A U.S. district judge ruled on March 31 that the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) must provide the Trump administration with a list of Jewish students and faculty. This subpoena, which was submitted by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), was framed as a way to combat antisemitism.
The judge who approved this effort is U.S. District Judge Gerald Pappert, who said, “Though ineptly worded, the request had an understandable purpose—to obtain in a narrowly tailored way, as opposed to seeking information on all university employees, information on individuals in Penn’s Jewish community who could have experienced or witnessed antisemitism in the workplace.”
Penn has appealed the subpoena, and a spokesperson representing the university raised concerns about the decision in a statement, saying, “We continue to believe that requiring Penn to create lists of Jewish faculty and staff, and to provide personal contact information, raises serious privacy and First Amendment concerns. The university does not maintain employee lists by religion.”
This shocking request is a clear example of the Trump administration’s agenda with the EEOC, with other recent headlines about the EEOC, investigating companies and other universities for their use of DEI practices. The chair of the EEOC, Andrea Lucas, is a Trump appointee who has weaponized an organization that was created in 1964 when the Civil Rights Act was signed into law, into a method for carrying out the Trump administration’s narrow and misguided view of “discrimination.”
Even if the supposed intentions of the EEOC are to investigate antisemitism at Penn, demanding a “list of Jews,” leaves a horrible taste in my mouth, especially as a Jewish college student.
Throughout history, Jews have been placed on lists as a way to alienate and target them. They were forced to live in the Pale of Settlement in the Russian Empire based on revision lists, a form of census, rounded up by SS officers in Nazi Germany based on censuses and synagogue membership lists, among countless other instances of antisemitism that the Jewish people have endured.
When Jews are placed on a list, it usually doesn’t end up going very well for us.
This decision raises many questions for my career as a college student. Why would the Trump administration stop at Penn? What university will they demand a list from next? Will it be at a college that I am attending now or in the future? Am I destined to be another Jew placed on a list?
Yes, antisemitism must continue to be investigated, but asking for a list of Jewish students and faculty at a university is not the way to go about such an effort. All that does is create distrust in the very people the EEOC is claiming to help.
I don’t want to be another Jew categorized strictly for my identity for the sake of a government’s identification, and I don’t think I’m the only Jewish individual who would agree with that sentiment. We must leave making lists of Jews in the past.