WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, America First Legal (AFL) sued the Department of Education for obstructing the release of government records regarding pro-Hamas violence and intimidation on American college campuses, including involvement from foreign students in the U.S. on F-1 student visas.
On October 7, 2023, Hamas broke its long-standing ceasefire with Israel, launching a massive wave of murder, rape, and kidnapping. On October 8, 2023, weeks before any Israeli counterattack, pro-terror organizations launched a massive wave of intimidation and violence on our campuses and in our streets. Often relying on masked extremists in the style of the Klu Klux Klan, their activities included physical attacks, vandalism, and overt advocacy for Hamas. In some cases, Hamas terrorism was sanctioned and promoted by university staff and administrators. The point and purpose of these activities is to threaten and intimidate pro-Israel American and American Jewish students at Columbia, USC, MIT, the University of Texas, and elsewhere.
Our laws have long prohibited advocacy and other material support for Hamas. Foreigners in the United States on F-1 student visas who support Hamas and terrorism should be deported. Naturalized citizens who support Hamas and terrorism should be denaturalized and deported as well. Finally, Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits universities from encouraging, facilitating, or funding anti-Semitic professors and pressure groups.
The Biden Administration, however, has refused to enforce these laws or to protect the rights of pro-Israel Americans and American Jews. Instead, it appears they have chosen to protect the pro-Hamas extremists.
On October 20, 2023, thirty-five members of Congress wrote to the Department of Justice asking to know “what steps are being taken by the Department of Justice to investigate Hamas supporters in the United States, as well as the perpetrators of anti-Semitic violence in cities and school campuses across the nation.” The letter noted that the Attorney General had issued a memorandum on October 4, 2021, directing the FBI to target American parents for lawfully speaking out at school board meetings but “since Hamas’s recent attack on Israel, you have not issued a similar memo about the increase of anti-Semitic violence, the threats of intimidation being made against supporters of Israel, or the public rallies being held in support of a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization.”
On November 6, 2023, AFL opened an investigation of the Department of Education regarding the Biden Administration’s response to pro-Hamas activities on American college campuses. To date, the Department has failed to produce any records. Today, AFL sued to end its obstruction of evidence; our citizens deserve to know why the Biden Administration has chosen to ignore our laws, to protect the viciously anti-Semitic pro-Hamas extremists and their fellow travelers, and to abandon law-abiding Americans.
Statement from America First Legal Senior Vice President and former U.S. Department of Education General Counsel Reed Rubinstein:
“What you’re seeing on campus did not spontaneously occur – it is the fruit of a twisted tree of foreign money, non-enforcement of our immigration laws, and the eliminationist anti-Semitism embedded in both leftist intersectionality and Islamic fundamentalism. These are not anti-war demonstrations – they are celebrations of Hamas’s bestial brutality. And yet, to protect pro-Hamas extremists, the Biden Administration has refused to enforce our criminal, civil rights, and education laws, effectively turning a blind eye to an organized campaign of anti-Semitic intimidation and harassment. America First Legal is going to court to find out why,” said Reed Rubinstein.
Read the lawsuit here.
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