{"id":35155,"date":"2025-11-04T18:58:12","date_gmt":"2025-11-04T18:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/35155\/"},"modified":"2025-11-04T18:58:12","modified_gmt":"2025-11-04T18:58:12","slug":"texas-am-paid-former-president-mark-a-welsh-iii-3-5-million-after-he-resigned-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/35155\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas A&M paid former president Mark A. Welsh III $3.5 million after he resigned\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sign up for The Brief<\/a>, The Texas Tribune\u2019s daily newsletter that keeps readers up to speed on the most essential Texas news.<\/p>\n

The Texas A&M University System paid former President Mark A. Welsh III more than $3.5 million after he resigned<\/a> amid the fallout of a controversy<\/a> over the teaching of gender identity issues, according to a separation agreement obtained through a public records request.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the days before he stepped down, Welsh had pushed for a full payout of the remainder of his contract, something that Welsh seemingly believed some members of the Board of Regents were opposed to, according to communications reviewed by The Texas Tribune.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Welsh became president in 2023 and his contract ran through December 2028 with a $1.1 million annual salary, meaning he had a little more than three years remaining when he resigned. He was also eligible for a $150,000 retention bonus on each anniversary of the agreement, plus a $150,000 housing allowance each year.<\/p>\n

On Sept. 17, two days before he resigned, Welsh emailed Chancellor Glenn Hegar and Executive Vice Chancellor Susan Ballabina and told them that Board of Regents Chair Robert Albritton supported giving Welsh a full payout.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cCan\u2019t believe I forgot to mention this to you today,\u201d Welsh wrote. \u201cThe idea for the 5-year payout actually came from something Bob Albritton said on our phone call Monday: \u2018Mark, I\u2019m so tired of this bullshit \u2026 You gotta trust me that I\u2019m gonna push to get you paid that full contract.\u2019\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Welsh\u2019s email also suggests that not every regent agreed with paying him the full amount left in his contract \u2014\u00a0and points to the tensions between him and top university system administrators ahead of his resignation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the reason I was a little surprised when you told me they didn\u2019t support the 5-year payout,\u201d Welsh wrote. \u201cI don\u2019t expect you to do anything with this note except double delete it (which is what I\u2019m gonna do after I send it), and I\u2019m not asking you to use it for anything, I just want you to know why trust has gone out the window on my side of all this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Welsh\u2019s last day as president was Sept. 19. The board approved<\/a> his separation agreement on Sept. 26.\u00a0<\/p>\n

His departure came after a secret recording of a classroom discussion about gender identity went viral on Sept. 8, prompting conservative lawmakers, including Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick<\/a>, to publicly criticize Welsh for initially refusing to fire the professor involved. He later fired<\/a> the professor and demoted the dean and department head.<\/p>\n

Welsh\u2019s payout follows a series of costly leadership and reputational crises at Texas A&M. In August 2023, regents approved<\/a> a $1 million settlement with journalism professor Kathleen McElroy after the university watered down her job offer following conservative criticism of her past diversity work. The controversy led to the resignation<\/a> of then-President M. Katherine Banks. Regents brought in Welsh to replace her and stabilize the university.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Months later, in November 2023, Texas A&M agreed to pay more than $75 million to buy out head football coach Jimbo Fisher, the largest buyout in college sports history.<\/p>\n

Welsh declined a request for comment. His separation agreement included a provision that he not discuss the payout or disparage the university.<\/p>\n

A Texas A&M system spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

The Texas Tribune partners with Open Campus on higher education coverage.<\/p>\n

Disclosure: Texas A&M University and Texas A&M University System have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune\u2019s journalism. Find a complete\u00a0list of them here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sign up for The Brief, The Texas Tribune\u2019s daily newsletter that keeps readers up to speed on the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35127,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[289,287,27,2687,3097,29,293,28],"class_list":["post-35155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-higher-education","tag-politics","tag-texas","tag-texas-am-university-system","tag-texas-am-university-college-station","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-legislature","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35155","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35155"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35155\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35127"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}