In 2016, zero professors at the top five US law schools endorsed Donald Trump.

'Top five US law schools' means the top five in the US News ranking in effect around 2016 (with ties included). 'Endorsed' means a public endorsement of Trump's 2016 candidacy, such as a signed endorsement letter, an op-ed, or a stated public endorsement; political donations alone do not count. True: no full-time faculty member at those schools is documented as publicly endorsing Trump during the 2016 election. Mostly false: one or a few such endorsements are documented, so 'zero' is wrong even though the near-absence is real. False: several or more endorsements are documented. 'Zero' is an exact claim, so a single documented endorsement rules out true and mostly true.

Set before the research began.

1. E1 A Two-Way Street | The Harvard Crimson The Harvard Crimson · 3 November 2016

   “Fried does not know any Trump supporters on the faculty—unsurprising, given that 98 percent of campaign contributions by Law School faculty between 2011 and the third quarter of 2014 went to Democratic campaigns.”

2. E2 Academics declare support for Donald Trump Inside Higher Ed · 4 October 2016

   “Frank Buckley, a Foundation Professor at the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University, said he and other conservative scholars helped organize the letter -- a brief, one-sentence statement backing the candidate -- to establish that there are some ideas behind Trump's candidacy.”

3. E3 Academics declare support for Donald Trump Inside Higher Ed · 4 October 2016

   “Now Bauerlein, one of the country's most vocal conservative academics, is one of the few in the profession openly supporting Donald Trump.”

4. E4 The academic Trumpists: American professors who support the Trump presidency - Theory and Society Theory and Society (Springer) · 28 April 2020

   “While our list of supporters includes a disproportionate number of law professors specializing in constitutional law, again this does not mean that constitutional law professors as a whole or even a majority of them support Trump.”

5. E5 The academic Trumpists: American professors who support the Trump presidency - Theory and Society Springer (Theory and Society) · 28 April 2020

   “Kersch (2019) claims that many “originalists” at the country’s top law schools steer clear of explicit support for Trump.”

6. E6 The academic Trumpists: American professors who support the Trump presidency - Theory and Society Springer (Theory and Society) · 28 April 2020

   “While our list of supporters includes a disproportionate number of law professors specializing in constitutional law, again this does not mean that constitutional law professors as a whole or even a majority of them support Trump.”

7. E7 The academic Trumpists: American professors who support the Trump presidency - Theory and Society Springer (Theory and Society) · 28 April 2020

   “Indeed, many who identify with a conservative orientation in legal matters, went public opposing Trump”

8. E8 What Do My Campaign Contributions Say About My Politics? - Above the Law Above the Law · 19 March 2024

   “And Yale appears all Democrat as well, despite vigorous support for a President Donald Trump Supreme Court Justice nominee by one faculty member.”

E1 reports that Fried knew of no Trump supporters on the Harvard Law faculty in 2016. That covers only one school and rests on one person's knowledge. E2 and E3 describe a 2016 academics-for-Trump letter, but they do not place any named organiser or supporter at a top-five law school, and they give no list of signers that could be checked for top-five faculty. E5 says many originalists at top law schools avoided explicit support for Trump, which suggests support was rare but does not establish that it was zero at all top-five schools. The evidence neither documents an endorsement nor rules one out across the schools, so the exact claim of "zero" cannot be settled.