations about his future at the university. 

Upon his appointment, colleagues and community members spoke to the press, generating a generally favorable consensus.

“Paul Mahoney is a brilliant and seasoned leader who is deeply invested in the success of the University,” Current Law School Dean Leslie Kendrick told UVA Today. “He has worked tirelessly toward one goal: the long-term health of the institution.”

Others took to social media.  

“Excellent choice,” posted UVA professor Paul Wagner. 

“[Mahoney] is the right person to shepherd UVA,” someone wrote on Facebook. 

“A fine choice,” added another, “but he’s no Jim Ryan.”

Mahoney was handed the job on a Monday and expected to walk into Madison Hall one week later, poised for the firing squad. With the start of his tenure, the Interim President inherited a stack of ongoing crises. The strained health system begged for reform, and the University had entangled itself with the Federal Government over civil rights, DEI, and free speech. Such an entanglement culminated in a proposed “Compact for University Excellence” — which Mahoney ultimately declined — and a deal with the DOJ that sent DEI to the chopping block without a settlement, without a payout.

But what does he hope to accomplish?

“My job is to make it possible for the tenth president to be successful,” he says. “I want to have things as stable and calm as possible and have some things teed up so that the tenth president can say, ‘Here’s some momentum I can ride.’ It’s not maintaining the status quo. It’s maintaining forward momentum.”

But forward momentum is vague—it lacks any concrete initiative or plan. Such rhetoric is common for Mahoney. Deliberately vague. Deliberately “interim.” He speaks with the measure, the restraint, of a smiling bellhop. His is the face that shows the donor to his room—the guide, never too forward, who lingers just long enough for his tip. And while, according to the President’s office, Mahoney has no direct role in the presidential search (of which Governor Elect Spanberger and others have tried to halt), he is acutely aware that he is on The List. That every action he takes is painstakingly scrutinized. 

So he sticks to buzzwords. 

“Free inquiry, civil and respectful debate, viewpoint diversity, affordability, the celebration of the 250th anniversary of American independence.” These he lists as his priorities.

When Mahoney took over, the President’s office absorbed the free-speech initiative, Think Again, into its agenda. Founder and Director, Mary Kate Cary, became Mahoney’s Deputy Chief of Staff, and those free speech pamphlets in the Madison Hall waiting room are all stamped with the Think Again emblem. By partnering with this program, Mahoney has found ways to appear as a leader in “civil discourse.” He spoke at the Student Oratory Competition, quoted the words “We the people of the United States” in a short-form video for Constitution Day, and sat with students for “Table Talk,” a project meant to pull phone-scrollers into actual conversation. That day in mid-October, he stepped into Newcomb Hall with cameras and a paper cone of mums and zinnias, handing them with a shy, schoolboy smile to Ms. Kathy, the heartmelting woman who greets students every morning. He then sat at a table with students, listening to their questions, providing them with (albeit vague) answers. 

“He’s such a sweetie pie,” Ms. Kathy said afterward, eyes gleaming.

Yes, Paul Mahoney values “free speech.” He has clerked for it, fostered it as dean of the law school, and now mentions it in every public comment. So Mahoney may be quiet and smiling, but he feels the pulse of what sells. FIRE, in its annual free speech rankings, dropped UVA from 1 to 21 in a single year, placing the university at 210 in terms of “Administrative Support” compared to last year’s 97.  He knows what people want to hear, especially when “free speech” and “universities” have a relationship that is both powerful and perilous.

But even Mahoney admits that he cannot complete all these goals as a short-term interim. “These are all longer-term projects,” he says, “I would like to hand these projects off to the tenth president.” And since Spanberger and the majority of UVA’s left-leaning actors do not have confidence in the BOV or their pick for president, the time for a conservative successor to Jim Ryan seems to be fleeting. Mahoney must become the moderate. He must present himself as Level-Headed Paul, as the Good Samaritan who pulls the shoulder when you pop a tire on 29.

“[The tenth president] may or may not make my goals a priority,” Mahoney says, “but at least they’ll have some momentum.”

At that, I decide to ask directly: “What if the BOV asks you to continue, to be the next president? Would you be interested?”

His neck tightens, shoulders roll. Mahoney stares at the ceiling and sighs. For five…ten…twelve seconds, he pauses and combs through years of legal training, judicial phrasing, organizing his words.

“I think answering that question in an interview,” he says, “would look like lobbying for the job. I would prefer not to do that.”

“Well, what about your initiatives?” I ask, “Would you like them to continue?”

“I would like for some of the things I am prioritizing to become the university’s priorities.”

Smooth.

“Can you complete any of these initiatives in the short term?”

“Well, I’m going to be able to make a good head start.”

Even smoother. 

Throughout his interim, Mahoney has felt the heat beneath his Oxfords. He’s provoked protesters, opposing the compact, to the steps of Madison Hall. He’s sparked critical op-eds in the Cavalier Daily and been tainted by liberal disdain for the current Board. Yet he has survived, again and again, because of his restraint. A flounder? Hardly. He’s the Mako! Shy, humble—sure. But fast enough to shift the tide. To haul the whole beach out with him. 

In a final question, I asked about a moment from his life that he thinks of often. Something that might humanize, something that he remembers fondly. 

“Huh,” he says. 

Another pause…this time spanning a full seventeen seconds.

“Well, I’ll have to ponder that a bit and get back to you.”

Running Hurdles

Game Day. 

It’s here that the President gathers his legions, that he caters and caters to the big ol’ box in Scott Stadium. Donors shuffle with Heinekens and Texas Tuxedos. Professors fill their paper plates, finding spots to rest their tweed. They unlatch their Smathers & Branson buckle belts, stretch their needlepointed saber-V’s…

And what a feast!

Look at that flank steak: cut by the butcher himself, cleaved away under red-hot heat lamps, horseradish to pair. There’s almonds in mounds, honey-drizzle off the comb, raspberry puree in thimble-sized jars, and charcuterie cornucopias on a maple serving board. Have some popcorn, theater style, as it pops! like hail on windshield glass. Then a finger-food Cuban on panini-ed brioche, a little garden salad, shaved carrots, onion volcanos leading toward the twin, open bars…toward Bombay and Wild Turkey, prosecco and chablis, chilled and ready for the cup.

Paul Mahoney stands with a glass of Perrier. Before him, the UVA marching band trudges in from the bleachers. They pool near the bathrooms, drawing a crowd. Uniforms of the Old Cavalier: bolt white stripes down lapels and breasted V’s, rotundas under cape and ostrich plume. Now, the Drum Major lifts his baton, drops his palm and nods. Mouths are led to trumpet lip and flutepiece, fingers grip round tuba valves and bell. A wave of the hand, a one and a two and…a fighting song, a chanting song: a “Countdown to Cav Man.” 

Rumble…rolllllll starts that first circus of drums. After that, the balloon of whining trumpet blares, the French Horn’s pastoral romp—

“U!”

Snap! goes the snare again. Lips wetting, spit valves full and dripping on the carpet—

“V!”

As the hee-HO, honking tuba rises, bumbles with the blast of an old, clogged nostril—

“A!” 

It just pulls free your pride, drags that football-feeling from your chest and quickens your pulse. Everyone standing as one: donors, pedagogues and cocktail mules, watching the concert from their cozy box seats. A whole stadium of sound in this high-rise fishbowl.

“U!—V!—A! LET’S!—GO!—HOOS!”

Mahoney loves his football. He loves his hiking and his opera and entertaining his troupe as any good president should. He’s there with Dan Brody, dressed to the nines in a chalk-blue tie. He’s more comfortable now, three months on the job. The first-round jitters are finally fading. He laughs more easily, comes around more often. His wife, Julia, stands beside him and smiles. They are grandparents now: a baby girl born this year. Every swing and dodge since August, they have felt together. Below, the crowd roars with touchdown. “The Good Ol’ Song” rises and Mahoney sways while the stadium links arms in song.

“President Mahoney,” someone says with a passing nod. 

No more Hey Paul. 

Not long after my interview, Mahoney reached out via staffer, relaying the personal anecdote I had asked for. The story he told was one of a middle school summer, of an evening in a St. Louis kitchen while he watched the Olympics on Channel 2. That night, he watched hurdlers run for the first time. He sat there, fascinated, feeling their thrill, bending their bones, wanting their fear of breaching the obstacle, midjump. So he found a pair of woodback chairs and a pantry broom, dragging them out to the dim backyard. There, he balanced the broom on the cross rails: his very own homegrown hurdle. He ran and ran and jumped and ran, jumped until he fell and split his shin. Then stood and started again. 

But, a few days after it was told, the story was nixed. The Office of the President reached out again, hoping the initial story would disappear. Perhaps Mahoney felt it too personal, too ordinary. In return, Mahoney sent a new story, one written in his own words. A personal memory that might be safe enough to share: 

“When I was a freshman in high school, I tried out for the track team. I had good but not off-the-charts athleticism, so I focused on events that also required excellent technique, such as the 110-meter hurdles. By chance, my home state of Missouri had just added triple jump as an event at state-level meets. I therefore decided that it would be my primary event. Because it was a new event, I figured that no one would have a head start in mastering the (difficult) technique, and if I worked really hard, I could be one of the best at it. The theory proved out; in my senior year, I was one of the top triple jumpers in the state. Strategy is the key.”

Strategy. 

There is not a word out of Mahoney’s mouth that is not dunked in plan and procedure. That folksy, disarming innocence you catch at first glance? It bears no resemblance to his mind of grand ambition. Here is a St. Louis boy, jumping broomsticks: crawling from Construction-Ville to MIT by scholarship, crossing Winter’s chamber, bounding over Sullivan & Cromwell to the deanship…landing, finally, in a corner office at Madison Hall. Here is a man, so disciplined and judicious, that when a childhood story reveals too much, he must remedy it with some teletype of high school athletics. 

Does he genuinely care? Certainly. But don’t let him fool you. He has the practice, the restraint. He knows when to pull the knee, when to lift the heel, how to time his leap and scale the ugly bar. This is not “maintaining forward momentum.” This is the runner, the strongman, the Mako in Pinstripes, striding the best he can, knowing there is only one way to reach the finish line.

Strategy.