Third-party monitors armed with a new definition of the word “antisemitism” could be appointed on college campuses across the nation under a pair of congressional bills introduced amid recent pro-Palestinian student protests at schools around the country.
One bill, the Antisemitism Awareness Act, may be voted on as early as Wednesday, congressional sources said. It would broaden the federal definitions of antisemitism to include claiming that the state of Israel is racist, comparing the treatment of Palestinians to the treatment of Jews during the Holocaust, and calling on Israel to exhibit “behavior not expected or demanded of any other Democratic nation.”
The measure has received strong support from several members of New Jersey’s congressional delegation.
The second bill, called the COLUMBIA Act — or the College Oversight and Legal Updates Mandating Bias Investigations and Accountability Act — would give the U.S. Secretary of Education the power to install third-party monitors of antisemitism on campuses. Colleges that do not comply would lose federal funding.
Officials at Rutgers and Princeton universities did not immediately respond to requests to comment on the legislation. The American Council of Trustees and Alumni, a national group that includes college governing boards and presidents, also did not immediately respond to a request to comment.
Both Rutgers and Princeton are under investigation by the U.S. Department of Education over allegations of antisemitism. Rutgers is also being investigated by Congress for similar allegations.
Pro-Palestinian protests have spread around the country in recent days, along with student demands that universities divest their investments in companies that profit from the Israel-Hamas War.
In New Jersey, Rutgers University protesters had set up an encampment of nearly 60 tents on Voorhees Mall on the New Brunswick campus Monday night. The protesters have called on the state university to divest from companies profiting from the Israel-Hamas war. The university has one of the largest Jewish and Muslim undergraduate populations in the country.
At Princeton University, 13 people were arrested Monday night after students briefly took over Clio Hall. The protesters moved to nearby Cannon Green by morning, according to the Daily Princetonian, the campus newspaper.
When asked about the student protests after a ribbon-cutting at a Newark tech start-up company Tuesday, Gov. Phil Murphy called the handling of the protests “complicated.”
“We are a country and a state for sure that respects the right to protest peacefully, the right to dissent,” Murphy said. “There’s no question about that, but I think there is a question at what point does that disrupt the educational process that folks are paying for, that parents are sending kids for.”
“We cannot condone any amount of antisemitism. We cannot condone any amount of Islamophobia. We’ve seen sadly a lot of both of late,” the Democratic governor added.
According to the Congressional bill that would redefine antisemitism, the use of current definitions hurts enforcement efforts because they have multiple standards.
Critics of the proposed expanded definition of antisemitism include the ACLU, Human Rights Watch, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Amnesty International and Israeli organizations.
U.S. Rep. Mike Lawler, D-N.Y., had a role in sponsoring both bills. There has been both Republican and Democratic support for the Antisemitism Awareness Act.
Rep. Josh Gottheimer, D-5th Dist., New Jersey’s sole Jewish member in Congress, co-sponsored the antisemitism definition bill along with Rep. Tom Kean, R-7th Dist., and Donald Norcross, D-1st Dist.
“We have an obligation to teach future generations about this evil and protect Jewish students from violence and the virulent impact of all hate,” Gottheimer said in an October press release.
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Jelani Gibson is a cannabis and politics reporter for NJ.com. He can be reached at jgibson@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on X @jelanigibson1 and on LinkedIn.
Tina Kelley may be reached at tkelley@njadvancemedia.com.
