On December 5, 2023, the United States House Committee on Education & the Workforce held a hearing on

antisemitism Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

on college campuses. The committee called a few university leaders to testify, including the presidents of

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

, the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

, and the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

. In the widely televised hearing, the presidents answered questions about their schools' policies, including those on antisemitism. After the hearing, the committee called for the resignation of the presidents, and announced a Congressional investigation "with the full force of subpoena power" into the same issues. The following week, Liz Magill, president of Penn, submitted her resignation, partly in response to backlash resulting from the hearing. In January, Harvard president

Claudine Gay Claudine Gay is a political scientist and university administrator. On July 1, 2023 she will become the 30th and first Black President of Harvard University. She serves as Harvard's Wilbur A. Cowett Professor of Government and of African and Af ...

resigned as well, following the hearing on antisemitism and allegations of plagiarism.

Background

Following the October 7,

2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel On 7 October 2023, the paramilitary wings of Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the PFLP, and the DFLP launched a series of coordinated armed incursions into the Gaza envelope of neighboring Israeli territory, the first invasion of Israel s ...

, there were multiple anti-

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

protests at university campuses in the United States, which supporters of Israel allege to have had antisemitic undertones. Many universities were criticized for supposedly failing to adequately condemn the Hamas attacks and ensuing alleged antisemitic rhetoric, including Penn and Harvard. This became a conservative talking point, described by some commentators as adding to more general right-wing attacks on higher education that had been ongoing for years.

Hearing

The Committee invited the presidents of four major universities to testify about antisemitism on their campuses. Those able to attend included

Magill ''Magill'' was an Irish politics and current affairs magazine founded by Vincent Browne and others in 1977. ''Magill'' specialised in investigative articles and colourful reportage by journalists such as Eamonn McCann (who wrote its anonymous ' ...

of the University of Pennsylvania,

of Harvard, and

Sally Kornbluth Sally Ann Kornbluth is a cell biologist and the James B. Duke Professor of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology at Duke University School of Medicine. Since 2014, she served as the Provost at Duke, and is the first woman to serve in this role. She ...

of MIT. It was later reported that at least one other university president,

Minouche Shafik Nemat Talaat Shafik, Baroness Shafik, (Arabic: نعمت شفيق; born 13 August 1962), known as Minouche Shafik, is an Egyptian-born British-American economist who has been serving as the President and Vice Chancellor of the London School of ...

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

, was invited to testify before the committee, but declined due to a "scheduling conflict." The presidents were joined by Pamela Nadell, professor of History at

American University The American University (AU or American) is a private federally chartered research university in Washington, D.C. Its main campus spans 90 acres (36 ha) on Ward Circle, mostly in the Spring Valley neighborhood of Northwest D.C. AU was charte ...

. Committee chairwoman Virginia Foxx (R-NC) led the hearing on December 5, and noted that the rise of antisemitism on college campuses is disturbing and threatening to Jewish students, faculty, and staff. The presidents were each asked whether "calling for the genocide of Jews" violated their rules of bullying and harassment. During the hearing when Kornbluth, who is Jewish, said she had not heard any calls for genocide, Rep. Elise Stefanik claimed that chants of " Intifada" (Arabic) may be considered a "call for the

genocide Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people—usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group—in whole or in part. Raphael Lemkin coined the term in 1944, combining the Greek word (, "race, people") with the Latin ...

" of Jewish people. Each president replied that the answer at their institution depended on context. In a specific exchange, Stefanik asked Harvard president Gay: "At Harvard, does calling for the genocide of Jews violate Harvard's rules of bullying and harassment, yes or no?", Gay answered, "It can be, depending on the context."

Reactions and further developments

Immediately after the hearing, Stefanik and other members of the committee called for the three presidents to resign, later publishing a written letter calling for their resignation signed by 70 members of Congress. The following day, the committee announced a Congressional investigation "with the full force of subpoena power" into the same issues. The responses of all three presidents drew public criticism for being evasive. Gay released a statement noting that some "have confused a right to free expression with the idea that Harvard will condone calls for violence against Jewish students." White House spokesman Andrew Bates said, "Calls for genocide are monstrous and antithetical to everything we represent as a country."

Josh Shapiro Joshua David Shapiro (born June 20, 1973) is an American politician and attorney who has served as the Pennsylvania Attorney General since 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he is the governor-elect of Pennsylvania. Raised in Montgomery ...

, the Democratic governor of

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

, said he found the responses by Magill "unacceptable." Will Creeley, legal director at the

Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), formerly known as the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, is a non-profit Civil liberties in the United States, civil liberties group founded in 1999 with the aim of protectin ...

, noted that though the university presidents' answers were "legally correct", it was frustrating "to see them discover free speech scruples while under fire at a congressional hearing," rather than in a more principled way. Magill, who had already been under pressure in October over the university's initial response, resigned as president of Penn four days after the hearing. A few days later, a series of allegations of plagiarism were levied against Gay by conservative activist Christopher Rufo and journalist Aaron Sibarium, followed the next week by an announcement by the Committee that it would open an additional probe into the allegations. Gay resigned as president of Harvard on January 2, 2024. Both resignations were widely reported as political victories for the right. After Gay's resignation, Stefanik declared this was "just the beginning of the reckoning", and that "Republicans will carry out a 'long overdue' cleansing of higher education".

In popular culture

The hearing was portrayed in the

cold open A cold open (also called a teaser sequence) is a narrative technique used in television and films. It is the practice of jumping directly into a story at the beginning of the show before the title sequence or opening credits are shown. In Ameri ...

of the December9 episode of ''

Saturday Night Live ''Saturday Night Live'' (often abbreviated to ''SNL'') is an American late-night live television sketch comedy and variety show created by Lorne Michaels and developed by Dick Ebersol that airs on NBC and Peacock. Michaels currently serves a ...

'' Season 49, in which Chloe Troast played Stefanik. It was also satirized in an episode of the Israeli comedy show '' Eretz Nehederet'', with a guest appearance from American comedian Michael Rapaport.

References

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External links

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Elise Stefanik (R-NY) Questions University Presidents on Antisemitism
' (on

C-SPAN Cable-Satellite Public Affairs Network (C-SPAN ) is an American cable and satellite television network that was created in 1979 by the cable television industry as a nonprofit public service. It televises many proceedings of the United States ...