Columbia University and antisemitism: (Expletive deleted) Around and Find Out

Any decent university’s mission statement should be to help students think for themselves in a safe environment while declaring neutrality regarding our times’ moral and ethical issues rather than nurturing and rewarding radicals in their quest to find the modern-day equivalent of Che Guevara. Sadly, when it comes to achieving this, Columbia University stands out as the most inept regarding the former and the best at bringing about the latter. Yesterday, the New York Post reported that the Trump Administration threatened to pull fifty-one million dollars in contracts for the university’s inaction on protests that harass Jewish students. As Secretary of Education Linda McMahon asserted in a press release, institutions that receive federal funds have a responsibility to protect all students from discrimination. Columbia’s apparent failure to uphold their end of this basic agreement raises very serious questions about the institution’s fitness to continue doing business with the United States Government.” For years, President Trump has been branded antisemitic by his detractors. Let’s hope the decision to potentially penalize Columbia University for its failure to protect Jewish students dispels the idea once and for all. 

The word “apparent” in McMahon’s statement is notable, as it implies Columbia University has the potential to restore its credibility. This potential for redemption is a glimmer of hope in an otherwise bleak situation, and it should be a driving force for the university’s administration and faculty as they work toward institutional change.

This raises the question of what they can do to rehabilitate the university. The Stand Columbia Society, a group dedicated to advocating for Columbia University’s core mission of excellence in teaching, learning, research, and patient care and restoring it to its rightful pre-eminence in American and global higher education, provides ten critical first steps. I will focus on some of the most essential ideas. Following the lead of Barnard’s president Laura Rosenbury, Interim President Katrina Armstrong should write an opinion piece conveying her commitment to the goals of the Justice Department’s task force to fight antisemitism. Additionally, Columbia’s University Judicial Board must discipline the individuals who occupied Hamilton Hall.

Most importantly, Stand believes Armstrong should “direct the admissions process to look for students whose only interest is learning and not the destruction of Western Civilization.” If we have learned anything about President Donald Trump, it is that he is committed to eradicating the lunacy and inaction of the Biden administration, and he’s taking no prisoners. The administration of Columbia University would be well advised to take Trump seriously. Of course, they can always side with the radical lunatic fringe of the student body and administration and defy him, risking the potential loss of government funds and tarnishing the university’s reputation. Alternatively, a progressive alumnus could tell President Trump that Columbia University will not deviate from the path it forged in 1968, which set the template for what we see on college campuses today, and donate the government funds Columbia stands to lose. In these Trumpian times, I think I can put what is at stake for the Columbia University administration another way: if they (expletive deleted) around, they will find out.