The American Diabetes Association (ADA) completed a review of incidents that took place during its June annual meeting, though the individuals removed from the session remain dissatisfied with the findings.
Although the full report has not been released, the ADA disclosed its conclusions in a press statement, characterizing the review as independent and carried out by its audit and governance committee at the board’s request.
The ADA determined that five members—collectively referred to as the New Orleans Five—were removed because their conduct disrupted the meeting and breached the ADA Attendee Code of Conduct while distributing an editorial critical of the Trump administration.
The editorial’s content, previously published in the ADA’s flagship journal *Diabetes Care*, was deemed unrelated to the removals, according to the press release.
The release added that there was no evidence of any ADA member contacting the New Orleans Police Department; the officers were hired by the event’s security provider, which responded appropriately to the disturbances.
Steven Kahn, MBChB, the editorial’s lead author and a meeting attendee who was expelled, argued that the review lacked true independence because two committee members serve on the ADA board of directors.
He also noted that it remains unclear which specific provisions of the code of conduct were allegedly violated.
Kahn further stated that he and the four other expelled attendees—Maureen Gannon, PhD; Aaron Kelly, PhD; Justin Ryder, PhD; and Desmond Schatz, MD—have not received the report despite requesting it.
“In the end, very few answers have been provided and many questions remain,” Kahn wrote in an email to *MedPage Today*.
David Nathan, MD, a distinguished diabetes specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, said he was interviewed by the committee and described the ADA’s conduct as “shameful” during the annual meeting, though he believes those remarks were not taken seriously.
“I was clearly ineffective, and the press release suggests the ‘independent review’ will amount to a whitewash of the events that began on June 5,” Nathan told *MedPage Today*. “I fear for the survival of this once admirable institution.”
The ADA release indicated that the committee interviewed 28 individuals with direct knowledge of the June 5 events, including the five removed attendees, and examined videos, emails, text messages, news articles, and editorials to construct a comprehensive factual account.
ADA announced it will launch new initiatives to strengthen its service to the scientific community, such as improving internal and external communications, enhancing guidance for event staff and volunteers, and tightening policies and procedures for large meetings.
In an op-ed for *STAT*, ADA CEO Charles Henderson highlighted his organization’s efforts to counteract federal funding cuts to diabetes research.
“The ADA has issued numerous public statements condemning current and former administrations for cutting diabetes prevention programs, reducing research support, and limiting healthcare coverage,” Henderson wrote. “We will continue to speak out whenever federal actions undermine the diabetes community.”
“What often goes untold is that most proposed cuts to diabetes research have not materialized,” he added. “Funding for diabetes research has largely remained intact despite those proposals, thanks to advocacy by our community.”
MedPage Today reported that Kahn and his colleagues were removed from the meeting and released a video showing security officers and police confronting the researchers on June 5. A local police officer pushed one attendee, with Louisiana State Police arriving shortly thereafter, and a security officer forcibly took a stack of editorials from Kahn’s hands.
A few days later, two ADA leaders resigned: President‑Elect Jennifer Green, MD, and Scientific Sessions Planning Committee Chair Mark Atkinson, PhD.
On June 10, Henderson posted a video apologizing to the five attendees removed from the meeting and to the broader diabetes research community.
Just over a month later, ADA chose not to publish a packet of editorials concerning the annual meeting in *Diabetes Care*—of which Kahn remains editor‑in‑chief—so the journal’s deputy editors posted the packet on Zenodo, the science repository created in 2013 by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), which hosts preprints, datasets, and presentation slides.
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