The University of California, Los Angeles, launched its new campus-wide Initiative to Combat Antisemitism on Monday, as the Trump administration continues pressuring American universities to protect Jewish students.
UCLA Chancellor Julio Frenk announced the initiative to enact recommendations from the Task Force to Combat Antisemitism and Anti-Israeli Bias. The action steps, Frenk said, include “enhancing relevant training and education, improving the complaint system, assuring enforcement of current and new laws and policies, and cooperating with stakeholders.”
The group implementing the recommendations to combat antisemitism on campus will be led by UCLA Anderson School of Management Professor Stuart Gabriel, who will report directly to the chancellor.
“Antisemitism has no place in our society — and no place at UCLA. It threatens the mission of academia and is antithetical to the values that define the very essence of a university,” Frenk said. “Everyone deserves the right to learn, teach, work and live in a community that is free from discrimination and bigotry. With honest reflection, it is clear that while we have made progress in addressing antisemitism, we have more to do in our shared goal of eradicating it in its entirety.”
The university’s move comes a week after the Department of Justice opened an investigation into the University of California system to determine whether it permitted antisemitism on campus, which would be in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. The law prohibits discrimination based on race, religion, and national origin in the workplace.
That particular investigation is part of President Donald Trump’s broader efforts to root out antisemitism on college and university campuses across the U.S.
On Monday, the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights warned 60 universities they are subject to federal investigations concerning allegations of antisemitism on campus. UCLA was not one of the 60 schools that received a letter, but four other UC campuses in Davis, San Diego, Santa Barbara, and Berkeley were listed, in addition to six more California schools.
The Education Department is looking for potential violations of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, which bars discrimination based on race, color, and national origin in federally funded institutions.
Last week, Trump threatened to imprison “agitators” and deport foreign students who express hatred toward Israel and Jews or align themselves with Hamas. He also vowed to pull federal funding from any schools that permit such protests or activities.
The president later followed through on his promise, taking aim at Columbia University. On Friday, the administration’s antisemitism task force pulled $400 million in federal grants and contracts from the New York university for failing to condemn or punish discrimination and harassment against Jewish students.
On arresting and deporting foreign students, immigration agents detained Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil at Columbia over the weekend. The December graduate, who previously led anti-Israel protests on campus, is believed to be a potential national security threat due to his support for Hamas.
The White House says the arrest was warranted for this reason, but Khalil’s lawyer argues he was unlawfully detained because he is a permanent legal U.S. resident with a green card. Immigration authorities say they were acting on the State Department’s order to revoke Khalil’s student visa, but his lawyer contested that he only had a green card. Agents moved to revoke that identification instead.
Answering questions from reporters on Tuesday, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Secretary of State Marco Rubio had the right to revoke Khalil’s green card or visa under the Immigration and Nationality Act.
“Mahmoud Khalil was an individual who was given the privilege of coming to this country to study at one of our nation’s finest universities and colleges, and he took advantage of that opportunity, of that privilege, by siding with terrorists, Hamas terrorists, who have killed innocent men, women and children,” Leavitt said.
“This is an individual who organized group protests that not only disrupted college campus classes and harassed Jewish American students and made them feel unsafe on their own college campus, but also distributed pro-Hamas propaganda fliers with the logo of Hamas. That is the behavior and activity that this individual engaged in.”
The Trump administration’s plan to remove Khalil from the U.S. was halted on Monday after a judge blocked his deportation until further notice pending a lawsuit. A hearing regarding the case is scheduled for Wednesday.
Trump promised Khalil’s arrest was the first of “many to come.” The detention raised alarm among anti-Israel protesters, Democratic lawmakers, and free speech advocates.
At UCLA, the Task Force on Anti-Palestinian, Anti-Muslim, and Anti-Arab Racism tied the university’s announcement about its antisemitism initiative to Khalil’s arrest.
“We all know why this is being announced today. We know UCLA is looking at Columbia. We know UCLA has already been scrutinized for something we all find ridiculous . . . not having a strong enough response [to protests] even though our students were among the most brutalized of all the peaceful protesters across the country,” Gaye Johnson, who co-chairs the task force, told the Los Angeles Times.
UCLA was the site of an anti-Israel encampment, in which anti-Israel protesters clashed with pro-Israel counter-protesters last spring. The altercation, which lasted for hours, was eventually broken up by police.
Meanwhile, the newly formed Initiative to Combat Antisemitism generated praise from Jewish members of UCLA’s campus community.
“As a fourth-year Jewish UCLA student, antisemitism has smacked me in the face almost every year,” Hailey Zill wrote in UCLA’s Jewish newsmagazine Ha’Am, recounting several experiences with anti-Israel students. “Given how the UCLA community, and the world at large, has responded to antisemitism, Chancellor Julio Frenk’s email was desperately needed to set administrative precedent.”