(AFP) – The Trump administration sued the University of California (UC) on Tuesday, accusing it of turning a “blind eye” to antisemitism on its Los Angeles campus during student protests against Israel. The lawsuit comes more than six months after President Donald Trump demanded a massive $1 billion fine from the prestigious UC system over claims of antisemitism.
The lawsuit filed by the Justice Department in a federal court in California demands unspecified damages to be awarded to Jewish and Israeli employees of the university and alleges they were subjected to a hostile work environment. “Following the October 7, 2023 massacre in Israel, UCLA’s administration turned a blind eye to — and at times facilitated — grossly antisemitic acts and systematically ignored cries for help from its own terrified Jewish and Israeli employees,” the complaint said.
Attorney General Pam Bondi said UCLA administrators “allegedly allowed virulent antisemitism to flourish on campus, harming students and staff alike.” “Today’s lawsuit underscores that this Department of Justice stands strong against hate and antisemitism in all its vile forms,” Bondi said in a statement.
California Governor Gavin Newsom, a Democrat who sits on the UC board, accused Trump of “extortion” when he made his $1 billion demand from the university in August, accusing the Republican president of trying to stifle academic freedom.
Columbia University was the first to be targeted in Trump’s war against elite universities, for what the US president claimed was its failure to tackle antisemitism on campus in the wake of pro-Palestinian protests. It was stripped of hundreds of millions of dollars of federal funding and lost its ability to apply for new research grants. Columbia eventually agreed to pay the government $200 million, and an additional $21 million to settle an investigation into antisemitism on campus.
Trump has demanded that Harvard pay $1 billion in damages for allegedly failing to sufficiently protect Jewish students during pro-Palestinian protests. The Justice Department also sued Harvard this month demanding its student admissions data. In a 2023 ruling, the Supreme Court barred consideration of race in college admissions and the Justice Department is investigating whether any US schools are discriminating against white applicants.
Trump has previously sought to cut more than $2.6 billion of federal funding to Harvard and has moved to block entry of international students — a quarter of its student body. Those moves have largely been temporarily blocked by the courts.
© 2024 AFP
