WASHINGTON (AP) — Many colleges accused of tolerating anti-Semitism on their campuses have reached an agreement with federal civil rights investigators in the weeks before President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration, calling for a tougher response to campus protests against the war in Gaza demanded.
By settling with the Department of Education, schools are closing cases against them as long as they comply with the terms of the agreements, which mostly required training, policy updates and review of previous complaints.
But many colleges at the center of the most high-profile cases — including Columbia and Cornell — face ongoing investigations and could face harsher penalties after Trump takes office. Trump hasn’t said what he would like to see from the investigation, but he has threatened to cut off federal funding to schools that don’t comply with his demands.
“Colleges will and must end anti-Semitic propaganda or they will lose their accreditation and federal support,” Trump said in a virtual address to Jewish donors in September. “If they don’t do it, no money will go to them.”
In recent weeks, settlements with the Education Department’s civil rights division have mounted with the University of Washington, the University of California, Johns Hopkins, Rutgers and the University of Cincinnati. These follow other voluntary agreements signed by Brown and Temple universities and the University of Michigan.
The spate of recent deals has sparked outrage among Republicans in Congress, who say the Biden administration is letting colleges off the hook.
Rep. Tim Walberg, R-Mich., chairman of the House Education and Workforce Committee, said the comparisons are “toothless” and do not hold colleges accountable for allowing anti-Semitism. In a statement, he said the Trump administration should “review these agreements and explore options to impose real consequences on schools.”
One of the committee’s priorities will be to “call out woke higher education institutions — particularly those that allow anti-Semitism to run rampant,” Walberg said at a meeting Wednesday.
More than 100 U.S. colleges and school districts remain under investigation for alleged anti-Semitism or Islamophobia following Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel. These include Columbia, Cornell, Yale, Princeton and other prestigious schools that are targets of a Republican campaign against anti-Semitism.
The Education Department’s investigation stems from complaints that schools violated Title VI, which prohibits discrimination or harassment based on race, color and national origin at colleges and universities that receive federal funding.
Several colleges under investigation declined to comment on their status.
Last year, presidents of several universities were summoned before Congress over their handling of pro-Palestinian protests, contributing to the resignations of Claudine Gay at Harvard, Liz Magill at Penn and Minouche Shafik at Columbia.
The immense majority of Education Department civil rights investigations end in voluntary agreements negotiated with schools. If they can’t reach an agreement, the agency can refer the case to the Justice Department or request that the school be cut off from federal funding – an extreme sanction that has almost never been used.
Whether Trump is pushing the Department of Education to operate the so-called “nuclear option” is still questionable. But without a deal before Jan. 20, colleges risk becoming test cases for Trump, who is openly hostile to universities he sees as hotbeds of liberalism.
Losing access to federal funding is typically viewed as a death sentence for higher education institutions. However, if there is one exception, it would be Harvard, with its $53 billion endowment, the wealthiest college in the world. A complete exclusion would also mean that students at the university would no longer be able to claim federal subsidies.
However, it couldn’t happen immediately. The Department of Education can terminate federal funds only if the school fails to enforce voluntary compliance and they are approved by an administrative law judge. A hearing would have to be held and the school would have the opportunity to appeal the decision.
With Republicans taking control of both chambers of Congress, there is also a renewed push for legislation on the issue. A report coordinated in December by House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) found that colleges across the U.S. had failed to stop anti-Semitism during demonstrations last year, highlighting cases at Harvard, Columbia and UCLA.
The report called for novel laws “to support students and ensure accountability” and advocated for legislation to cut federal funding to schools that support divestment from Israel. She called on the executive branch to “aggressively enforce” civil rights laws. Universities that do not curb anti-Semitism “are unfit to manage taxpayer dollars and should be dealt with accordingly.”
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