Last week, Columbia University President Minouche Shafik announced her resignation as lawsuits have begun to hit colleges and universities for enabling antisemitic protests last spring. She is now the fifth president of an Ivy League university who has resigned or stepped down since pro-Palestinian protests erupted on college campuses last fall.
Others included the University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill, Harvard University President Claudine Gay, and Martha Pollack, the president of Cornell University. Peter Salovey, the president of Yale, stepped down in June, but he announced his decision to step down a month before Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023 attack.
Shafik was widely criticized for her inability to address antisemitism at Columbia and her timid response to the pro-Palestinian encampment on campus, which caused chaos and disruptions for weeks. Some of the protesters even illegally occupied an academic building and held a janitor hostage — a tactic that seems straight out of the terrorist group Hamas’ playbook. Rather than shutting down the encampment, the university moved all classes online and later canceled the school’s main commencement ceremony, a significant blow to students and their families, who deserved a celebration for such an important life milestone.
Pro-Palestinian protesters established similar “Gaza Solidarity Encampments” at several other prestigious colleges and universities, compromising the safety of many Jewish students. University administrators were either unwilling or incompetent to fulfill their duties, including maintaining law and order, addressing antisemitism, and protecting Jewish students.
The pro-Palestinian protests on campuses and university leaders’ inadequate responses have triggered a donor revolt. Former governor and current ambassador to China Jon Huntsman notified Penn that “the Huntsman Foundation will close its checkbook on all future giving to Penn.” Former Victor’s Secret billionaire Leslie Wexner’s foundation ended its relationship and financial support for Harvard University and Harvard Kennedy School.
In June, Columbia University was once again engulfed in a scandal when three administrators were exposed for exchanging a series of antisemitic text messages during a panel on campus Jewish life. This revelation pointed to the root cause of Columbia’s antisemitism: the adults in charge. The scandal, which significantly damaged the university’s standing, underscores the urgent need for action.
Amidst the leadership resignations and donor revolts, elite schools are now facing a new challenge: lawsuits. Just in time for a new school year, a federal judge ruled that the University of California, Los Angeles must uphold equal access to programs, activities, and campus areas for all students, including Jewish students.
Last spring, UCLA witnessed some of the most disruptive pro-Palestinian protests in the nation. The pro-Palestinian protesters established encampments and checkpoints around the so-called Jewish Exclusion Zone, preventing “Zionists” (any Jewish students supporting the existence of Israel) from going to classes, the library, and other parts of campus. A lawsuit alleges that UCLA administrators, who are expected to ensure the safety and well-being of all students, contributed to these illegal encampments and checkpoints, “both by providing metal barriers and by sending away Jewish students—while taking no effective action to ensure safe passage for Jewish students.”
Violent confrontations erupted between pro-Palestinian protesters and pro-Israel counter-protesters between late April and the beginning of May. The confrontation only ended after the Los Angeles Police Department arrested more than 200 people. This led to UCLA first canceling classes and then moving its classes online.
In June, Becket Law and Clement and Murphy PLLC filed a lawsuit, Frankel v. Regents of the University of California, on behalf of three current UCLA Jewish students. The lawsuit asked the court to “put an immediate stop to UCLA’s actions so that they could return to class free from fear that they would be harassed and excluded for being Jewish.” UCLA responded by claiming that a court shouldn’t tell the school how to deal with protests, and Jewish students have nothing to fear when classes begin this fall.
On Aug. 13, U.S. District Judge Mark Scarsi, a Trump appointee, issued a preliminary injunction set to take effect on Aug. 15, mandating UCLA to provide equal access for Jewish and non-Jewish students alike. The injunction states that “if Jewish students are blocked from certain programs, activities or parts of campus, UCLA must also stop providing access to all students.”
Judge Scarsi further smacked down UCLA administrators in his opinion with this memorable passage, which is worth quoting in full:
In the year 2024, in the United States of America, in the State of California, in the City of Los Angeles, Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith. This fact is so unimaginable and so abhorrent to our constitutional guarantee of religious freedom that it bears repeating, Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith. UCLA does not dispute this. Instead, UCLA claims that it has no responsibility to protect the religious freedom of its Jewish students because the exclusion was engineered by third-party protesters. But under constitutional principles, UCLA may not allow services to some students when UCLA knows that other students are excluded on religious grounds, regardless of who engineered the exclusion.
Scarsi’s ruling came less than a week after U.S. District Judge Richard G. Stearns denied Harvard University’s motion to dismiss a lawsuit. The lawsuit, filed by a group of Jewish students, alleges that Harvard has failed to protect Jewish students from antisemitism.
Stearns didn’t accept Harvard’s argument that breaking up pro-Palestinian protests on campus would infringe on the First Amendment rights of students. Judge Stearns wrote in his opinion that it “is dubious that Harvard can hide behind the First Amendment,” and “the facts as pled show that Harvard failed its Jewish students.” It is noteworthy that Harvard University received the lowest score on the 2023 College Free Speech rankings from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE).
Scarsi and Stearns’s rulings are welcome news for Jewish students and a warning to college and university administrators nationwide. As former Attorney General Bill Barr points out, “when it comes to combating antisemitism, talk is cheap.” Administrators of colleges and universities will continue to face growing legal scrutiny if they let antisemitic behaviors disrupt college campuses and violate Jewish students’ constitutional rights.
With another school year right around the corner, let’s see if administrators of colleges and universities can find moral clarity and courage to do the right thing this time.
This article has been updated since publication.
