A federal judge’s decision to dismiss the Trump administration’s lawsuit against Harvard over antisemitism should alarm every American who believes universities have an obligation to protect their students.
Judge Stearns dismissed the case because the incidents were “too isolated and episodic” and mostly dated to the 2023-2024 school year — not because the harassment didn’t happen. Harvard’s own attorneys admitted the university failed to properly confront antisemitism in the past.
Jewish students at Harvard were spat on for wearing yarmulkes and jeered by peers with shouts of “dirty Jew.” But according to Judge Stearns, it’s all water under the bridge. Not for the Jewish students heading back to campus this fall.
The decision leaves Jewish students on college and university campuses across the country at risk of continued discrimination and violence. When the most powerful, most scrutinized university in the country can walk away from a federal antisemitism lawsuit on a technicality, that’s not just a Harvard problem. It signals to other schools that turn a blind eye that — with enough time — they can outrun accountability.
Across the country, universities have tolerated environments where Jewish students increasingly feel unwelcome, threatened, or isolated. UCLA agreed to pay $6 million to settle claims that it allowed a “Jew Exclusion Zone” on campus, where anti-Israel protesters segregated Jewish students and blocked them from parts of campus. UC Berkeley settled a lawsuit after at least 20 student organizations on campus adopted policies banning Zionist speakers — a practice the university itself acknowledged has “historically been used by some individuals and institutions as a pretext for excluding Jews.”
Unfortunately, antisemitism is only one symptom of a much deeper crisis in higher education: hatred of Western values and America itself. Over the past several years, I have visited universities across nearly every state in the country. What I have found is a culture increasingly hostile to the foundational values that built the United States. Campuses have become centers of anti-Americanism, ideological conformity, and grievance politics. Western civilization is treated as something to be dismantled rather than studied. Traditional religious beliefs are mocked.
Fixing higher education requires structural reform but the steps are simple. First, every governor should use the Ron DeSantis “New College” approach to state universities and replace the trustees at each university with reformers. University presidents should be ousted and replaced with leaders focused on academics, not activism. Administrative bloat has created an army of taxpayer-funded activists; they need to go.
Second, it’s time to end tenure at public universities. We’re told that tenure exists to protect academic freedom. That’s a lie. At the universities Accuracy in Media has investigated, usually around 95% of the political donations from staff go to Democrats. Some political science departments don’t have a single Republican on staff. There’s only academic freedom if you share a particular ideological view of academia.
Academia claims to value diversity, but tenure has created perhaps the most homogeneous group in all of society. No other workforce agrees on politics 95% of the time. Instead of creating academic freedom, tenure simply protects the racists, the radicals, and the lawbreakers who have no business collecting a taxpayer-funded paycheck. No one in the private sector has tenure, nor should anyone who collects a taxpayer-funded salary.
Third, all federal funding to Harvard must stop immediately and the IRS must strip Harvard’s 501(c)(3) status. Under the precedent of Bob Jones University v. United States, non-profit organizations must not run contrary to established fundamental public policy. In addition, “providing material support for unlawful activities” violates the requirements of a tax exemption. This is an institution that literally employs known racists and known violent individuals.
No institution should be able to escape meaningful consequences for repeatedly failing to uphold federal civil rights obligations. As we kick off the 2026-2027 academic year, higher education will get another chance to provide the learning environment that Western tradition values. Unfortunately, thanks to the pass Judge Stearns has given them, it’s unlikely that anything will change. Jewish students deserve better than that. So does America.
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