[House Hearing, 118 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]


                    ANTISEMITISM ON COLLEGE CAMPUSES

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               BEFORE THE

        SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE CONSTITUTION AND LIMITED GOVERNMENT

                                 OF THE

                       COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY

                     U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                    ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION
                               __________

                        WEDNESDAY, MAY 15, 2024
                               __________

                           Serial No. 118-79
                               __________

         Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary
         
         
                  [GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]         


               Available via: http://judiciary.house.gov
               
                               __________

                    U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
                    
55-775                     WASHINGTON : 2024                  


                       COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY

                        JIM JORDAN, Ohio, Chair

DARRELL ISSA, California             JERROLD NADLER, New York, Ranking 
MATT GAETZ, Florida                      Member
ANDY BIGGS, Arizona                  ZOE LOFGREN, California
TOM McCLINTOCK, California           SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas
TOM TIFFANY, Wisconsin               STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky              HENRY C. ``HANK'' JOHNSON, Jr., 
CHIP ROY, Texas                          Georgia
DAN BISHOP, North Carolina           ADAM SCHIFF, California
VICTORIA SPARTZ, Indiana             J. LUIS CORREA, California
SCOTT FITZGERALD, Wisconsin          ERIC SWALWELL, California
CLIFF BENTZ, Oregon                  TED LIEU, California
BEN CLINE, Virginia                  PRAMILA JAYAPAL, Washington
KELLY ARMSTRONG, North Dakota        MARY GAY SCANLON, Pennsylvania
LANCE GOODEN, Texas                  JOE NEGUSE, Colorado
JEFF VAN DREW, New Jersey            LUCY McBATH, Georgia
TROY NEHLS, Texas                    MADELEINE DEAN, Pennsylvania
BARRY MOORE, Alabama                 VERONICA ESCOBAR, Texas
KEVIN KILEY, California              DEBORAH ROSS, North Carolina
HARRIET HAGEMAN, Wyoming             CORI BUSH, Missouri
NATHANIEL MORAN, Texas               GLENN IVEY, Maryland
LAUREL LEE, Florida                  BECCA BALINT, Vermont
WESLEY HUNT, Texas
RUSSELL FRY, South Carolina
Vacancy

                                 ------                                

        SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE CONSTITUTION AND LIMITED GOVERNMENT

                         CHIP ROY, Texas, Chair

TOM McCLINTOCK, California           MARY GAY SCANLON, Pennsylvania, 
DAN BISHOP, North Carolina               Ranking Member
KEVIN KILEY, California              STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
HARRIET HAGEMAN, Wyoming             VERONICA ESCOBAR, Texas
WESLEY HUNT, Texas                   CORI BUSH, Missouri
RUSSELL FRY, South Carolina          SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas
KELLY ARMSTRONG, North Dakota        BECCA BALINT, Vermont

               CHRISTOPHER HIXON, Majority Staff Director
         AARON HILLER, Minority Staff Director & Chief of Staff


                            C O N T E N T S

                              ----------                              

                        Wednesday, May 15, 2024

                           OPENING STATEMENTS

                                                                   Page
The Honorable Chip Roy, Chair of the Subcommittee on the 
  Constitution and Limited Governmentfrom the State of Texas.....     1
The Honorable Mary Gay Scanlon, Ranking Member of the 
  Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government from 
  the State of Pennsylvania......................................     3
The Honorable Jim Jordan, Chair of the Committee on the Judiciary 
  from the State of Ohio.........................................     5
The Honorable Jerrold Nadler, Ranking Member of the Committee on 
  the Judiciary from the State of New York.......................     7

                               WITNESSES

Eyal Yakoby, Undergraduate Student, University of Pennsylvania
  Oral Testimony.................................................     9
  Prepared Testimony.............................................    12
Shabbos Kestenbaum, Graduate Student, Harvard University
  Oral Testimony.................................................    15
  Prepared Testimony.............................................    17
Dr. Mark Goldfeder, CEO, National Jewish Advocacy Center
  Oral Testimony.................................................    32
  Prepared Testimony.............................................    34
Kevin Rachlin, Washington Director, Nexus Leadership Project
  Oral Testimony.................................................    43
  Prepared Testimony.............................................    45

          LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC. SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING

All materials submitted by the Subcommittee on the Constitution 
  and Limited Government, for the record.........................    65

An article entitled, ``National: Pro-Palestinian protesters are 
  backed by a surprising source: Biden's biggest donors,'' May 6, 
  2024, Politico, submitted by the Honorable Wesley Hunt, a 
  Member of the Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited 
  Government from the State of Texas, for the record
An article entitled, ``TIPSHEET: One Look at Biden's Top Advisor 
  Explains His Support for Hamas,'' May 13, 2024, Townhall, 
  submitted by the Honorable Harriet Hageman, a Member of the 
  Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government from 
  the State of Wyoming, for the record
A letter to Merrick Garland, Attorney General of the United 
  States, and Miguel Cardona, Secretary of Education, May 7, 
  2024, from Advancing American Freedom, submitted by the 
  Honorable Chip Roy, Chair of the Subcommittee on the 
  Constitution and Limited Governmentfrom the State of Texas, for 
  the record
An article entitled, ``Antisemitism on College Campuses: Incident 
  Tracking from 2019-2024,'' May 13, 2024, Hillel International, 
  submitted by the Honorable Russell Fry, a Member of the 
  Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government from 
  the State of South Carolina, for the record
An article entitled, ``How Republicans Echo Antisemitic Tropes 
  Despite Declaring Support for Israel,'' May 9, 2024, The New 
  York Times, submitted by the Honorable Mary Gay Scanlon, 
  Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on the Constitution and 
  Limited Government from the State of Pennsylvania, for the 
  record

                                APPENDIX

Materials submitted by the Honorable Kelly Armstrong, a Member of 
  the Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government 
  from the State of North Dakota, for the record
    A report entitled, ``The Hamas Networks in America: A Short 
        History,'' Oct. 2023, Program on Extremism, George 
        Washington University
    A report entitled, ``Antisemitism, Violent Extremism and the 
        Threat to North American Universities,'' Oct. 2019, 
        National Students for Justice in Palestine (NSJP)
    A report entitled, ``Antisemitism, Anti-Americanism, Violent 
        Extremism and the Threat to North American 
        Universities,'' 2024, National Students for Justice in 
        Palestine (NSJP)

 
                    ANTISEMITISM ON COLLEGE CAMPUSES

                              ----------                              


                        Wednesday, May 15, 2024

                        House of Representatives

        Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government

                       Committee on the Judiciary

                             Washington, DC

    The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:33 p.m., in 
Room 2141, Rayburn House Office Building, the Hon. Chip Roy 
[Chair of the Subcommittee] presiding.
    Members present: Representatives Roy, Jordan, Kiley, 
Hageman, Hunt, Fry, Armstrong, Scanlon, Nadler, Cohen, Escobar, 
and Balint.
    Mr. Roy. The Committee will be in order. I would like to 
remind the audience that there is no audience participation in 
the hearing. All are welcome to spectate, but to follow the 
rules of decorum here in the hearing room.
    I would like to thank our witnesses for being here today. I 
would--without objection, the Chair is authorized to declare a 
recess at any time. We welcome everyone to today's hearing on 
Antisemitism on College Campuses, and I will now recognize 
myself for an opening statement.
    I would like to thank our witnesses for being here today. 
Since Hamas' brutal attack on our friend and ally Israel on 
October 7th, we have witnessed a disturbing spike in 
antisemitic violence across our own country. This rampant 
antisemitism is perhaps most prevalent on American college 
campuses, often funded with billions in taxpayer dollars.
    Let's be clear: Much of what we are seeing transpire on 
college campuses is not First Amendment protected speech. We 
are seeing pro-Hamas protesters commit vandalism, destroy 
university property, set up large encampments, and even in some 
instances, carry out acts of violence.
    At the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, 
protesters defaced a campus building hours before graduation, 
covering the university steps in red paint. At Yale University, 
a Jewish student was surrounded by a mob of protesters and 
assaulted by a pro-Palestinian demonstrator. He used a 
Palestinian flag to jab her in the eye.
    At Columbia University, protesters barricaded themselves in 
Hamilton Hall, breaking windows and furniture and preventing 
other students from accessing the building. I would note that 
Columbia canceled its main commencement ceremony.
    I would point out the young man that was asked if he was a 
Zionist at UCLA, and then prohibited from moving to another 
part of the campus and then a building, simply for expressing 
his view. Unconscionable.
    In fact, at the height of the protests on Columbia 
University's campus, one Columbia employee, an Orthodox rabbi, 
urged Jewish students to avoid campus, suggesting it was no 
longer safe to remain on university grounds in the face of 
ongoing protest. Imagine that, in the United States of America 
Jewish students were being told to avoid campus.
    It is not just antisemitism on college campuses, it is also 
blatant anti-Americanism. University of Pennsylvania, Ben 
Franklin's statue was vandalized with the words, ``Glory to the 
martyrs--Intifada until victory.''
    At George Washington University, the statue of George 
Washington was spray painted with the words ``Genocidal 
warmonger university.''
    At the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, 
protesters replaced the American flag with the Palestinian 
flag.
    Unfortunately, the leadership of far too many of these 
universities has refused to respond with moral clarity as to 
what is happening. Instead, they have opted to cancel 
graduation ceremoneys and in-person classes to avoid further 
disruptive demonstrations. The colleges that are failing to 
rein in these violent protests are actively trampling their 
Jewish students' civil rights.
    Keep in mind, these colleges receive billions in funding 
and subsidies from the Federal Government. The Committee for a 
Responsible Federal Budget estimates that President Biden's 
student debt cancellation, which constitutes a free handout to 
universities just as much as the borrower, could cost taxpayers 
up to $1.4 trillion.
    These colleges cannot have it both ways. They cannot rake 
in billions in Federal dollars and subsidizing students to 
attend their universities while refusing to protect their 
Jewish students as they hide behind a false First Amendment 
argument.
    Congress has a duty to ensure that these Federally funded 
entities are protecting students and upholding their rights. 
Thankfully, there are a few universities that have demonstrated 
strong leadership.
    University of Florida's President Ben Sasse made it clear 
that while students have a right to free speech, they do not 
have a right to take over an entire university, barricade 
themselves in campus buildings, and disrupt students' 
commencement. He rightfully stated,

        I want all of our students to feel safe. But more important 
        than the subjective feeling, I want our students to be safe. 
        And that is what is critically important here.

    In my home State, the University of Texas, President Jay 
Hartzell rightfully refused to let protesters set up an 
encampment and disrupt campus operations.
    You might ask, with Jewish students' rights under attack by 
students, agitators, and DEI bureaucrats, where is the 
Department of Justice and its crown jewel, the Civil Rights 
Division? Where is Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke?
    Instead of taking meaningful action to uphold Jewish 
students' rights or going to the Columbia campus, like Speaker 
Mike Johnson did, the former Chair of this Subcommittee, to 
condemn the lawlessness, on Monday, Clarke delivered Columbia 
Law School's commencement remarks, making no significant 
mention of the surge in antisemitic action on campus. In fact, 
lumping it into a long train of items in a speech.
    Imagine that, he didn't even bring it up in any 
significance after Columbia had basically been sacked in 
protest. All while the Civil Rights Division, by the way, is 
actively trampling on the rights of pro-life Americans to 
peacefully protest by prosecuting them under the FACE Act.
    One young woman, a progressive activist, received a 
sentence of 57 months just this week. All while we haven't 
heard a word about what, if anything, her division intends to 
do about this antisemitic movement among secular liberals on 
campuses across this country.
    Beyond civil rights, Congress must also examine how we 
should use our power of the purse in Congress to shut off the 
flow of taxpayer dollars that are going to universities to fuel 
this radical ideology. We are allowing billions, five billion 
alone in Fiscal Year 2023 that went to Ivy League institutions.
    Harvard is sitting on a $50 billion endowment, $50 billion 
endowment, most of which is tax-free. Penn, $20 billion 
endowment. Yet, we continue to have taxpayer dollars flow to 
these universities while they are treating our Jewish brothers 
and sisters as we have seen unfold before our very eyes in 
recent weeks.
    The secular left wants to admonish us not to foment culture 
wars. The best way to do that is for these radical progressive 
Democrats that infest college campuses and leech off the public 
dole and the public debt and the fat cat donors that fuel the 
endowments not to do just that, not to start the culture wars 
by attacking our Jewish brothers and sisters.
    I look forward to hearing from today's witnesses about 
their experiences with antisemitism on college campuses and how 
we can ensure the safety, security, and equal protection of 
rights.
    I now recognize the Ranking Member, the gentlewoman from 
Pennsylvania, Ms. Scanlon, for her opening statement.
    Ms. Scanlon. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you to our 
witnesses for appearing today.
    As someone who represents a district with more than a dozen 
colleges and universities and many others nearby, it is 
particularly important to me that our campuses are spaces where 
students can engage in meaningful academic discourse while 
feeling safe and supported.
    Let's be clear: There is no place for violence, threats, 
intimidation, or harassment against students, faculty, or other 
school community members because they are Jewish. That kind of 
conduct is unlawful.
    It is not constitutionally protected speech, and it is 
antithetical to our most fundamental American values. That 
bigotry has no place in our society, and everyone deserves an 
equal opportunity for a safe learning environment, regardless 
of their race, ethnicity, gender, religion, or ancestry.
    That being said, we have seen too many times during this 
majority--as we have seen too many times during this majority, 
this hearing seems to be part of a pattern of conduct in which 
our Republican colleagues appear once again eager to divide 
people, to exploit the issues that they think will score them 
the most political points.
    In this very Committee room, the Republican majority have 
at times decided it serves them best politically to actually 
defend threats or acts of violence, including those against 
public servants like election workers and school board 
officials. Every American should understand that political 
violence has no place in our country or in our political 
discourse.
    Everyone who purports to call themselves a leader must 
unequivocally condemn such calls to violence. That includes 
standing against acts of discrimination and hate in all its 
forms.
    Similarly, I believe that those in positions of leadership 
have an obligation to model good behavior and not inflame 
passions around these issues, even when it might inure to their 
political benefit.
    So, as we focus on fighting antisemitism on campus, we must 
also guard against reactions in the heat of the moment that 
threaten important principles like academic freedom and freedom 
of speech, considerations that I know the Chair and many other 
Members of this Committee on both sides of the aisle take very 
seriously.
    These principles are as fundamental to our democracy as 
antidiscrimination laws are central to the mission of our 
higher education institutions, and they are most threatened 
when the speech at issue is controversial.
    Schools of course are important places to help our young 
people become critical thinkers. That is because schools can 
and should expose students to the diversity of people, 
viewpoints, and experiences in the world around them. In 
fighting hate, Congress must respect the imperative that it not 
overreach and end up chilling constitutionally protected speech 
on college campuses or other places.
    That being said, there are concrete steps that Congress can 
take to combat antisemitism. As the Chair mentioned, Congress 
has the power of the purse.
    If my Republican colleagues are serious about confronting 
this issue, they would start by adequately funding the 
Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights. That is the 
primary agency tasked with enforcing civil rights laws at 
colleges and universities.
    This includes enforcement of Title VI of the Civil Rights 
Act of 1964, which prohibits discrimination based on race, 
color, or national origin in Federally funded programs, and 
which protects Jewish students from antisemitic discrimination.
    When the Biden Administration requested an increase in 
OCR's funding for Fiscal Year 2024, House Republicans instead 
tried to cut the agency's funding by 25 percent. Ultimately the 
final compromise deal left OCR's funding inadequately flat at a 
time when Title VI complaints from college students have risen 
sharply and OCR lacks the resources it needs to get through an 
unprecedented backlog.
    OCR's mission includes not just identifying violations of 
civil rights around antisemitism, but also implementing 
corrective action. So, the failure to adequately fund impacts 
both the failure to identify past events as well as preventing 
future events.
    So, as we look toward funding the government for 2025, the 
administration is once again requesting an increase for OCR. If 
our colleagues on the other side of the aisle are looking for a 
real, tangible way to fight antisemitism, they should provide 
that funding instead of once again trying to cut it.
    Similarly, if our Republican colleagues are looking for 
serious solutions, they would help to implement President 
Biden's comprehensive national strategy to counter 
antisemitism. We could do so by passing the bipartisan and 
bicameral Countering Antisemitism Act of 2024, a bill that 
would, among other things, create a national coordinator to 
counter antisemitism in the Executive Office of the President 
to coordinate governmentwide efforts to combat antisemitism.
    I should also add that while our Republican colleagues have 
called this hearing today, their record of condemning 
antisemitic--sorry, antisemitic speech and acts is far from 
perfect. Time and time again, they have failed to condemn 
instances of antisemitism, particularly when it comes from 
their right-wing allies, including the former President.
    Therefore, you will have to pardon our skepticism about the 
rationale for holding multiple hearings to address this topic 
in multiple Committees, when the focus appears to be actually 
stoking culture wars concerning institutions of higher 
education, rather than actually solving the problem and the 
scope of the problem of antisemitism on college campuses.
    We had a Full Committee hearing on this topic last fall, 
and other Committees have held hearings on the topic as well. 
We know the concrete steps that Congress can take now to help 
counter antisemitism on campuses. The Subcommittee's time would 
be better spent helping to ensure that we take those steps and 
empower OCR rather than pouring gasoline on the embers of hate 
and antisemitism that we are seeing around the country.
    Nonetheless, I thank our witnesses for being here, and I 
look forward to their testimony.
    Yield back.
    Mr. Roy. I thank the Ranking Member, and I will now 
recognize the Chair of the Full Committee, Mr. Jordan, for his 
opening statement.
    Chair Jordan. I thank the Chair.
    Violent protests and encampments on college campuses, civil 
unrest throughout the country, a deeply unpopular Democrat 
President, and a Democrat Convention happening in Chicago. 
Sounds like 1968, but it is 2024.
    Weeks after the October 7th, terrorist attacks by Hamas on 
Israel, the Judiciary Committee held a hearing on the topic of 
antisemitism on college campuses. We examined the discrepancy 
between university administrators rapidly shutting down 
conservative events while posturing a slow reaction to violent 
pro-Hamas rallies and encampments throughout America's top 
institutions.
    The school year continued with antisemitic and anti-
American encampments lasting months. This even led to many 
graduation cancellations and disruptions. Imagine that. You go 
to class, you do your work, you pay your tuition, and your 
family and friends come to celebrate your achievements, and 
your school chooses to take the side of the woke mob they have 
let infiltrate their grounds since this last October.
    It has been said that the activity on college campuses is 
like looking into a crystal ball five years into the future. 
Censorship of conservative ideas, speakers, and even students, 
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion initiatives being forced on 
peers, cancel culture, safe spaces, the list goes on and on.
    At this Committee our oversight is often retrospectively. 
This hearing is an opportunity to look forward to ensuring no 
other students have to go through what the brave witnesses 
today have had to endure. That is why we are here today.
    I want to thank my colleagues, including Speaker Johnson, 
Conference Chair Elise Stefanik, who have launched a House-wide 
investigation on this topic.
    In fact, this Committee sent letters to Secretary Blinken 
and Secretary Mayorkas three weeks ago, asking a fundamental 
question. The Immigration and Nationality Act says if a student 
is here on a visa and they are engaged in activity that is 
against the law, they are not supposed to be here. The visa is 
supposed to be taken away.
    So, we asked Secretary Blinken, have you begun the process 
of revoking any visas. We know for example, it has been 
reported in the press, 55 perent of the student body, according 
to the press, 55 perent of the student body at Columbia is here 
on a student visa or some kind of visa.
    Any of those people engaged in unlawful activity? If they 
are, Secretary Blinken, are you working to revoke that visa? If 
that is happening, Secretary Mayorkas, are you looking to or 
are you in the process of removing these folks from the 
country?
    I want Israel to win. They were attacked by a terrorist 
organization. I want them to win. I thought the White House did 
too. I do not understand recent statements and actions by this 
Administration. When it comes to the weapons, not letting them 
go to our dearest and closest friend, the State of Israel?
    When it comes to the leading Democrat in the U.S. Senate 
telling Israel you need a new prime minister, for goodness 
sake? This is our ally. I do not understand some of the things 
that are going on. That is why this hearing is so darn 
important.
    I want to thank our Chair, Chair Roy. I want to thank 
Virginia Fox for the work she is doing on the Education and 
Workforce Committee as well. I want to thank our witnesses for 
coming here today to testify. This is important. This is real--
I do not understand what this White House is doing. I do not 
understand.
    We want to help--we want to help Israel prevail. That is 
what we should be focused on. We want college campuses where 
students can learn and get the education they paid for.
    With that, I yield back.
    Mr. Roy. Thank the Chair, and I will now recognize the 
Ranking Member of the Full Committee, Mr. Nadler, for his 
opening statement.
    Mr. Nadler. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Mr. Chair, I devoted much of my life to combating 
antisemitism, and I am as attuned as anyone to threats and 
bigotry aimed at Jewish people. I will take lectures from no 
one about the need for vigorous efforts to fight antisemitism 
on campus or anywhere else.
    I am also an unapologetic and deeply committed Zionist. I 
believe, and I hope every Member at the dais and each of our 
witnesses here today would agree, that criticism of Israel's 
government or political criticism of Zionism on a college 
campus is not inherently antisemitic.
    I also hope our witnesses and Members agree that our 
democracy's commitment to free speech requires each of us to 
tolerate criticisms of even some of our most deeply held 
beliefs, especially in an academic setting where the freedom of 
inquiry is necessary to the teaching of critical thinking.
    That said, I am extremely disturbed by instances when 
political criticism of Zionism or of Israel does verge into 
antisemitism, such as when it is used as a proxy or a dog 
whistle for hatred of Jewish people.
    To the students appearing before us today, Mr. Yakoby, Mr. 
Kestenbaum, I am sorry that you and your fellow Jewish students 
have endured threats, harassment, and intimidation simply for 
being who you are. That is completely unacceptable. I 
appreciate you being here today to share your experiences with 
us.
    Since the Judiciary Committee held a Full Committee hearing 
last November on free speech on campus, protests over the 
deaths of Palestinian civilians and the mounting humanitarian 
crisis in Gaza have increased, if not in number, then certainly 
in intensity. Much of the protesters' activity, even 
expressions that I consider disgusting and despicable, 
constitute legally protected speech.
    Too often, however, the protests have exhibited vile 
antisemitic conduct. The Department of Education will 
rightfully investigate them and their institution's response 
for unlawful discrimination. There have been of course obvious 
examples of activities that are wholly unprotected, like 
threats and intimidation.
    Some students and protesters have even crossed the line 
into vandalism, destruction of private property, and willful 
disruption of campus life. They, too, should face disciplinary 
action by their institution, if not legal consequences for 
conduct that is obviously not protected by the First Amendment.
    There is no excuse for bigotry, threats, violence, or other 
criminal conduct directed at anyone, anywhere. It is imperative 
that we confront the scourge of antisemitism. Congress can 
help.
    With respect, Mr. Chair, we don't need more hearings. We 
need to take concrete action. We need to put our money where 
our mouth is. Last year the Biden Administration outlined a 
comprehensive national strategy to counter antisemitism, the 
cornerstone of which was increasing enforcement actions by the 
Office of Civil Rights at the Department of Education.
    OCR, as the Ranking Member of the Subcommittee mentioned, 
is in charge of enforcing antidiscrimination--is in charge of 
enforcing Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which 
prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, creed, 
national origin, antisemitism, etc.
    President Biden's budget called for a 27 percent increase 
in funding for that office, an increase made necessary by the 
huge increase in antisemitic incidents that we saw. If my 
Republican colleagues were serious about antisemitism, they 
would have fully funded that request.
    Instead, they bragged about proposing to slash funding by 
25 percent. Slash funding for the office in charge of enforcing 
discrimination--of enforcing the laws against discrimination 
against Jews and others on campus. By 25 perent they wanted to 
cut it, and ultimately insisted that funding be kept flat, 
despite the marked increase in Title VI complaints.
    We should also be considering H.R. 7921, the Countering 
Antisemitism Act, bipartisan legislation introduced by our 
colleagues Kathy Manning and Chris Smith, which would codify 
this national strategy's whole-of-government approach to 
confronting antisemitism.
    We cannot stay silent when calling out antisemitism is 
inconvenient. I appreciate my Republican colleagues' concern 
for antisemitism on college campuses, but where were they when 
neo-Nazis in Charlottesville chanted that ``Jews will not 
replace us''?
    Why did they not speak up when President Trump declared 
that they're ``very fine people on both sides of that rally''? 
Or when he said that the Charlottesville rally was ``a little 
peanut'' compared to ongoing campus protests regarding the 
Israel-Gaza war?
    We hear nothing from our Republican colleagues when some 
conservatives repeat antisemitic tropes about George Soros or 
others.
    If you mean what you say here today, if you believe that 
the threats and vitriol that Jewish students face on college 
campuses is unjust, and that combating antisemitism is more 
than just a convenient talking point in a larger crusade 
against institutions of higher education, then it is time to 
move beyond hearings, pointless gestures, and posturing.
    We know what the problem is, and what we need is action 
that actually helps protect Jewish students. Fully fund the 
Administration's efforts to counter antisemitism and other 
forms of discrimination by fully funding the requested increase 
in OCR to enforce Title VI. Pass the Countering Antisemitism 
Act. Our Nation's students deserve no less.
    With that, Mr. Chair, I yield back.
    Mr. Roy. Thank the Ranking Member of the Full Committee, 
Mr. Nadler.
    Without objection, all other opening statements will be 
included in the record. We will now introduce today's 
witnesses.
    Mr. Eyal Yakoby. Mr. Yakoby is a senior at the University 
of Pennsylvania. He is one of three named students who filed a 
lawsuit against the University of Pennsylvania alleging 
violations of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act.
    Mr. Shabbos Kestenbaum. Mr. Kestenbaum is a graduate 
student at Harvard University. He is one of the students who 
filed a lawsuit against Harvard alleging violations of Title VI 
of the Civil Rights Act.
    Rabbi Dr. Mark Goldfeder. Rabbi Goldfeder is the Director 
of the National Jewish Advocacy Center. He also serves as a 
Presidentially Appointed Member of the United States Holocaust 
Memorial Council, the General Counsel to the Hillels of 
Georgia, and Senior Counsel at the Lewis Brandeis Center for 
Human Rights under Law.
    He has previously served as a senior lecturer at Emory 
University Law School and has written widely on antisemitism 
and the law.
    Mr. Kevin Rachlin. Mr. Rachlin is the Washington Director 
of the Nexus Leadership Project. He previously served as the 
Vice President of Public Affairs at J Street, and as the United 
States Director for the Alliance for Middle East Peace.
    We will begin by swearing you in. Would you please rise and 
raise your right hand?
    Do you swear or affirm under penalty of perjury that the 
testimony you are about to give is true and correct to the best 
of your knowledge, information, and belief, so help you God?
    Let the record reflect that the witnesses have answered in 
the affirmative.
    Thank you, please be seated.
    Please know that your written testimony will be entered 
into the record in its entirety. Accordingly, we ask that you 
summarize your testimony in five minutes.
    Mr. Yakoby, you may begin. I would ask everybody to 
remember to put your microphones on.

                    STATEMENT OF EYAL YAKOBY

    Mr. Yakoby. Thank you, Chair Jordan, Ranking Member Nadler, 
as well as Subcommittee Ranking Member Roy, Ranking Member 
Scanlon, and Chair Roy, as well as the other Members of this 
Committee, for inviting me to be here today.
    My name is Eyal Yakoby, a senior at the University of 
Pennsylvania. For two weeks, an unlawful and dangerous 
encampment was erected in the heart of Penn's campus. Bigotry, 
violence, and harassment have become part of Penn's daily 
syllabus.
    The encampment at Penn waved the flag of the PFLP while 
chanting ``Al Qasam, make us proud,'' the PFLP being a 
designated terrorist organization, and Al Qasam being the armed 
wing of Hamas.
    While students walked to class, they were met with masked 
individuals screaming at them ``Go die, you are Hitler's 
children and Nazis.'' One member of the encampment wore a 
sweatshirt with two rats surrounding a Jewish star.
    In another incident, a student walking on his own campus 
was surrounded by four masked figures flashing strobe lights 
directly into his eyes. They proceeded to threaten him, saying,

        If you know what is good for you, you will get out of here. 
        Hope you have a good doctor, and how is your dental plan?

    During a unity rally held by Jewish students, we chanted 
``Rape is not resistance,'' while the encampment chanted 
``Resistance is justified.''
    When people reveal their beliefs, pay attention, because at 
Columbia, they chanted ``Globalize the Intifada'' right before 
smashing windows, barricading doors, and even taking a janitor 
hostage. For anyone wondering, that is what the start of a 
global intifada looks like.
    This is not just an issue for Jews, it is an issue for all 
Americans. Because on October 7th, Israel was physically 
attacked, but ideologically every free country had been 
infiltrated. Because the same people who wave the flags of 
Hamas are burning the flag of the United States.
    I am a firm believer in the First Amendment, but the 
vandalism, assault, and trespassing that is taking place across 
college campuses are conduct, not speech. More specifically, it 
is unlawful conduct.
    At Penn, bigotry and violence seems to be permitted. 
Because within 24 hours of the encampment being assembled, 
Penn's administration released a statement and said in no 
uncertain terms, ``Blatant violations of university policies 
and credible reports of harassing and intimidating conduct have 
occurred.''
    The President went on. He stated, ``Failure to disband the 
encampment immediately will result in sanctions.'' The 
encampment went nowhere.
    The following week, the President of Penn released another 
statement, whereby he said,

        Every day the encampment exists, the campus is less safe. Some 
        have aimed to characterize this as a peaceful protest. It is 
        not.

    Despite this, he said that he still believes negotiations 
are the best way to go, while admitting that ``The protesters 
have refused.''
    What happened a mere 24 hours after the statement, you ask? 
The encampment took over the other side of Penn's college 
green, chanted ``We don't want no Zionist pigs,'' and compared 
the Philadelphia Police Department to the KKK.
    They also vandalized the Benjamin Franklin statue with Nazi 
and Hamas logos, as well as graffiti reading ``Zios get 
fucked.'' While the encampment persisted, on an anonymous 
social media app exclusive to Penn students, posts read ``Burn 
Filthy Zios,'' and ``Keep protesting louder, Hamas just made a 
statement and they are with us.''
    Penn, after 16 days, finally disbanded the encampment, 
declaring, ``Our community has been under threat for too 
long.'' The university finally acknowledged reality. We as 
students for far too long endured danger.
    So, let me ask you this: What value is such an 
acknowledgment if action takes two weeks? The lesson that Penn 
has been teaching students and faculty is that violence and 
harassment work. Penn has allowed individuals to act with 
impunity.
    As former President Harry S. Truman stated, ``Appeasement 
only makes the aggressor more aggressive.'' Moreover, four days 
prior to the encampment being disbanded, in Penn's own words,

        We have heard reports of circulating documents with 
        instructions for escalating, including through building 
        occupations and violence.

The Penn crimes log even included ``Terroristic threats.''
    To be clear, the university knew about documents 
circulating within the encampment for instructions on building 
occupations and violence. There were terroristic threats. They 
waited at least four days to do something.
    On top of that, once the encampment was cleared, the 
university found weapons within it. This right here is the 
moral degradation of higher education and an utter neglect for 
safety.
    When we applied to Penn, we expected to be nervous about 
our final exams. What we didn't expect was to have 
counterterrorism units roaming on our campus. Taxpayers weren't 
aware that their Federal dollars would support the hate that 
has taken root at Penn.
    Make no mistake, it is not the administration alone. Some 
professors at Penn are also abetting hateful speech and 
conduct. To illustrate, one professor posted a cartoon mocking 
9/11.
    Another posted on October 7th, ``Beautiful and timely,'' 
referencing Hamas terrorists entering Israel. While in class, a 
different professor remarked that not all Jews should be thrown 
into the sea, but only because, in his own words, it was not 
practical.
    I sit here today because I am urging the administration to 
redeem themselves. Penn's coat of arms reads ``Laws without 
morals are useless.'' Well, right now, Penn has laws with zero 
morals.
    Just last week, students put up six American flags on 
campus. Within 24 hours, all the flags were removed. Yet, the 
PFLP flag that sat just yards away was left untouched. 
Apparently, at Penn, the flags of terrorist organizations that 
rape, murder, and take American hostages can fly freely, but 
the U.S. flag cannot.
    Thank you.
    [The Statement of Mr. Yakoby follows:]

[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
                STATEMENT OF SHABBOS KESTENBAUM

    Mr. Kestenbaum. Subcommittee Chair Roy, Subcommittee 
Ranking Member Scanlon, my name is Shabbos Kestenbaum. I am a 
proud Jew. I am a proud first generation American. 
Unfortunately, I have the distinction of being the plaintiff 
against Harvard University for their inability and 
unwillingness to combat Jew hatred on their campus.
    As my last name Kestenbaum suggests, my family's origins 
are traced to Germany. Indeed, my great-great grandfather, 
Yosef Breuer, was the leading German Orthodox Rabbi and a 
respected figure within German society. Breuer's youngest 
daughter, my great-great aunt, vividly recalls praying from the 
Book of Psalms while her father was arrested by the Nazi 
gestapo.
    Their historic Breuer Synagogue in Frankfurt completely 
burnt to the ground on the night of Kristallnacht. As one of 
the very last Jews to flee Nazi persecution in Germany, my 
family found home in the United States of America where they 
were able to rebuild and sustain their Jewish identity. To this 
day, the historic Breuer Shul stands tall in New York City, 
representing not only the indomitable spirit of the Jewish 
people, but of what makes the United States such a beautiful, 
welcoming country.
    My story of antisemitism, therefore, is deeply painful and 
it is deeply personal. The members, Kristallnacht did not begin 
with burning books or broken windows. Kristallnacht did not 
begin with destroyed synagogues nor expulsions.
    Kristallnacht began with the acceptance, the normalization, 
and the celebration of Jew hatred. The Members of this 
Committee, I appear before you with an urgent warning. The 
treatment of Jewish Americans on college campuses across this 
country and, in particular, at Harvard University is nothing 
short of a national emergency. It is blatantly antisemitic. It 
is frighteningly discriminatory, and it is deeply un-American.
    I say this words out of two years of personal experience 
with a pervasive bigotry toward Jews and a stunning lack of 
moral clarity. I'd like to walk you through the last three 
weeks at Harvard to prove my point. On the first day Passover, 
hundreds of Harvard students and faculty members set up 
encampments in Harvard Yard in direct violation of Harvard 
policies demanding that Harvard divest all moneys from the 
Jewish State.
    The protestors cheered thunderously when they replaced the 
American flag overlooking Harvard with that of Palestine. They 
screamed about globalizing the intifada, drew pictures of our 
Jewish university president with horns and a tail, and screamed 
at all hours of the day that, quote, ``Palestine will be 
Arab.'' Perhaps most concerning, the protestors established 
their own rule of law on campus creating self-appointed safety 
marshals to patrol the campus. These safety marshals followed 
Jews like me on our way to class, monitoring our every move.
    They often recorded us and demanded that we leave their 
encampment as if we did not have a right to exist at Harvard. 
They did nothing when their encampment participants physically 
threatened Harvard community members. This campaign was 
designed for one reason and one reason only, to intimidate, 
harass, and bully Jewish students at Harvard University.
    In fact, although President Alan Garber himself admitted 
that these students threatened both students and employees, the 
encampment was allowed to continue uninterrupted for nearly 
threw weeks. While the encampment finally ended yesterday, if 
you would like to see Harvard's antisemitism in real time, look 
no further than the fact that Harvard has agreed with almost 
all the encampment leader's demands. In exchange for leaving, 
the anti-Semites will face zero consequences.
    They will get to meet with the university to discuss a 
Palestinian Studies Department. They will meet with the 
corporation to discuss divesting from the Jewish State. Not 
once has Harvard publicly condemned the objective antisemitism 
that we Jewish students have faced as a result.
    Not once has Harvard's antisemitism task force said 
anything. More importantly, not once have they done anything to 
combat an-
tisemitism at Harvard. The encampment espoused near daily 
antisemitism, harassed, and followed Jews, called for the 
violent destruction of the Jewish State, all in direct 
violation of school policy.
    As a result, they will all be rewarded. Only those--I am a 
Jewish student and have thus far been unable to meet with 
President Alan Garber or my dean, Marla Frederick, to discuss 
the pervasive antisemitism on campus. Only those who call for 
the ethnic genocide of Jews, violate school policy, and sent 
masked thugs to follow Jews are given the honor of having a 
seat at the table.
    That is the reality of being a Jew at Harvard in 2024. When 
the antisemitic encampment was ongoing, a few brave patriots 
and I decided to plant 1,200 Israeli and American flags in 
memory of the 1,200 Muslim, Jews, and Christians slaughtered by 
October 7th. Harvard responded by calling the police on me.
    Harvard did not deem chanting violent destruction of the 
Jewish hate actionable, but planting American flags were. 
Tellingly within 24 hours of our installation being set up, the 
American flags, Israeli flags, and hostage posters were all 
vandalized. To this day, Harvard has yet to acknowledge let 
alone condemn this act of hatred.
    I will close by saying that Harvard students have called 
Jews bloodthirsty vipers. A professor has publicly stated that 
quote, ``Zionists do not belong in public health.'' Class 
instructors have canceled classes to encourage students to 
participate in anti-Israel demonstrations, and a staff at 
Harvard threatened me with a machete.
    To this day, Harvard has yet acknowledged to me what they 
will do to protect me, what they have done to discipline the 
staff member. I have seldom experienced such disdain, 
disregard, and contempt for a minority group than the way in 
which Harvard treats its Jews at Harvard.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Kestenbaum follows:]

[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Mr. Roy. Thank you, Mr. Kestenbaum.
    Rabbi Dr. Goldfeder, you may begin your testimony.

                  STATEMENT OF MARK GOLDFEDER

    Mr. Goldfeder. Chair Roy, Ranking Member Scanlon, the 
Members of the Subcommittee, good afternoon. My name is Mark 
Goldfeder. I'm the Director of the National Jewish Advocacy 
Center, a nonprofit legal organization set up to combat 
antisemitism.
    It is an honor to appear before you on this important 
topic. Even pre-October 7th, studies show that nearly 75 
percent of Jewish students on campus had experienced 
antisemitism. That number is only growing.
    I'm incredibly grateful for the wide bipartisan consensus, 
both here in Congress and in State legislatures throughout the 
country, that more needs to be done to protect our Jewish 
students. Antisemitism is also a serious concern for the rest 
of American society because history has repeatedly shown that 
it is a proverbial canary in the coal mine of intolerance. One 
need look no further than our college campuses, where already 
the chants have morphed from death to Israel to death to 
America.
    There's no time for a history of antisemitism. It is worth 
noting that there are certain patterns that consistently emerge 
when it comes to antisemitism's focus, the form if not the 
content of its justifications, and the effective process by 
which it allows otherwise decent people to do horrible things. 
In terms of its focus, as Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks of 
blessed memory once explained, antisemitism often looks at Jews 
as a collective.
    The idea being that while individual Jews might be 
tolerable, Jews as a separate collective identity should not be 
allowed to exist with the same rights as other groups. That's 
why the majority of antisemitism at any given era tends to 
focus on the primary form of collective Jewish identity at that 
point in time. So, in the Middle Ages, Jews were for the most 
part a religious community.
    So, they were hated for their religion, even if those 
particular Jews being oppressed were not religious. In the 19th 
and 20th centuries, the primary unifying collective identity of 
Jews was their ethnicity. Even when the assimilated Jews had 
only a trace amount of Jewish blood in them, they were killed.
    Today when the primary collective embodiment of Jewish 
people on the world stage is the people of Israel and their 
nation State, Jews around the world are hated and held 
accountable for their State, even if they're not Israeli. The 
essence is the same even if the focus shifts. It's the denial 
of the legitimacy of the Jews as a separate people.
    In every generation, those manifesting such bigotry use 
some variant of the same refrain. We don't hate Jews. We just 
hate X, to justify their hatred in a socially acceptable way. 
Anti-Semites need a rationale that can pass in polite society.
    So, in the Middle Ages, that was religion. In post-
Enlightenment Europe, it was science. Today, it involves using, 
actually abusing the language of human rights with selective 
claims of social justice.
    That's only Jews or the Jewish State as worth of 
condemnation. Finally, in terms of its insidious process, one 
unifying theme is consistent dehumanization. Whether the Jews 
are portrayed as malevolently superhuman like in the Protocols 
of the Elders of Zion or as worthlessly subhuman in Nazi 
ideology, anti-Semites have found that it is easier to despise 
and eventually kill that which you don't consider human.
    The bottom line is that the rationales are ever changing. 
So, to fight antisemitism, we need solutions that can cut 
through all the timely excuses given for a timeless hatred. We 
need to focus on practical measures.
    So, I wish to offer three suggested efforts. First and 
foremost, for the vast majority of Jewish people across time 
and space, Zionism is and always has been an integral part of 
their Jewish identities. To quote my distinguished co-panelist, 
Mr. Rachlin, ``not all anti-Zionism is antisemitism, but most 
of it is.''
    Certainly, any time that Jews are targeted for their Jewish 
belief in Zionism, that is antisemitism nor is that in any way 
controversial or partisan. That idea actually comes from the 
Administration's National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism that 
Ranking Member Nadler referenced. So, Congress should clarify 
that unlawfully targeting a Jewish person for any aspect of 
their Jewish identity, including a belief in Zionism is 
antisemitism and will be treated as such.
    Second, Congress should make sure that the Federal 
Government is enforcing laws already in place, including, of 
course, Title VI. Congress could also add teeth in the form of 
penalties for schools that fail to fulfill their obligations or 
to file the requirements to disclose foreign funding. Finally, 
Congress should make clear that the First Amendment is not some 
mystery that no one knows how to apply.
    The government expects universities to apply it correctly 
and consistently. Freedom of speech, even offensive and hateful 
speech, must be protected. There are limits to what constitutes 
speech and there are rules for when it crosses over into 
actionable conduct.
    Let me be clear. You can say whatever you want, however 
abhorrent, about Jews or the Jewish State. You can't then 
attack Jews because of those hateful feelings. The First 
Amendment does not protect trespassing, vandalism, harassment, 
assault, the destruction of property.
    It does not protect those making true threats or 
intimidation or incitement. Protests are important, important. 
Schools can and must still impose reasonable time, place, and 
manner restrictions.
    Even a public university is not a public street. The rules 
for what speech must be allowed on each are very different. 
University officials do not have to tolerate student activities 
that breach reasonable campus rules that interrupt the 
educational process or interfere with other students' right to 
receive an education.
    We also don't have to imagine what responsible leadership 
looks like in practice. As the Chair mentioned, President Ben 
Sasse of the University of Florida is one example of someone 
who had stepped up to show the way. Thank you for this 
opportunity to testify, and I look forward to your questions.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Goldfeder follows:]

[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Mr. Roy. Thank you, Rabbi Goldfeder.
    Now, I would turn to Mr. Rachlin for his testimony.

                   STATEMENT OF KEVIN RACHLIN

    Mr. Rachlin. Thank you so much, Chair Roy and Ranking 
Member Scanlon. Thank you for inviting me here today. My name 
is Kevin Rachlin, and I'm the Washington Director of the Nexus 
Leadership Project, a group committed to supporting the 
historic U.S. National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism and to 
fight antisemitism in ways that bring together communities.
    Antisemitism is a threat to our society and to the norms 
and values of democracy. Every day, there seems to be new data 
showing an undeniable dramatic spike in antisemitism. That data 
doesn't tell the story half as well as these two students here 
today.
    As Rabbi Dr. Goldfeder explained in his testimony, the kind 
of incidents being reported go well beyond the bounds of mere 
expression or protest. Chants of eff the Jews or calls for 
Jewish students to go back to Poland, these are brazened anti-
Jewish taunts and harassment and they should be condemned and 
are simply unacceptable. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a 
complex issue, and reasonable people can disagree on solutions.
    Universities should be a place to embrace complexity and 
promote understanding. When students are celebrating October 
7th or saying Zionists should die, this is simply unacceptable 
and should be condemned. There's some disagreement about where 
anti-Zionism and criticism of Israel overlaps into 
antisemitism.
    That's a debate that Nexus project has engaged in. When it 
comes to actually to protect college students, there's 
consensus around the anti-Jewish incidents we are hearing about 
today and about one of the common ways that anti-Zionism shows 
up. While not every argument against Zionism as a political 
ideology may be motivated by anti-Jewish bias, as a practical 
matter, the majority of American Jews self-identify as 
Zionists.
    So, we have seen school clubs or movements with litmus 
tests saying Zionists not allowed, this is effectively a ban on 
including a majority of the Jewish students on that campus. 
That exclusion can be a Title VI violation and civil rights 
laws give enforcement agencies a mandate to act against that 
discrimination. Ultimately, we have to recognize that the rise 
of antisemitism is a broader societal issue that extends far 
beyond just our college campuses.
    That is why the comprehensive whole-of-society approach of 
the National Strategy is so critical. Its recommendations for 
how the government, schools, businesses, and communities can 
prevent and respond to antisemitism has bipartisan bicameral 
support and has been embraced by the majority of the American 
Jewish community. The administration is already currently 
implementing the strategy within the relevant Federal agencies.
    What we have seen again is that politicians won't even take 
a look at it or accept it simply by virtual of the fact that 
it's from another party. As you hear in this room today, Jewish 
students are facing atrocious antisemitic hostility, and 
Members of Congress should do something that might be 
extraordinary. Reach across any divide to take action.
    Too much of this debate and too many proposed solutions do 
nothing for Jewish students, American students, or the health 
of the higher education system here in the United States. A 
recent letter from Jewish students at Columbia noted, quote,

        Over the past six months, many have spoken in our name. Some 
        are politicians looking to use our experiences to foment 
        America's culture war.

    Another national Jewish student petition said something 
similar. To truly protect Jews on campus and across the 
country, Congress must implement a collaborative and nuanced 
antisemitism strategy that centers Jewish safety above 
political gamesmanship. Students are smart enough to know that 
the external public posturing and politicized debate is making 
more headlines than headway to improve their lives on campus.
    Politicians who are quick to descend on campus, call for 
Presidents to be fired, or to hold press conferences have not 
done their core job to make sure students have a place to call 
for help. I hope that every Member of the Subcommittee supports 
two bills that are a priority for the vast majority of the 
Jewish community. I don't know what could be easier or more 
salient at this point in time.
    First, support the Goldman's Showing Up for Students Act, 
so that the Department of Education has the capacity it needs 
to cope with the influx of Title VI complaints. That office is 
handling a record number of antisemitism cases. Congress hasn't 
even provided adequate support to cope with their pre-October 
7th case load, not to mention what has happened post-October 
7th.
    Second, support the Manning-Smith Countering Antisemitism 
Act, a bipartisan bicameral bill to establish a national 
coordinator to oversee Federal efforts to counter antisemitism 
and lead an interagency task force to implement the U.S. 
National Strategy. This bill has broad American Jewish communal 
support from groups like the ADL, AJC, J Street, AIPAC, Nexus, 
Hillel, and JCPA, just to name a few. I hope this hearing spurs 
a few more Members of Congress to cosponsor and support these 
really critical bills in fulfilling a basic duty to protect 
these students at this critical point in time. Thank you so 
much for inviting me to testify today, and I really look 
forward to your questions.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Rachlin follows:]

[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Mr. Roy. Thank you, Mr. Rachlin. I will now recognize 
myself under the five-minute rule for questions. Mr. 
Kestenbaum, you wrote on March 5th in Newsweek a fairly 
detailed outline of what you've been facing at Harvard. I 
wanted to give you the opportunity to be able to express some 
of that.
    Let me just read for the record, then you can expand on it, 
if you want, where you talked about being shocked to learn that 
Harvard permits the Palestine Solidarity Committee and other 
groups to hold an annual Israel Apartheid Week funded with 
Harvard money, designed fund student initiatives as you laid 
out in the lawsuit.
    During these events, student activists built what they 
called apartheid walls meant to criticize Israel's efforts to 
prevent terrorist attacks, plastered Harvard Yard with imagery 
designed to compare Israel to the Nazis, and have invited more 
antisemitic speakers to infect Harvard's community. After that 
week, a swastika was found in the undergraduate Currier House, 
correct?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. Yes.
    Mr. Roy. Since October 7th, ``antisemitism on campus has 
multiplied exponentially,'' you wrote. On my way to class, this 
is your words, ``people directed chants at me to,'' quote,

        Globalize intifada, to kill all Jews in the world, or to free 
        Palestine from the river to the sea to annihilate the only 
        Jewish State and its Jewish inhabitants, including my family.

Your family.
    Might expect that, as you wrote that, Harvard Divinity 
School, with its mission emphasizing, quote, diversity, 
inclusion, and belonging, and with religious tolerance--the 
divinity school, I want to be clear--one of its core tenets 
would be a safe place for Jews. As you wrote,

        Harvard Divinity, however, as my lawsuit alleges, has proven to 
        be a fount of anti-Jewish sentiment and discrimination.

    Does this reflect what you are currently finding in your 
experience at Harvard? Do you think it reflects the experience 
of most Jewish students currently at universities across the 
country, particularly Ivy League universities?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. It absolutely reflects my experience, and I 
would actually argue it has only gotten worse. I will give you 
one quick anecdote. Marla Frederick, who is the Dean of Harvard 
Divinity School, who I am sure is watching right now, I have 
emailed her more than 40 times to talk about antisemitism. She 
has not responded once to a single one of my emails. She has 
refused to meet with me. She has refused to acknowledge that 
antisemitism is a problem at Harvard Divinity School, and 
Harvard University more broadly.
    I will make one last point. We invited two months ago a 
popular Israeli musician, Ishay Ribo, to come sing songs to 
Jewish students who have been experiencing antisemitism. There 
was such a vicious boycott and protest where they chanted 
``Globalize the intifada, resistance is justified,'' that we 
had to hire outside security.
    When I asked Harvard DEI to at minimum condemn the fact 
that Harvard students had made it so unsafe for Jews to sing 
songs that we needed to have security, they said, ``This does 
not fall under our purview.'' This is the same Harvard DEI that 
commented on George Floyd, on abortion, and on Russia's 
invasion of Ukraine. When it comes to protecting Jewish 
students, nothing.
    Mr. Roy. So, and to be clear, this is Harvard that has a 
$50 billion endowment, correct? It is still--
    Mr. Kestenbaum. That is correct.
    Mr. Roy. --getting billions of dollars in taxpayer funds.
    Mr. Kestenbaum. Right.
    Mr. Roy. I just want to be very clear, when we are talking 
about the money, and the need for resources, the problem here 
is the secular left in control of universities that are 
perpetuating the kind of stuff that you just described. I want 
to investigate the point here the extent to which this has been 
coordinated, the extent to which this is coordinated across 
campus across this university--across the country.
    Rabbi, I believe you are familiar with some of the 
observations and actually some information about the extent to 
which this has been very clearly organized and coordinated 
campus by campus around the country.
    Mr. Goldfeder. Sure. Chair, somebody is buying all those 
matching tents. I believe, and I believe strongly enough, that 
along with my partners at Greenberg Traurig, Holtzman Vogel, 
and the Schoen Law Firm, we filed a Federal lawsuit in the 
Eastern District of Virginia accusing some of those 
coordinators of working directly with Hamas. We will let our 
filing speak for ourselves.
    I know that Congress is now looking into some of that 
funding, but it goes beyond funding. It goes beyond 
coordinating. When someone tells you that they are trying to 
provide material support to Hamas, it behooves us to believe 
them. I will tell you why I think it is important to trace that 
funding. It is because if you ever walk into one of those 
protests, which I have done, you will notice something 
fascinating. Eighty percent of the people there don't know what 
river and what sea.
    Mr. Roy. Yes.
    Mr. Goldfeder. Some are there for the pizza. Some are there 
because they have been genuinely misled into thinking that they 
are on the right side of history. If we can actually prove who 
is behind this, I think we can save 80 percent of our future 
citizens.
    Mr. Roy. On this point about the universities fomenting 
this, there are some universities that have not. There are some 
universities that have stood up. I would ask if you can think 
of some good examples. For example, my friend Ben Sasse, the 
President of the University of Florida, who basically said this 
is not a daycare. You know the rules. Follow the rules. Florida 
then did it the right way. Or, for example, the University of 
Texas where Jay Hartzell said we are not going to do this.
    Would you guys agree that there is a way to do this at 
campuses, you can have free speech, you can be able to say what 
you believe, but not terrorize and harass Jewish students? 
Would you guys agree with that? Yes or no.
    Mr. Goldfeder. Yes.
    Mr. Roy. Yes?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. Yes.
    Mr. Roy. Last question because I am running out of time, 
particularly to the two students. Could you guys expand a 
little bit on the extent to which this is not just antisemitism 
but anti-Americanism? I am going to go to you first, Mr. 
Yakoby. I would ask the two students to answer my question.
    Mr. Yakoby. Definitely. I just want to reference one 
Professor who on a Twitter account, which criticized Sami Al-
Arian, who was deported for terrorism, and it commented on how 
he visited a campus. A professor then retweeted it saying that 
``This is the time to say that I have a longstanding respect 
for Sami Al-Arian.''
    That is a terrorist that was deported from the United 
States, and a Professor at Penn then said that she has a 
longstanding respect for him in response to that tweet.
    Mr. Roy. Mr. Kestenbaum, do you want to respond?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. Within 24 hours of installing two American 
flags at Harvard Divinity School, they were vandalized three 
separate times. The flagpole was ripped in half. The flags were 
tossed across the ground. This is not just about antisemitism, 
and it is not just about Jew hatred, but it is hating the 
United States. It is hating our democracy and hating Western 
values.
    Mr. Roy. Thank you, Mr. Kestenbaum.
    I will now recognize the gentleman from Tennessee, Mr. 
Cohen.
    Mr. Cohen. Thank you, Mr. Chair. There is a whole lot of--
    [Disturbance in the hearing room.]
    Mr. Kestenbaum. Even when we talk about antisemitism, we 
can't even do it.
    [Disturbance in the hearing room.]
    Mr. Roy. All right. Mr. Cohen, you may begin. We can 
restart the clock at five minutes.
    Mr. Cohen. Thank you, sir. What bothers me with this 
hearing--I think the hearing is good that we are having it on 
the issue, and I think the discussion has been great and the 
witnesses are great. There has been antisemitism in this 
country and in the world for a long, long time, and the world I 
guess 2,000 years give or take, and in the United States 
probably since the beginning of this country.
    Most of it has come from right-wing racist crowds, like the 
Ku Klux Klan, the Proud Boys, other groups that stand for 
nationalism. They were the groups that were at Charlottesville 
and said, ``Jews will not replace us'' and marched with their 
torches.
    They are the people that have consistently been the David 
Dukes and been antisemitic, and yet when those things happen, 
people that are really against antisemitism, and those of us 
are who are Jewish and feel it in a personal way so many times, 
didn't feel support from many, many, many people who today are 
some of the strongest people fighting antisemitism.
    Now, when they fight it, they are really fighting higher 
education, and they have always had a problem with that. I know 
a Senator who said, ``Higher education is a cesspool.'' Well, 
obviously, it is not, but that says something about her 
education.
    We ought to fight antisemitism at every corner in which it 
exists. What is happening now on the campuses is despicable and 
unfortunate, and so many of these people, including those--many 
of those who just left us with their red hands and voices, 
don't understand the history of why Israel was created, why 
there is a necessity for Israel, and why it needs to exist.
    Ignorance has given them a lot of opportunities to make 
their voices heard. It needs to stop, but I think in that--what 
I would ask Dr. Goldfeder, and I know you have been at Emory, I 
don't know, but I think earlier--I don't think you are 
necessarily as Southern as that far back, but you get a taste 
of it in Atlanta. Is antisemitism more prevalent among Klansman 
and Proud Boys, and some of these right-wing groups?
    Mr. Goldfeder. I am Emory by way of New York. Thank you for 
the question, Congressman. It is an excellent question. I will 
answer that by saying that I think that antisemitism is hard to 
measure where it is more prevalent. It is dangerous wherever it 
comes from, but I think it is more dangerous coming from the 
left right now, because it is OK to say it in polite society. 
No one think it is OK to say, ``I stand with David Duke or with 
the Klan.'' People are willing to literally say, ``I stand with 
Hamas.'' That is why it is more dangerous, because you can say 
it in polite society on university campuses.
    Mr. Cohen. Well, President Trump said he thought David Duke 
was OK when he ran for office in 2016, and he said he didn't 
know about all that other stuff. He welcomed David Duke's 
support. That is neither here nor there.
    A lot of the issues--and I don't mean to defend it in any 
way whatsoever, but has anybody out here, any one of you, done 
any studies to see how much Saudi money, Kuwaiti money, or 
Qatari money has been given to the schools, Ivy schools in 
particular? It is dollars I think might have something to say 
because I have read that there is a lot of Middle Eastern money 
gone into these universities, and that they are afraid to lose 
it.
    Yes, sir. Rabbi?
    Mr. Goldfeder. I didn't do the study, but there was 
research done by the Institute for the Study of Global 
Antisemitism and Policy, and they found that from 2015-2020, 
institutions that accepted money from the Middle Eastern donors 
had on average 300 percent more antisemitic incidents than 
those institutions that did not. From 2015-2020, institutions 
that accepted undisclosed funds from authoritarian donors had 
on average 250 percent more antisemitic incidents than those 
institutions that did not.
    Mr. Cohen. Anybody else have anything to add? Mr. Yakoby?
    Mr. Yakoby. This was a report done by the Network Contagion 
Research Institute that invested Qatari money funneling into 
U.S. universities. The report clearly states, and I quote,

        There has clearly been an erosion of democratic norms on 
        campuses and that a massive influx of foreign concealed 
        donations to American institutions of higher learning, much of 
        it from authoritarian regimes with notable support from Middle 
        Eastern sources.

That was the direct quote from the study.
    Mr. Cohen. They generally are--those countries are 
generally aligned with Hamas.
    Mr. Yakoby. I can tell you from my own experience--I am a 
political science and modern Middle East studies major--I have 
yet to take a class in all four years of college that depicts 
the United States in any sort of positive light. Much of the 
professors that are saying things like playing the victim is 
what Jews are best at are the ones in the Political Science and 
Modern Middle East Studies Department at Penn.
    Mr. Cohen. Well, I thank each of you. The students are very 
impressive, and the adults are--super adults are very 
impressive, too, but--and I appreciate the hearing. I do hope 
that we will have more consistency in our opposition to 
antisemitism.
    I yield back the balance of my time.
    Mr. Roy. I thank the gentleman from Tennessee.
    I will now recognize my friend from Texas, Mr. Hunt.
    Mr. Hunt. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. You have 
probably been wondering why all these pro-Palestinian 
antisemitic protests are occurring across the country today. It 
seems organic, right? Just some college kids protesting like it 
was back in the 1960s and 1970s, same song, different verse. Is 
that true?
    We have seen this before even more recently than you might 
think. In 2020, we had the Summer of Love, and then the 
organized, coordinated BLM and Antifa riots. In 2024, we had 
the organized and coordinated antisemitic protests and riots on 
college campuses around the country, like we are seeing right 
now.
    What do these two years have in common? I know. They are 
both Presidential election years. Sometimes I feel like Bill 
Murray on Groundhog Day. It is the same thing over and over and 
over again, groups with similar ideologies and goals causing 
chaos and riots across my Nation, and they have just picked a 
different cause this year. This year it is my friends of Israel 
and my friends, the Jewish people.
    This isn't just some grass-roots effort of college kids 
rallying around a joint cause, picketing the campus with signs 
and shouting ``From the river to the sea'' for those who know 
what that means. These are people shouting antisemitic remarks 
taking over and barricading themselves inside campus buildings, 
and in the case of Columbia University, taking a university 
employee hostage inside of a campus building.
    What are we seeing? What we are seeing now is not a simple 
protest. It is a more organized, violent occupation of campuses 
funded by outside organizations, by their wealthy, liberal 
donors. Who are these wealthy donors? Don't shoot the 
messenger. I am not the one saying this. This is in Politico. 
We can all agree that Politico is a relatively trusted source, 
especially for the left. According to a recent Politico 
article, ``some of the biggest donors behind these protests are 
George Soros, David Rockefeller, Jr., and Nick and Susan 
Pritzker.''
    Mr. Chai, I would like to submit to the record the article 
from Politico titled ``Pro-Palestinian Protests are Backed by a 
Surprising Source: Biden's Biggest Donors.''
    Interestingly enough, in his remarks about the campus 
protests, President Biden said, and I quote, ``Destroying 
property is not a peaceful protest. It is against the law.'' It 
seems like the President is talking out of both sides of his 
mouth, so which one is it? The protests wouldn't have happened 
in the first place without his donors funding it. For you, 
President Biden, none of this would be happening at all.
    Remember, this isn't me saying this, Republican Wesley 
Hunt. This is Politico. We should have seen this coming. This 
is a Presidential year after all, and I suspect that many of 
the protests that we have seen on college campuses may have 
just been recycled from 2020 riots and rioters and protests.
    Why do I suspect that? New York city officials said that 
close to 30 percent--

        Thirty percent of the people arrested at Columbia, and 60 
        percent of the people arrested in City College, were not 
        affiliated with the universities at all.

In my home State, over half the people who were arrested at the 
University of Texas had no tie to the university at all.
    Mr. Kestenbaum, you brought up a very good point. You see, 
if you were Black students, you wouldn't be sitting here. 
Period. Because the entire campus would have changed their 
social media profiles to Black dots, and these people would 
have been fired. These teachers would have been fired, and you 
would have your justice.
    Just because I am Black, I look different from you, doesn't 
mean that we get different treatment and we should be treated 
better than you, because we are all Americans. I know we are 
all Americans because I fought for this country. I went to West 
Point. I fought beside my Jewish friends. I went to Cornell 
University for grad school. I learned beside my Jewish friends.
    You should see the emails and text messages that I am 
getting from my Jewish friends that I grew up with. I want to 
let you know that I have their back and I have your back. Just 
because you have a lighter skin color than me doesn't mean that 
you get to get treated differently than me because we are all 
Americans and we all should be treated fairly in this country.
    No one should have it easier or more difficult to be able 
to walk around on campus based on the way we look. If you are 
leaders on these campuses today, you are failing us.
    I went to Cornell for grad school. Failure. Columbia. 
Failure. Harvard. Failure. Fix it right now.
    I want to let you all know that we, especially on this side 
of the dais, we have your back, and we will fight antisemitism 
tooth and nail.
    Thank you for the courage and continue to fight for your 
people, and most importantly continue to fight for our fellow 
Americans. God bless you. Thank you for being here.
    I yield back the rest of my time.
    Mr. Roy. Thank you. I thank the gentleman from Texas.
    I will now recognize the gentlelady from Texas, Ms. 
Escobar.
    Ms. Escobar. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I would like to thank 
all our witnesses for being here to testify. I know this is a 
really challenging moment in American history, and it is so 
important for us to listen to one another and learn from one 
another.
    I will tell you, I wish, wish, wish we could hear that same 
passion that we just heard about all racism. I sit on this 
Committee, this Subcommittee, and the Immigration Subcommittee, 
and I think it is really important for us to draw an 
interesting distinction that I have seen. From this Committee, 
this Committee actually has been used as a vehicle to promote 
xenophobia and to push anti-immigrant rhetoric in a way that 
has been incredibly alarming and disheartening.
    Again, I stand against antisemitism, as do the vast 
majority of Americans I believe. I wish we could stand against 
all racism and all hatred together. It is important for 
Americans who are watching at home to not necessarily listen to 
what my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are saying 
with regard to this issue, but really to look at their actions.
    They say they condemn antisemitism, and yet they fought to 
reduce funding for the Department of Education's Office of 
Civil Rights by 25 percent last year. If we really are deeply 
committed as the U.S. Congress to combating antisemitism, then 
we should put our money where our mouth is, and actually use 
the tools at our disposal and fund those tools.
    When one side wants to cut those tools, it really makes you 
question what their real intention is. They say they condemn 
antisemitism, yet a good portion of them stood by silently in 
2017 when White supremacists chanting explicitly antisemitic 
slogans marched in Charlottesville. They said nothing when 
then-President Donald Trump called those marching good people.
    They say they condemn antisemitism, yet they embrace the 
great replacement theory, a White supremacist belief that is 
rooted in both anti-immigrant and antisemitic sentiment, and it 
portrays immigrants and non-White Americans as invaders. In 
fact, the word ``invasion'' is probably the word most 
frequently used on this Committee by my colleagues on the other 
side of the aisle.
    Here in Congress, as I said, ``our budgets reflect our 
values.'' I will continue to support and urge funding for 
offices like the Department of Education's Office of Civil 
Rights, so that our government has the tools it needs to really 
combat antisemitism.
    I do believe students' rights to express their opinions or 
share their beliefs on campus should be protected, but students 
do deserve to be safe and learn in a safe environment.
    Mr. Rachlin, can you please tell us, do you think colleges 
and universities could help ratchet down the temperature on 
campuses and prevent violence by facilitating constructive 
dialog and understanding among students with diverse 
backgrounds, students who are Jewish, Israeli, Muslim, and 
Arab?
    Mr. Rachlin. Thank you so much for that question, 
Congresswoman. Unequivocally, yes, this is something that can 
and should be done. Universities, college campuses, high 
schools, they need to meet students where they are, and they 
need to be able to bring them together in a safe and 
collaborative environment that fosters open and honest dialog, 
but that is respectful dialog at the same time.
    It can be upsetting, these conversations, for students on 
both sides of the aisle, but at the end of the day this is how 
you actually bridge the sides together, through conversation 
that is respectful and meaningful. Having worked in the peace-
building space, this is something that we push for quite 
consistently, the idea of sitting down with the others to see 
them as a human being and to actually have those conversations 
that are difficult and recognizing the shared humanity from the 
other side as well.
    So, it is absolutely critical that universities bring 
people together to have those conversations in a safe and 
effective environment.
    Ms. Escobar. Thank you for reminding us of those very 
important values, which we should not just pursue in a 
university setting but those of us who are lawmakers as well.
    Thank you, Mr. Chair. I yield back.
    Mr. Roy. I thank the gentlelady from Texas.
    I will now recognize the gentleman from California, Mr. 
Kiley.
    Mr. Kiley. Mr. Kestenbaum, thank you for your very 
compelling and very disturbing testimony. I am so sorry for 
what you and your peers have had to endure, just the 
backwardness and the horror, on Harvard's campus.
    I want to reiterate a very important point from your 
testimony, which is that Harvard caved to the demands of the 
encampment. Is that correct?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. That is correct.
    Mr. Kiley. Tell us again how long the encampment was there?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. About three weeks.
    Mr. Kiley. You had the people on this encampment--I don't 
know if they were students or not--who were harassing Jewish 
students, who were threatening them, who were following them 
around, and monitoring their activities. In response to this, 
the university gave them what they wanted?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. That is absolutely correct.
    Mr. Kiley. What were the demands that were agreed to?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. They want a full divestment from the only 
Jewish State, they want a Palestinian study center, and they 
want to have full control over certain narratives that are 
being given in classrooms as it pertains to Israel.
    Mr. Kiley. This was described as a negotiation. Were you 
invited to that negotiation?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. I have never once been invited to speak, 
with the president, with the dean, with anyone of power in 
Harvard.
    Mr. Kiley. So, this is the important point, and you have 
these university presidents, and this has become a trend now of 
university presidents caving to the demands of the encampments. 
Then they pat themselves on the back. They say, ``Oh, reasoned 
dialog, that is how we got here, dialog is the answer.''
    This is not dialog. This is the opposite of dialog. 
Dialogue involves a reasoned consideration of different points 
of view. Dialogue is not the preferred mode of operation for 
antisemites, anarchists, terrorists, and their sympathizers 
because their arguments are terrible. They are morally 
bankrupt. They are repugnant. So, they prefer to do things by 
force.
    Now, you have university administrations that are rewarding 
that mode of operation by saying the way that you get to be 
part of this negotiation is not by representing a significant 
voice on campus, not by someone who has been victimized by the 
things that are going on the campus; rather, the way that we 
will negotiate with you is if you engage in illegal activities 
and violate the university's rules and harass other students.
    We are seeing this at more and more universities now. Just 
today, Sonoma State, which is a university in California, 
announced that they were, in response to the encampment there, 
basically adopting the full BDS program. They even said that 
for flyers that might be out there that made a reference to 
study abroad in Israel, they would immediately act to get rid 
of those flyers, so the word ``Israel'' doesn't even appear on 
any of them.
    Then, to top it all off, to enforce this new policy, they 
set up an Advisory Council of Students for Justice in 
Palestine. I am not making this up. This is actually what they 
did. This Council will enforce the agreement, and it is going 
to consist of members from the encampment--faculty, staff, 
administrators, Palestinian alumni, and other interested 
students. This is an absolute disgrace. Any leader at Sonoma 
State who is party to this needs to resign immediately. They 
are institutionalizing antisemitism.
    I will give you another example, because you said you 
haven't been invited to take part in negotiations, to have any 
sort of meeting with university leadership, and that is what we 
are seeing at universities across the country.
    Here is an example from University of California, San 
Diego, where a student emailed the Chair of the Academic Senate 
and said,

        Hope all is well. I have been invited to schedule a meeting 
        with the Academic Senate regarding my experience as a Jewish 
        and Israeli student on campus during this academic year. Please 
        let me know the followup steps.

    The response, and this is from John Hildebrand, the Chair 
of the Academic Senate at UCSD, says,

        I apologize, but we can't meet with you at this time. There is 
        a lot going on, and it is just not possible just now. Feel free 
        to send comments to my email. But as you may imagine, we are 
        inundated with requests.

    This is an absolutely shameful State of affairs where you 
have the voice of Jewish American students that is being 
sidelined, the people who are most affected by what is going on 
in our campuses, but the people who are creating the 
disruption, who are engaging in harassment, who are engaging in 
threats of violence, and even in some cases acts of violence, 
are being elevated, are being given a privileged position, and 
then are having their antisemitic, anti-Israel demands actually 
being agreed to by the Administration.
    So, this has become a much bigger problem than just the 
sort of scenes that we are seeing that are so disturbing, that 
have been described by our witnesses today. It has become an 
institutional problem, the way that universities are responding 
to this, but of course we know that it is the actions of the 
universities that in many ways have led to this crisis that we 
are now experiencing in the first place.
    So, I want to thank, in particular, the students here from 
Harvard and from Penn, and so many voices that we have heard, 
courageous accounts from all across the country. We need 
fundamental reform in American higher education.
    I yield back.
    Mr. Roy. I thank the gentleman from California.
    I now recognize the gentlelady from Vermont, Ms. Balint.
    Ms. Balint. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    This issue is deeply personal for me. I am the 
granddaughter of Leopold Balint, who was horribly, viciously 
murdered in the Holocaust. When you go to Yad Vashem and you 
read the ``Book of Names,'' you will see a lot of Balints 
there. You don't see a lot of Balints in this country. There 
are a lot of Balints in that book.
    I have seen antisemitism firsthand. My family has 
experienced it. We are continuing to deal with the generational 
trauma that was brought on my family through the Holocaust.
    I was raised in a house in which it was taught at a very 
young age that you always need to look for the signs of 
antisemitism. It is used to manufacture division and fear, and 
anyone can fuel it, but it always benefits politicians who rely 
on that division and fear for their own power.
    It is incredibly frustrating to me that in Congress right 
now we can't have a conversation around antisemitism that will 
lead to actual action.
    I ask unanimous consent to enter into the record a video 
that I have compiled regarding antisemitism, and I ask 
unanimous consent to show it in Committee.
    [Video shown.]
    Ms. Balint. So, you can see why I have a very hard time 
taking it seriously when we come together in this format, when 
I have to sit and listen to antisemitic rhetoric from my own 
colleagues.
    To the students, your experience is horrible, and you never 
should have had to go through that. I have family and friends 
who have students also at college campuses right now. Some are 
part of exercising their First Amendment rights against Israel. 
Some of them, like you, have been on the receiving end of 
horribly antisemitic rhetoric. Both these things are true.
    What I would like to see from my colleagues is to stop 
using antisemitism and your bogus attempts to address it to 
raise money and dollars. Why don't we do something that will 
actually solve the problem? Because it is real, and many people 
in this country are suffering from it.
    I yield back.
    Mr. Roy. I now recognize the gentlelady from Wyoming, Ms. 
Hageman.
    Ms. Hageman. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I actually want to take 
a step back and look at the forces behind these college campus 
riots, which have far overstepped the protections from the 
First Amendment and threatened Jewish students and faculty 
across the Nation.
    From what I have seen, these riots are a form of anarchy 
that are being pursued by a violent group of anti-American and 
antisemitic groups. What strikes me about this pro-Palestine, 
pro-Hamas-inspired unrest is both the speed, in which, it 
started after the October 7th attack, and the sophistication of 
the coordinated acts of crime, including threatening our Jewish 
students occupying and damaging college buildings and more.
    First, we must start with the fact that on October 8th, one 
day after the Hamas terrorist attack, Palestine chapters on 
college universities such as Harvard issued statements and 
began holding rallies in support of Hamas, and placing the 
blame for the violence entirely on Israel.
    Mr. Kestenbaum, you are a master's student at Harvard. 
Didn't you find it a little odd that groups were so prepared to 
immediately support the Hamas attacks?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. I found it odd, and I found it horrifying.
    Ms. Hageman. Well, and I did, too. I would say this 
preparation suggests outside influence inside the student 
organizations, and that such outside groups were possibly 
informed of the October 7th attack, before it occurred. That 
this situation is being driven by outside forces is not just 
speculation.
    Of the 262 people arrested at Columbia and the City College 
of New York, nearly half had no affiliation with the schools. 
At George Washington University here in D.C., only six of the 
33 arrested individuals were affiliated with the school. The 
coordination is mind-blowing.
    I don't want to diminish what our Jewish students are going 
through right now, but I want to hopefully highlight something, 
Mr. Kestenbaum, you stated in your testimony and to describe 
the further danger of this situation. Wouldn't you agree that 
outside criminal and violent forces exploiting colleges for 
their causes are dangerous for each and every member of the 
school, the students, and the faculty alike? Mr. Yakoby, would 
you agree with that?
    Mr. Yakoby. One hundred percent.
    Ms. Hageman. What about you, Mr. Kestenbaum?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. Absolutely.
    Ms. Hageman. Rabbi Goldfeder?
    Mr. Goldfeder. Absolutely.
    Ms. Hageman. Mr. Rachlin?
    Mr. Rachlin. Yes.
    Ms. Hageman. Shai Davidai, an Assistant Professor at 
Columbia Business School, reported that one of the nationwide 
instigators of these campus movements, Students for Justice for 
Palestine, received guidance and financial support from 
American Muslims for Palestine, and he reports AMP's directors 
have links to groups which fundraise for Hamas.
    These groups have these antisemitic, anti-American groups 
even have direct ties to the Biden Administration, to the White 
House. The National Security Council Coordinator for 
Intelligence and Defense Policy, and the Deputy Assistant to 
the President, Maher Bitar, is driving the Administration's 
Hamas policy. In college, Mr. Bitar was an active participant 
in the Students for Justice in Palestine at Georgetown 
University.
    Again, that relationship, that connection, absolutely 
horrifies me, and it demonstrates why we have seen such a weak 
response from the Biden Administration.
    Rabbi Goldfeder, your testimony touches on this issue a bit 
in your second recommendation, and what you State is that we 
just simply need to enforce the laws on the books, which 
provide for punishment when foreign students provide support 
for terrorism. Could you please elaborate on the source of the 
issue from which this recommendation comes from and what 
Congress can do through oversight to ensure that DOJ is doing 
just that, which is enforcing the law?
    Mr. Goldfeder. Sure. Well, that particular recommendation 
comes from the Immigration and Nationality Act, but I will take 
it a step further, which is that even groups that include 
domestic citizens that support terror, there are laws in place. 
The ATA and JASTA are there to protect everyone else from 
groups that support terror.
    AMP was founded on the ashes of other groups that were shut 
down literally for supporting Hamas. AMP coordinates NSJP, and 
that is why we sued them in Federal Court. So, it is important 
to enforce those laws to make sure that the DOJ actually does 
hold them accountable.
    Ms. Hageman. Do you think that the DOJ is currently 
enforcing the law as it is written?
    Mr. Goldfeder. I do not.
    Ms. Hageman. OK. I would ask unanimous consent to introduce 
into the record the article ``One Look at Biden's Top Advisor 
Explains his Support for Hamas.''
    I want to thank all of you for being here. I am sorry for 
what you are going through, but I also want to thank you for 
your bravery, for your willingness to step up and talk about 
this. It needs to be exposed. Sunshine is the best 
disinfectant. We are going to get through this. We are all 
going to get through this. I know it is tough, but your bravery 
demonstrates that there are good, good, good Americans out 
there that will always fight for the right thing.
    Thank you. I yield back.
    Mr. Roy. I thank the gentlelady from Wyoming. Without 
objection, her consent request will be admitted into the 
record.
    Mr. Roy. I also have a letter from Advancing American 
Freedom that--to Attorney General Garland that, without 
objection, I would like to introduce into the record involving 
these issues and some questions they asked from the Department 
of Education.
    Then, in addition, I think somebody referenced earlier and 
would like to introduce a Politico article, dated May 5th, 
titled ``Pro-Palestinian Protestors are Backed by a Surprising 
Source: Biden's Biggest Donors,'' including Soros, Rockefeller, 
and Pritzker. Without objection.
    Now, with that, I will recognize the Ranking Member.
    Ms. Scanlon. Thank you. I do think we are hearing an 
interesting array of conspiracy theories here without much 
evidence to back them up. That could be a subject of a whole 
other hearing, including the growing evidence that Russia, 
China, and Iran are exploiting the campus protests for their 
own purposes, to sow division in the U.S., particularly, in 
advance of an election, as we have seen them do the last two 
election cycles.
    So, that probably is not the right subject for today's 
hearing, but it does go to one of the issues I am most 
interested in, which is the role that our schools, colleges, 
and universities can play in terms of educating students and 
young people how to distinguish fact from fiction, propaganda 
from what is true in the world, and how they can help us, 
everybody, but particularly on our college campuses, provide 
the atmosphere, the respect for one another, and the ability 
for people to have those open conversations.
    We have seen a variety of responses. I know today's focus 
has been on places where there has been virulent antisemitism 
and hate speech and actual potentially criminal violations. 
There are many campuses where this has not occurred and there 
have been great efforts.
    So, Mr. Rachlin, could you comment on the role that 
colleges and universities can play, what they can do, perhaps 
in combination with the Office of Civil Rights, to make sure we 
do have safe spaces for people to discuss these important 
issues without veering into territory that we don't want them 
to.
    Mr. Rachlin. I am really glad you brought that up, and 
actually I am very happy you brought up the Office for Civil 
Rights. I think it is an important thing to note in this 
Committee that hasn't been said yet is this. I am just going to 
say a quick number, 50 to 1. This is the number of 
investigations per investigator that the Department of 
Education's Office of Civil Rights have currently for their 
caseloads--50 investigations per investigator.
    Each one is trying their best to try to investigate all 
these complaints of Title VI on college campuses and in high 
schools around the country. They don't have the resources to 
adequately address this. They need more money. It is one of the 
reasons why we and others are really pushing for increased 
funding for OCR to really push that forward to give them the 
resources to take some of the pressure off the university, so 
that when there are complaints, like the students say that they 
are being investigated quickly, that they are being brought to 
fruition, and that there are consequences following those 
investigations that the Department is actually putting forward.
    In terms of universities, they really need to do a better 
job at bringing people together. One of the things I have seen 
is that there are several universities that rather than allow 
these encampments and these issues to bubble up and explode the 
way they have on other campuses around the country that they 
brought together sides before any of this has happened, sat 
them down, and said: These are the rules for engagement. These 
are the rules for protests. If you go outside these lines, you 
will be subject to be penalized for that.
    I think that is the way that universities should be 
handling this. They should be taking a proactive approach 
rather than a reactive approach to this at this point in time. 
I think all universities, particularly, someone like my alma 
mater, Ohio State, this is what they are trying to do at this 
point in time. They are trying to be proactive and address this 
before it starts spilling out, so that it impacts Jewish 
students across their campuses.
    Ms. Scanlon. I do think that is a really interesting role, 
particularly in the academic context, of helping people to 
understand, what are the boundaries of free speech versus hate 
speech, what are the boundaries of nonviolent protests and 
civil disobedience, so people understand where they are, and if 
they do cross those lines, they do so intentionally, and then 
they know what the consequences are.
    Do you want to add anything, Rabbi? You looked like you 
were nodding in agreement.
    Mr. Goldfeder. I agree with everything that was said, but I 
am also a practical thinker. When I look on campus, we are not 
seeing calls for conversation. Hard conversations are like 
chess, and you can't play chess when someone keeps on knocking 
over the board and kicking you in the face.
    So, until we can assert these are the rules of the game, 
and how we are going to have conversations. Again, I will point 
to Ben Sasse in Florida, President Ben Sasse; he has done 
that--then I am all for it. You have to have a conversation 
with someone who respects your very existence or else it won't 
go anywhere. So, I 100 percent agree in theory. When it comes 
to funding OCR, absolutely, we should give them the funding 
that they need. There also does need to be accountability.
    I have done OCR complaints for many years, and to my 
knowledge there has never been in history a single time where a 
university actually lost its funding for antisemitism. The 
words have to mean something, so I think any additional funding 
has to come with accountability.
    Ms. Scanlon. Sure. That makes sense, and it would help if 
OCR had the resources it needs to do its job.
    I do have to disagree that the only response has to be 
threats, because we have certainly seen many of the 
universities in my district that having open dialog, having 
respectful dialog, has avoided some of the issues that we have 
seen and that have been discussed today. So, thank you.
    With that, I yield back.
    Mr. Roy. I thank the Ranking Member.
    I will now recognize my good friend, Mr. Armstrong.
    Mr. Armstrong. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think we should 
start with this isn't a protest. What we saw here today is 
performative art. The only time their hands go up is when the 
camera goes on, because they are trying to get in a picture. 
They can't keep their hands up for longer than 15 seconds.
    If they want to know what protest and bravery looks like, 
read some stories, talk about somebody starving to death and 
handing the person standing next to them in line their food for 
the day, when the food they are getting for a day is less than 
most people get for half of a breakfast, when an entire 
continent is trying to wipe you off the face of the planet.
    You want to know what the difference is? Mr. Kestenbaum, if 
the Klan tried to have a two-week sit-in protest at Harvard, do 
you think Harvard's university and their leadership would 
negotiate a cease-fire with them?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. Absolutely no.
    Mr. Armstrong. Mr. Yakoby, if a bunch of militia guys 
showed up in Tommy tactical gear and playing G.I. Joe and doing 
all those things, and wanted to do all that at Pennsylvania, do 
you think the university would negotiate with them?
    Mr. Yakoby. They would not.
    Mr. Armstrong. No, they wouldn't.
    Mr. Goldfeder, you said that. That is the difference, 
because you can get a picture with these people, you can stand 
there, you can talk about these things in polite society, when 
they are saying things when they have no idea what the history 
is.
    Seven miles from the river to the sea. Seven miles to the 
Jordanian border. That is where it is in Israel. The reason 
Israel exists is because nobody in Europe would take them. We 
wouldn't take them. It is the greatest single horrific event in 
modern history. I just think if you are at Harvard maybe you 
should learn about it, or if you are at Penn, you should learn 
about it.
    So, when we talk about these things like they are 
equivalent, they are not. They are just not. This is 
coordinated. This is going on. We treat somebody differently. 
Here is the thing. If somebody comes after you with a machete, 
that is not a mostly peaceful protest. That is a felony. Charge 
them.
    If you want to occupy an entire building and commit felony 
acts of vandalism, how about a bunch of rich, liberal, and 
credit card kids understand what the consequences to a protest 
are.
    I spent 10 years as a criminal defense attorney and a 
public defender. I can tell you, if you are not on an Ivy 
League campus and you decide to do that, when you are told you 
are going to leave, you know what you are? Six months later you 
are a felon. We don't need more Federal money and dialog. We 
need somebody to say, hey, we are going to--you want to do 
this? You want to go bomb the grounds of free speech? You want 
to commit crimes on public ground? Then, you know what? You can 
go through the rest of your life with your Ivy League 
education. Great. Fantastic. It is awesome, but You are also 
going to have that felony designation. Let me know how that 
goes when you are trying to become a licensed doctor or a 
licensed nurse.
    Then, better yet, I think we should give them a Columbia 
law school graduate as their attorney, because you know what 
they got? Pass-fail grades because who could possibly go to law 
school at a time like this. The one profession where your 
personal feelings and your independent emotions and your spaces 
don't matter, ``I am sorry, Judge. I need a continuance.''
    Judge replies ``Why?'' and you reply, ``You overruled my 
objection, and I don't know how we can go on at a time like 
this.''
    I have no concept. This is not the same thing. This is 
pervasive. It has been allowed to exist. I just had three 
seniors in high school here, not from North Dakota. Turns out I 
don't have a very large Jewish constituency in North Dakota. We 
are pretty homogeneous up there.
    There is no moral equivalency to any of this. When we 
pretend that there is, and we paint our hands red, and we walk 
around here, the reason the Klan wore hoods was two reasons: 
(1) To intimidate people; (2) because they didn't want anybody 
to know who they were. That is the difference.
    I have got a minute left, and you guys, Mr. Kestenbaum, you 
go back to your neighborhood right now, where you went to high 
school, would you tell a senior in high school who is a Jewish 
senior in high school to go to Harvard?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. Thank you for the question, Congressman. I 
want to be super clear with my former principal and my Jewish 
community that it is not that Jewish students don't feel safe 
at Harvard. Jewish students are not safe at Harvard. Until 
Harvard implements any type of accountability, responsibility, 
or policies to combat antisemitism, then all these Jewish 
schools, synagogues, and communities should not allow Harvard 
admission recruiters within 50 feet of their school or 50 feet 
of their child. It is completely unacceptable what Jews are 
facing at Harvard in 2024 in the United States of America.
    Mr. Armstrong. Mr. Yakoby, same question for Penn.
    Mr. Yakoby. I agree with my friend, Shabbos. Unless the 
university enforces their own rules between now and graduation, 
then no Jewish student, no one that doesn't support the pro-
terror encampments that are happening should step foot on 
Penn's campus.
    Mr. Armstrong. Thank you. I yield back.
    Mr. Roy. I thank the gentleman from North Dakota.
    I now recognize the gentleman from South Carolina, Mr. Fry.
    Mr. Fry. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Thank you to all our witnesses for being here today, what 
you have testified to. We have heard this not only here in 
Congress but in our communities back home, and I myself just 
came back from Israel where there is a deep-seated fear that 
there is a separation between Israel and the United States 
because of the policies of this Administration.
    According to Hillel International, there have been 1,584 
total reported antisemitic incidents on college campuses since 
October 7th. Since October 7th. That is a 700 percent increase 
compared to just last year. The 65 institutions of higher 
education have been placed under investigation since October 
7th, of last year--65 institutions.
    Mr. Chair, I request unanimous consent to enter into the 
record the statistics from Hillel International.
    Mr. Roy. Without objection.
    Mr. Fry. So, let's take a look at these statistics in 
action. Let's play a video.
    [Video shown.]
    Mr. Fry. So, these clips are just a snippet of the nonsense 
that we have seen on college campuses since October 7th. This 
isn't in Gaza. This isn't in the West Bank. This is right here 
in our country. Institutions of higher education, which are 
supposed to be great institutions of learning where you develop 
as an individual, are now places of repression and suppression, 
depending on who you are.
    The last photo is George Washington visualized dressed up. 
I think it is one of the most abhorrent things that I have 
seen, and that is right here in our Nation's capital. It is 
heartbreaking to see that. I am not Jewish, but I empathize 
with what you two have gone through, and your classmates. Not 
only at your schools, but in dozens of schools across the 
country.
    Mr. Kestenbaum, just yesterday protesters at Harvard 
finally took down their tents as the university officials 
agreed to the students to discuss the questions about the 
university's endowment. Have Harvard officials publicly 
condemned antisemitism that Jewish students have faced on 
campus in any which way?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. As it pertains to the encampments, Harvard 
forgot about it and hasn't condemned the antisemitism from the 
encampments. They haven't even acknowledged that it happened.
    Mr. Fry. Do you feel that Jewish students at Harvard have 
an ally, an advocate, in the Administration?
    Mr. Kestenbaum. In no uncertain terms, let me be absolutely 
clear, Harvard--Jewish students do not have a single advocate 
at Harvard University. The president doesn't meet with us or 
care about us. Our respective deans don't meet with us or care 
about us.
    We have students who have seen that there is no 
responsibility or accountability for their actions, so they can 
chant ``Globalize the intifada.'' They can chant calls for the 
ethnic genocide of Jewish people. They can draw a Jewish 
university president as a devil because they know they will get 
away with it. It is inconceivable that any other minority group 
in the United States would be treated with the scorn, contempt, 
and disregard that Harvard treats its Jewish student 
population.
    Let me just add, it is a damming indictment that in order 
for Jewish students at Harvard to receive equity, equality, or 
justice, we have to go to a court of law. We have to go to the 
U.S. Congress. We have to go to the media, because the people 
at Harvard who, again, I am sure are watching this and they 
won't even talk to us.
    Mr. Fry. Yes. Isn't that absurd, right? Like you are 
followed on a college campus, you can't go to school, and some 
universities are canceling commencement.
    You are the generation that couldn't go to your own 
commencement for high school because of COVID, and now these 
radical lunatics are taking over a college campus, and we can't 
ensure the security of our own students, so we are going to 
cancel things.
    Then we adhere and acquiesce to the demands of this lunatic 
fringe. It just doesn't--it makes no sense to me.
    Mr. Yakoby, earlier this month you delivered a petition to 
shut down the encampments. I think you got 3,200 signatures. 
You delivered it to the president, the provost, and the Board 
of Trustees. You did not receive a timely response, so you sent 
a letter. I think it was in an email, and you laid out a few 
demands.
    Can you elaborate what those were really briefly?
    Mr. Yakoby. Thank you for the question, Representative Fry. 
The demands were, actually, exactly what the president stated 
within 24 hours of the encampment, is disbanding an encampment, 
which is allowing violence, pro-terrorism support to happen. We 
got 3,300 signatures on that petition. Then after a week, when 
we hadn't heard a response, we sent another petition where we 
got 2,800 signatures within 24 hours, both of which were not 
responded to, and yet the administration had three meetings 
with the encampment.
    Mr. Fry. Then my last question here, do you believe--both 
of you--do you believe that your universities are doing enough 
to prevent antisemitism on college campuses? It is an obvious 
answer I think, but--
    Mr. Kestenbaum. I wouldn't say that they are not doing 
enough. They are not doing anything.
    Mr. Fry. Mr. Yakoby?
    Mr. Yakoby. It is almost a satirical question with how 
little they are doing.
    Mr. Fry. Thank you so much. I appreciate your time, your 
bravery today to be here.
    With that, Mr. Chair, I yield back.
    Mr. Roy. I thank the gentleman from South Carolina.
    I recognize the gentlelady for a UC request.
    Ms. Scanlon. Yes. I request unanimous consent to enter into 
the record an article from the front page of The New York 
Times, Sunday, May 11th, describing how the Republican Party 
has seized on-campus protests as a political tool. It is 
entitled ``How Republicans Echo Antisemitic Tropes Despite 
Declaring Support for Israel.''
    Mr. Roy. Without objection.
    Ms. Scanlon. Thank you.
    Mr. Roy. Well, this concludes today's hearing. We thank the 
witnesses for appearing before the Committee today.
    Without objection, all Members will have five legislative 
days to submit additional written questions for the witnesses 
or additional materials for the record.
    Without objection, the hearing is adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 4:15 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]

    All materials submitted for the record by Members of the 
Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government can
be found at: https://docs.house.gov/Committee/Calendar/ByEvent 
.aspx?EventID=117305.

                                 [all]