(JTA) — Rep. Elise Stefanik is perhaps best known for grilling the leaders of three elite universities about campus antisemitism in December 2023, prompting two of them to step down.
On Wednesday, she warned the latest set of campus presidents sitting before her that they could meet the same fate.
The hearing on Wednesday was the House Committee on Education and the Workforce’s eighth on campus antisemitism since Oct. 7, 2023. It brought the presidents of Haverford College, DePaul University, and California Polytechnic State University to Capitol Hill to field a volley of questions regarding their response to antisemitism and pro-Palestinian protests.
In a heated exchange, Stefanik, a New York Republican, shot a series of questions at Haverford President Wendy Raymond about the school’s disciplinary policy. In one question, Stefanik referenced a professor who, in the wake of Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack, had allegedly said, “We should never have to apologize for celebrating these scenes of an imprisoned people breaking free from their chains.”
Stefanik repeatedly asked Raymond to describe the disciplinary action taken against the professor, but Raymond refused.
“Respectfully, representative, I will not be talking about individual cases,” Raymond said.
Stefanik shot back: “Respectfully, president of Haverford, many people have sat in this position who are no longer in the positions as president of universities for their failure to answer straightforward questions.”
During the hearing, Republican representatives accused the schools of failing to address antisemitism on their campuses. Many zeroed-in on one incident at Depaul last November in which two Jewish DePaul students were allegedly beaten after one showed support for Israel.
Allegations about Haverford University professors
The committee chair, Republican Rep. Tim Walberg of Michigan, also alleged that at Haverford a professor equated Zionism to Nazism and a Cal Poly faculty member was “complicit” in the harassment of Jewish students who were trying to attend a lecture about Israel.
Other representatives invoked the Trump administration’s recent string of funding cuts to universities, purportedly over their handling of pro-Palestinian protests and antisemitic incidents. While DePaul and Cal Poly’s presidents provided records of the disciplinary actions taken against pro-Palestinian student protestors, Raymond declined.
Rep. Ryan Mackenzie, a Pennsylvania Republican, asked Raymond whether her school received federal funding, to which she replied, “we do in a wonderful partnership with the federal government.”
In response, Mackenzie said, “that partnership may be in jeopardy, because if you will not provide transparency and accountability like your other colleagues here, it calls into question your actions on your campus.”
Rep. Bob Onder, a Missouri Republican, also took aim at Raymond. He asked her about the disciplinary process for a gender studies professor who allegedly said, “Blacks and gays have, in the past, not felt safe on campus. It is now the turn of Jewish students to experience that feeling.”
Raymond denied the professor had made the statement. But when asked by Onder whether someone who made such a statement would be fired, suspended or disciplined in some way, Raymond responded, “statements of discrimination and harassment are unacceptable.”
Onder replied, “I suppose it’s your first Amendment right to be evasive, but it’s also our right to decide that such institutions are not deserving of taxpayer money.”
Several Democratic representatives questioned the premise of the hearing, with many arguing that the Trump administration’s recent cuts to the Education Department’s Office of Civil Rights, which handles discrimination complaints, is evidence that antisemitism is being mishandled.
“This administration is in the process of dismantling the Office of Civil Rights, and it raises reasonable doubt about the plans for addressing antisemitism on campus,” said Rep. Bobby Scott, a Virginia Democrat and ranking member of the committee.
Scott also asked the presidents whether they considered their schools “hotbeds” of antisemitism, to which all three said that they were not.
Other Democratic representatives also accused colleagues across the aisle of not adequately responding to other instances of antisemitism, and only focusing on campus issues.
“If my Republican colleagues want to stop the spread of antisemitism, maybe they should stop apologizing for and promoting antisemites,” said Rep. Greg Casar, a Texas Democrat, after referencing President Donald Trump’s pardoning of an antisemitic rioter on Jan. 6, 2021.
Ahead of the hearing, members of Haverford’s chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace, an anti-Zionist group, published a letter in the school’s student newspaper, the Haverford Clerk, rejecting Congress’ “weaponization of antisemitism.”
“The Committee cites incidents that are not, in fact, antisemitic to justify their interrogation of President Raymond,” the students wrote. “By painting events that criticize the state of Israel as antisemitic, the Committee erases the range of views about the State of Israel, especially amongst Jewish people.”
