The House Ways and Means Committee invited Brandeis Center Chairman Kenneth L. Marcus to testify at its hearing: “Crisis on Campus: Antisemitism, Radical Faculty, and the Failure of University Leadership,” which took place June 13, 2024. The hearing’s other witnesses included recently-graduated Cornell student Talia Dror, Columbia Professor Shai Davidai, American Jewish Committee CEO and former U.S. Congressman Ted Deutch, and American First Policy Institute Higher Education Reform Director Dr. Jonathan Pidluzny.

This hearing focused on what Congress could do to respond and stop the rampant anti-Semitism that students have seen and experienced on college campuses since the October 7 Hamas massacre. The various ideas included curbing the college’s tax-exempt status, cutting federal funding, and revoking foreign wrongdoers’ visas. “Over the last 20 years, I have been fighting anti-Semitism on college campuses, but never seen anything like what we have experienced since October 7,” began Chairman Marcus in his opening statement. “Over the time since…this Committee held its last hearing…we are seeing a kind of perfect storm of student violent extremism, professorial politicization, undisclosed foreign funding, and often feckless and weak administration.”

Chairman Marcus shared concern about retaliation against students who report the anti-Semitic abuse: “In some cases, those who report anti-Semitic incidents have been met with retaliatory complaints or countercomplaints. Students should be encouraged to report their abuse without fear of reprisal.” Marcus is also troubled about how the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) has dismissed some complaints unlawfully. He recommended OCR prioritize “opening, investigating, and resolving shared ancestry cases.” He suggested the Dept. of Education not merely wait for new complaints to be filed, but instead open its own investigations of anti-Semitic discrimination on campuses. And Marcus recommended joint investigations with the U.S. Department of Justice, because discrimination cases can fall under their purview.

Two bills were also discussed as potential remedies. One was the Anti-Semitism Awareness Act, which recently passed the U.S. House of Representatives. Chairman Marcus called this a “huge step,” saying, “I hope the Senate will follow suit.”

Chairman Marcus advises that university presidents investigate Students for Justice in Palestine for “potential violations of the prohibition against materially supporting a foreign terrorist organization under 18 USC 2339A and B, and its state equivalents. Marcus also advocated for increased transparency about the “large sums of money from foreign governments.” But he cautioned for the “need to know what those funds are used for and “what impact it has on the curriculum and campus environment.”

The idea of rescinding funding to schools that refuse or declare themselves unable to respond to the ongoing crisis of hatred on campuses was endorsed by all the hearing’s witnesses. In response to a question from Congressman Drew Fergurson, Marcus said school administrations are “addicted to federal funding,” and it would change their

approach to anti-Semitic harassment and discrimination of students were their federal funding to be revoked or blocked.

Video of the hearing and a transcript of Chairman Marcus’s opening statement are embedded below.

This is the default image

Full Hearing Recording – Brandeis Center Chairman Kenneth L. Marcus’s Opening Statement Begins at 1:03:07

Ken Marcus Testimony 061324 FINALDownload

Authored by: Eli Goldstein

“The seeds of hate are sown long before the freshman year,” congressman Mike Kelly said.

Published in Jewish News Syndicate on 6/14/24; Story by Andrew Bernard

Experts told the House Ways and Means Committee on Thursday that Congress ought to use its power of the purse to combat antisemitism on college campuses.

“We are seeing a kind of perfect storm of student violent extremism, professorial politicization, undisclosed foreign funding and often feckless and weak administration,” said Kenneth Marcus, founder and chairman of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law. 

“Most of these institutions are tax-exempt and need to be held accountable if they do not meet the requirements of their tax-exempt status,” Marcus told the committee. “That’s true of the universities and also some of the organizations that have been fomenting hatred.”

The Ways and Means Committee, which is responsible for taxation, is one of six House committees investigating the wave of antisemitism on college campuses in the aftermath of Oct. 7.

Thursday’s hearing also included testimony from recent Cornell University graduate Talia Dror, Columbia University professor Shai Davidai, American Jewish Committee CEO Ted Deutch and Jonathan Pidluzny, a director at the America First Policy Institute.

The sharpest exchanges Thursday included partisan disagreements about the extent to which “diversity, equity and inclusion” initiatives contribute to Jew-hatred.

“DEI teaches that the world is made up of oppressors and the oppressed, victims and those with privilege,” Pidluzny said. “Jews are coded as the oppressors by virtue of their political and economic success.”

“This is what creates a kind of permission structure for students to join in with the true radicals cheering for Hamas terrorists who deliberately kill children and rape hostages,” he added.

Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas) disagreed with that perspective.

“Such claims not only misconstrue diversity, equity and inclusion but also basically pit one minority group against another,” he said. “DEI responds to decades of systematic exclusion of people of color from higher education in states like mine in Texas.”

“It seeks to create a culture of respect and understanding for all. Both communities of color and Jewish Americans are all too familiar with the very real prejudice that they’ve endured,” he added.

The hearing also probed the influence of foreign donations to American universities, with some congressmen questioning whether the 501(c)(3) tax-exempt charity status was intended to permit universities to receive billions of foreign dollars.

Repeated mentions of Qatar at the hearing—both as the host of the Hamas political leadership and as a multi-billion dollar donor to U.S. higher education institutions—prompted pushback from the Qatari embassy on Friday.

“Qatar has no desire or ability to influence anything that happens on U.S. university campuses,” the embassy stated. “It is flatly untrue, for example, that Qatar is the ‘largest foreign donor to U.S. universities’—a claim made to imply dark motives, and to undermine the strong U.S.- Qatar security and trade partnership.”

Rep. Mike Kelly (R-Pa.) welcomed the testimony from Thursday’s panel but questioned the efficacy of congressional hearings in combating bigotry.

“It’s amazing that we think we can have a meeting of the Ways and Means Committee to come together to try to figure out what the heck is wrong with what’s going on in the world today,” he said. “The seeds of hate are sown long before the freshman year.” 

“I am amazed that we think there’s a political answer to a human problem,” he added.