Trump Demands Major Changes in Columbia Discipline and Admissions Rules

by · NY Times

Trump Demands Major Changes in Columbia Discipline and Admissions Rules

A letter outlining “immediate next steps” arrived less than a week after the administration said it was canceling $400 million in grants and contracts.

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Protesters occupied Hamilton Hall last spring. The Trump administration said Columbia had “fundamentally failed to protect American students and faculty from antisemitic violence and harassment.”
Credit...Bing Guan for The New York Times

By Katherine Rosman

The Trump administration on Thursday demanded that Columbia University make dramatic changes in student discipline and admissions before it would discuss lifting the cancellation of $400 million in government grants and contracts.

It said the ultimatum was necessary because of what it described as Columbia’s failure to protect Jewish students from harassment.

The government called for the university to formalize its definition of antisemitism, to ban the wearing of masks “intended to conceal identity or intimidate” and to place the school’s Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies Department under “academic receivership.”

“We expect your immediate compliance,” officials from the General Services Administration, Department of Education and Department of Health and Human Services said in a letter.

They said that since the Trump administration had announced it was cutting the funding, “your counsel has asked to discuss ‘next steps.’” The administration demanded a response to its letter within a week as “a precondition for formal negotiations regarding Columbia University’s continued financial relationship with the United States government.”

Read the Letter to Columbia University

The Trump administration sent a letter to Columbia on Thursday demanding that the university make dramatic changes in student discipline and admissions before it would discuss lifting the cancellation of $400 million in government grants and contracts.

Read Document 2 pages

The Trump administration’s move to cut Columbia’s grants and contracts represented an extraordinary escalation of the government’s actions against the university.

Columbia, it said, “has fundamentally failed to protect American students and faculty from antisemitic violence and harassment.”

A Columbia spokeswoman said Thursday evening that the school was “reviewing the letter" from the three government agencies, adding, “We are committed at all times to advancing our mission, supporting our students, and addressing all forms of discrimination and hatred on our campus.”

On social media, Jameel Jaffer, director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia, described the government’s letter as essentially saying, “We’ll destroy Columbia unless you destroy it first.”

Hours earlier, the school announced a range of disciplinary actions against students who occupied a campus building last spring, including expulsions and suspensions.

The punishments levied include “multiyear suspensions, temporary degree revocations and expulsions,” according to a statement. The school did not release the names of students who would be punished, in compliance with federal privacy laws, according to a university spokeswoman. It is unclear how many students have been punished.

The announcement came one day after Gregory J. Wawro, a professor of political science who also serves as the university’s rules administrator, said in a statement that the hearings for students accused of violations “in connection with the April 17-18 encampment on the South Lawn and the occupation of Hamilton Hall” had been completed.

Student defendants were allowed to bring two advisers, including legal counsel, to hearings, which were held over video conference, according to a Columbia employee with knowledge of the process who spoke on the condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to speak publicly.

Late Thursday, Columbia’s interim president, Katrina Armstrong, said that the Department of Homeland Security had searched two dorm rooms after presenting two federal search warrants. In an email to students and staff, and a news release, Ms. Armstrong said that no one was detained and nothing had been taken. She did not say what the target of the warrants was.

Columbia University and the D.H.S. did not immediately respond to requests for comments after working hours.

The Trump administration has placed increasing scrutiny on universities in recent weeks. On Monday, it warned 60 other universities they, too, could face penalties from pending investigations into antisemitism on college campuses.

Last spring, Columbia began to issue suspensions of pro-Palestinian demonstrators who had been encamped for more than a week on campus as they protested the university’s investment in Israel, including its dual-degree program with Tel Aviv University.

A protest that had mostly been nonviolent then took a turn, with demonstrators breaking into and seizing Hamilton Hall, an academic building. After about 20 hours, Columbia’s president at the time, Dr. Nemat Shafik, called in the city’s Police Department. Officers in riot gear arrested dozens of people.

A maintenance worker who was trapped in the building was physically injured in the melee.

In all, nearly 50 pro-Palestinian demonstrators who had been inside Hamilton Hall were arrested, along with more than 100 others who were protesting in and around the campus.

Questions about how the university administration was handling discipline have dogged the school since.

In February, the House Committee on Education and Workforce sent a letter to Ms. Armstrong, and Columbia’s board chairs, David Greenwald and Claire Shipman, listing “numerous antisemitic incidents” that it said had taken place in the last two academic years.

Those incidents include the student occupation of Hamilton Hall last April, the protest against a class taught by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the disruption of an Israeli history class.

Representative Tim Walberg, a Republican from Michigan who is the chair of the House committee, said he was glad that there has been forward movement but expressed frustration that the school has not provided the detailed disciplinary records his committee seeks.

“I welcome the news that some lawbreaking individuals are being held accountable,” Mr. Walberg said, “but I remain skeptical about Columbia University’s long-term ability to continue to hold pro-terror supporters accountable given the school’s obfuscation.”

The university said that it began its judicial process last summer, filing its complaints against students with the University Judicial Board, which is an independent panel of faculty, students and staff.

Students notified on Thursday of the sanctions have five business days to file an appeal, on grounds that there was a procedural error, availability of new information or “excessiveness of sanction.” A university appellate board has 10 days to issue a ruling.

Columbia University Apartheid Divest, a group that helped organize the protests and last fall asserted its support for “armed resistance,” said on its Instagram page Thursday that “the university’s extreme repression is a panicked attempt at silencing the movement for Palestinian liberation,” adding that “they have seen our unyielding commitment to Palestine firsthand over the last year, and they are terrified.”

The announcement of sanctions can be seen as a sign that “Columbia has turned the corner,” said Professor Joshua Mitts, a professor in the law school who this semester is teaching a seminar on free speech and civil liberties on campus. He is also the adviser to Law Students Against Antisemitism, a campus group.

Calling the judicial process “fair and transparent,” Mr. Mitts said that the university showed its fidelity to due process, free speech and academic freedom as it sought to upend antisemitism.

“This is Columbia at its best,” he said.

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