DOJ sues UCLA over alleged antisemitism against Jewish, Israeli students
The U.S. Justice Department has filed a civil rights lawsuit against the University of California, accusing UCLA of failing to protect Jewish and Israeli students from antisemitic harassment, violence and exclusion from parts of campus.
The lawsuit was filed on Tuesday in federal court in Los Angeles against the Regents of the University of California, which oversees UCLA and the rest of the UC system. The department says UCLA violated Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which bars race and national origin discrimination in programs that receive federal funding.
The complaint focuses on the 2024 protest encampment at UCLA, which the Justice Department says blocked Jewish and Israeli students from academic buildings and other parts of campus.
Federal prosecutors allege that masked demonstrators built barriers, formed “human phalanxes” and required wristbands to cross parts of the encampment. The lawsuit says Jewish and Israeli students were assaulted, pepper-sprayed, beaten with sticks and physically prevented from accessing parts of campus.
The complaint also alleges that one Jewish student was knocked unconscious and taken to a hospital with an open head wound.
“UCLA failed to protect its Jewish and Israeli students,” the Justice Department said in the complaint, adding that the lawsuit seeks to force the university to comply with Title VI and reform its anti-discrimination procedures.
The department said UCLA had received more than 100 complaints about antisemitism and anti-Israeli hostility but failed to take meaningful action. The lawsuit also says UCLA breached federal funding contracts by certifying compliance with Title VI while allowing discrimination to continue.
“Earlier this year, we sued UCLA for subjecting its Jewish and Israeli employees to an antisemitic hostile work environment,” Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon said. “Now, the Department of Justice calls UCLA to account for its toleration of the equally appalling hostile educational environment against its Jewish and Israeli students.”
The Justice Department is asking the court to order UCLA to enforce its anti-discrimination policies, enforce time, place and manner restrictions for protests, impose discipline on students and faculty who harass Jewish or Israeli students, and promptly investigate complaints of antisemitism and anti-Israeli bias.
The lawsuit also seeks to recover federal grant payments made to UCLA during the alleged period of noncompliance and to block the university from entering future federal contracts containing Title VI assurances until the court finds it is complying with the law.
UCLA Chancellor Julio Frenk rejected the allegation that the university has failed to respond to antisemitism.
“Let me be direct: the suggestion that UCLA has been passive in the face of antisemitism is simply wrong,” Frenk said in a statement to CBS News. “Combating antisemitism is a moral imperative — one rooted, for me, in personal history that makes indifference unthinkable.”
Frenk said UCLA has taken “numerous concrete actions” over the past year, including appointing a Title VI officer, reorganizing its Civil Rights Office, hiring an associate vice chancellor for campus and community safety, and strengthening policies meant to protect free expression and campus safety.
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Ella Rae Greene, Editor In Chief
