As pro-Palestinian protests continue to roil Columbia University, donors are weighing dropping their support as calls grow for school President Minouche Shafik to resign.
Protesters at the Columbia “Gaza Solidarity Encampment,” led by coalition organizer Columbia University Apartheid Divest, have entered their seventh day occupying part of campus, where agitators have disrupted campus life, been arrested by the New York Police Department, and vowed to hold their position until demands for university divestment from Israel are met.
Amid the chaos, billionaire donors such as Columbia alumnus and New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft have pledged to withhold donations due to the school’s response to the anti-Israel protests on campus and growing antisemitic activity.
“I am deeply saddened at the virulent hate that continues to grow on campus and throughout our country,” Kraft said in a statement through his organization Foundation to Combat Antisemitism. “I am no longer confident that Columbia can protect its students and staff and I am not comfortable supporting the university until corrective action is taken.”
“It is my hope that Columbia and its leadership will stand up to this hate by ending these protests immediately and will work to earn back the respect and trust of many of us who have lost faith in the institution,” he added. “It is my hope that in this difficult time, the Kraft Center at Columbia will serve as a source of security and safety for all Jewish students and faculty on campus who want to gather peacefully to practice their religions, to be together and to be welcomed.”
Kraft, who is worth roughly $11.1 billion, has been a regular donor to the school and funded the creation of the Kraft Center for Jewish Student Life with an $11.5 million donation in 2000 followed by a 2005 donation of $1.5 million. He also donated $5 million to the school’s athletics program in 2007.
Kraft has also separately donated millions of dollars to raise awareness about antisemitism and fund causes in Israel.
Leon Cooperman, Omega Family Office chairman and CEO and a Columbia Business School alumnus, is a billionaire investor and donor who is weighing pulling support, telling CNBC that he is “uncomfortable with what’s going on at the school,” but adding, “I don’t want to hold the administration responsible for demonstrations.” Cooperman said he would continue giving money to the business school “when they solicit” him.
According to the New York Post, businessman, philanthropist, and alumnus Len Blavatnik is also considering pulling funding, telling the outlet, “Columbia University’s leadership must take immediate steps to ensure that Jewish students are protected from threats and intimidation, and that those who violate their policies are held to account.”
Some estimates put financial support from Kraft, Cooperman, and Blavatnik at a collective $100 million, and despite the growing pressure on Shafik from others, none of the three top donors have called for the ouster of the university’s president.
Many critics, particularly in Congress, have demanded Shafik’s resignation, including at least one Democrat.
As the Washington Examiner reported, the New York congressional delegation of Republicans collectively called for Shafik’s ouster on Monday. That was followed by similar calls from Reps. Jim Banks (R-IN) and Mark Alford (R-MO), as well as Sens. Tim Scott (R-SC) and John Fetterman (D-PA).
Aside from Fetterman, other Democrats have spoken out about the antisemitism on Columbia’s campus but have stopped short of calling for the resignation of Shafik.
“Every American has a right to protest,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said. “But when protests shift to antisemitism, verbal abuse, intimidation, or glorification of Oct. 7 violence against Jewish people, that crosses the line.”
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), who serves with Schumer representing New York, where Columbia is located, added, “Threats of violence against Jewish students and the Jewish community are horrible, despicable and wholly unacceptable.”
The Columbia Jewish Alumni Association added to the chorus of calls for Shafik to resign on Monday, saying the school has become “the center of worldwide hatred and bigotry,” adding, “President Shafik’s silence has been deafening. Appeasing antisemitism never works.”
Some in the faculty are also calling for Shafik’s resignation — but for the opposite reason. On Monday, a group of about a dozen faculty members held a rally in solidarity with the protesters, condemning Shafik’s decision to bring in the NYPD to arrest some protesters.
Columbia history professor Christopher Brown called for Shafik’s resignation, saying, “I have no confidence in the president’s leadership. … She has forfeited the privilege to lead this great university.”
“The president’s decision to send riot police to pick up peaceful protesters on our campus was unprecedented, unjustified, disproportionate, divisive, and dangerous,” he said, according to the Washington Free Beacon. “The police department does not belong on this campus. … That show of force was a sign of weakness.”
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According to the New York Times, Shafik is expected to face a censure resolution as early as Wednesday from the university senate in the wake of her administration’s response to the protests. The resolution says she violated “the fundamental requirements of academic freedom” and committed an “unprecedented assault on student rights.” The resolution says explicitly that it is not a call for resignation, however.
Brown also criticized Shafik’s congressional testimony from last week. Since appearing on Capitol Hill, she has been criticized by the Left for appearing to capitulate to Republicans looking for another academic scalp after the ousters of former Harvard President Claudine Gay and former University of Pennsylvania President Elizabeth Magill. Brown said Shafik “allowed slander of our institution to stand without rebuke.”