Over the past few days, the University’s Board of Visitors experienced its largest shakeup in years. As reported by the New York Times, shortly before assuming office, governor-elect Abigail Spanberger asked multiple members of the Board to resign, five of whom have so far complied with her request. Immediately after assuming office on January 17th, Governor Spanberger announced the appointment of ten new members to the Board—five to fill the spaces left open from the members who had recently resigned, and five to fill the spaces that had been left open during the latter half of former Governor Glenn Youngkin’s term, when the majority-Democratic General Assembly refused to approve to approve his appointments.
The five members who have so far resigned from the Board of Visitors are, as follows:
Rachel Sheridan: Sheridan served as rector of the Board of Visitors from July 1st, 2025 until her resignation on Friday. Sheridan, who was appointed to the Board in 2023, faced controversy earlier in her term regarding her role in the resignation of former University President Jim Ryan in June, resulting in a call for her own resignation from the Faculty Senate in November. Sheridan has defended her conduct in the period leading up to Ryan’s resignation, stating that she had not supported initial Board efforts to remove him.
Porter Wilkinson: Porter Wilkinson, a member of the Board since 2024, was appointed vice rector along with Sheridan in July, and served in that capacity until Friday. Like Sheridan, Wilkinson faced increased scrutiny in the months following Jim Ryan’s resignation, especially when Ryan issued a statement in November claiming that Wilkinson and Sheridan had acted as liaisons with the Department of Justice despite not officially having assumed office as vice rector and rector, respectively.
Paul Manning: Manning, who had previously donated $100 million to the University for the creation of the Paul and Diane Manning Institute of Biotechnology and served as a member of the Board of Visitors since 2023, also resigned on Friday. Manning was the third prominent board member who featured heavily in the controversies surrounding Jim Ryan’s resignation, having been one of the members who, according to Ryan, communicated information from the DOJ to him in June and July.
Douglas D. Wetmore: Wetmore, confirmed to the Board in 2023, resigned on Saturday. Wetmore was not directly mentioned in any of the accounts surrounding Jim Ryan’s resignation, but attracted attention shortly before his own resignation when the Washington Post published text messages by him with other board members stating, among other things, that the Board “[needs] to move decisively at UVA to ban DEI and all forms and regimes of racial classification.”
Stephen Long: Long, appointed to the board in 2022, resigned on Saturday. Long was also featured in the Post’s report on leaked text messages from Board Members; among the messages by him include one critical of a professor supportive of DEI programs and one in reference to then-President Ryan’s handling of UVA’s health system: “He’s such a snake — thinks I don’t know everything!!”
All five were appointed by former Governor Glenn Youngkin.
The ten members appointed by Governor Spanberger are, as follows:
Mike Bisceglia: Bisceglia is the President and CEO of Stauer, a watch and jewelry company. He also serves as a board member for both the MCV (VCU’s medical school and hospital) Foundation and the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts.
Carlos Brown: Brown currently serves as the President and Chief Administrative & Projects Officer of Dominion Energy. Brown has prior experience on the Board of Visitors, having been appointed by former Governor Ralph Northam in 2021 and elected vice rector in 2023. He left the Board in June 2025.
Robert Byron: Byron is the Chairman and Co-Founder of Blue Vista Capital Management. He is also a member of the Advisory Board of UVA’s White Ruffin Byron Center for Real Estate.
Peter M. Grant II: Grant is a founding partner at Anchormack Holdings and Chair of the Board of Directors of UVA’s Licensing & Ventures Group. He previously served as Chair of the Board of Managers of UVA’s Alumni Association.
Owen D. Griffin, Jr.: Griffin is the President and CFO of Currie Medical. In terms of University connections, he serves as a member of the Darden School Foundation’s Board of Trustees.
Victoria D. Harker: Harker is the former Vice President and CFO of TEGNA, Incorporated. Harker is a former member of the Board of Visitors, having been appointed by former Governor Robert McDonnell in 2012, and was a member of the presidential search committee that selected Jim Ryan in 2018.
Elizabeth Haile Hayes: Hayes is a former partner at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP and a member of the UVA Architecture Foundation Board and the Parent Program Leadership Council.
Rudene Mercer Haynes: Haynes serves as a partner at Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP and at Hunton & Williams LLP.
Evans Poston Jr.: Poston is currently Director of Federal & State Affairs at Troutman Strategies. Poston, appointed by Ralph Northam in 2018, is also a past member of the Board of Visitors.
Mohsin Syed: Syed served as Chief of Staff at the US Department of Transportation from July 2023 to January 2025, having previously served as Assistant Secretary for Government Affairs in the same department.
All ten Spanberger appointees are graduates of the University. The appointees are highly likely to be confirmed by the General Assembly, which has Democratic majorities in both the Senate and House of Delegates. If confirmed, a majority of the 17-member Board of Visitors will have been appointed by Governor Spanberger.
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