Harvard Ignored Antisemitism Advisory Group’s Recommendations, House Committee Says
In a report, the committee listed what it said were Harvard’s failures to crack down on antisemitism. Harvard said the report gives an “incomplete and inaccurate view” of its efforts.
A Republican-dominated congressional committee released on Thursday a scathing report of Harvard’s efforts to combat antisemitism on campus, accusing it of suppressing the findings of its antisemitism advisory group and avoiding implementing its recommendations, even as Jewish students were experiencing “pervasive ostracization” and being harassed.
Harvard has been particularly under fire by the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, which wrote the report and which has taken an anti-elitist tack against several of America’s top universities.
In the 42-page staff report, the committee focused on Harvard’s eight-member antisemitism advisory group and examples of what it said were shortcomings of the university in combating antisemitism on campus. The group was created in the aftermath of the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7 as antisemitic incidents on campus rose.
“Harvard’s leadership propped up the university’s Antisemitism Advisory Group all for show,” Virginia Foxx, a North Carolina Republican, and the chairwoman of the House committee, said in a statement issued with the report. “Not only did the A.A.G. find that antisemitism was a major issue on campus, it offered several recommendations on how to combat the problem — none of which were ever implemented with any real vigor.”
In response, Harvard said that the advisory group had helped to establish the groundwork for its continuing efforts to combat antisemitism on campus. The group has since disbanded and been replaced by two task forces, one to combat antisemitism and another to combat anti-Muslim and anti-Arab bias.
Jason Newton, a Harvard spokesman, said the university was cooperating with the committee, and had provided 30,000 pages of information.
Advertisement