Published 12/7/23 in Insider Higher Ed; Story by Katherine Knott After Republicans grilled three university presidents on Capitol Hill, experts weigh in on the broader implications for public opinion and the politics of colleges and universities. The failure of three college presidents to clearly say Tuesday that calling for the genocide of Jewish people violated their campus policies quickly went viral on social media—galling alumni, free speech experts and advocates in the Jewish community alike. Even the White House chimed in, one day after the contentious four-hour hearing before the House Education and Workforce Committee. “It’s unbelievable that this needs to be said: calls for genocide are monstrous and antithetical to everything we represent as a country,” Andrew Bates, deputy press secretary for the White House, said in a statement. “Any statements that advocate for the systematic murder of Jews are dangerous and revolting—and we should all stand firmly against them, on the side of human dignity and the most basic values that unite us as Americans.” By the end of Wednesday, Harvard University president Claudine Gay, one of the panelists, sought to clarify her comments. In a statement, Gay said that some have confused a right to free expression with condoning calls for violence against Jewish students. “Let me be clear: Calls for violence or genocide against the Jewish community, or any religious or ethnic group are vile, they have no place at Harvard, and those who threaten our Jewish students will be held to account,” she said. University of Pennsylvania president Liz Magill, who also testified and has faced criticism from the commonwealth’s Democratic governor, Josh Shapiro, also released a video statement Wednesday evening clarifying that calling for the genocide of Jewish people is harassment or intimidation. She pledged to re-evaluate the university’s policies on free speech. “In that moment, I was focused on our university’s long-standing policies aligned with the U.S. Constitution, which say that speech alone is not punishable,” she said of her testimony. “I was not focused on—but I should have been—on the irrefutable fact that a call for genocide of Jewish people is a call for some of the most terrible violence human beings can perpetrate. It’s evil, plain and simple.” The high-profile hearing featured sharp criticisms and fiery exchanges over how Harvard University, the University of Pennsylvania and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have responded to campus protests in support of the Palestinian people and their free speech policies. House Republicans also used their platform to air conservative grievances about higher education more broadly. As the metaphorical smoke cleared, we wanted to know what the remarkable hearing—which has already spurred more calls for the three presidents to resign—could mean for higher education writ large. Colleges and universities have faced growing skepticism among the American public over the past several years. Just 36 percent of Americans have “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in higher education, according to a Gallup poll released this summer. Meanwhile, higher education has increasingly come under political attack from conservatives who say colleges and universities aren’t worth the federal investment and are too uniformly liberal to be in touch with everyday Americans. Inside Higher Ed asked more than a dozen leaders, advocates and scholars the same question: What impact will the hearing have on public opinion and the politics of higher education going forward? Their responses, provided by phone or email, have been edited for clarity and concision. Kenneth Marcus, founder of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law I had thought that the main impact of the meeting was the fact that it was held and that it would signal to the higher education world that Congress is focused on this issue. That may still be the case. But the fact is that some of what transpired really is going to have some impact. The inability of the university leaders to speak with moral clarity about calls for genocide is shocking to a lot of people. The double standards that were discussed regarding antisemitism versus other forms of discrimination also has people talking. I think that members of Congress likely came out of this meeting believing that they really hit a nerve and that this is an issue on which they should continue to focus their attention. I think that this can have an impact on both prospective legislation and also oversight. Many in the Jewish community saw some of their concerns substantiated, perhaps worse than they had expected. Whether there will be ramifications for any of these leaders in their home institutions, I don’t know. But it is certainly raising greater public awareness of the extent of the problem. For those people who thought that the issue was largely one of discrimination versus free speech, I think there’s an increasing awareness that we’re not just talking about free speech but also violence, assault and harassment.