More than 70 lawmakers call on Harvard, MIT, UPenn to fire presidents following testimony

A group of 74 lawmakers across the political spectrum have called on the governing boards of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Pennsylvania, and Harvard University to remove their presidents following testimony they gave this week addressing antisemitism on college campuses.

Led by New York Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik and Florida Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz, the group highlighted a rise in reported antisemitism on campus, citing data from the Anti-Defamation league and Hillel International, claiming that "73% of Jewish college students surveyed have experienced or witnessed some form of antisemitism on campus since the beginning of the school year."

"This is unacceptable. Antisemitism has been allowed to fester on campuses for years, and in the wake of the October 7[th] attack, the world is witnessing the consequences," they continued. "This is a clear result of the failure of university leadership. To hold universities accountable, Congress held a hearing on confronting antisemitism. Testimony provided by presidents of your institutions showed a complete absence of moral clarity and illuminated the problematic double standards and dehumanization of the Jewish communities that your university presidents enabled."

The group deemed the responses of Presidents Claudine Gay of Harvard, Sally Kornbluth of MIT, and Liz Magill of Penn to be "abhorrent" as well as "evasive and dismissive."

"Their failure to unequivocally condemn calls for the systematic murder of Jews is deeply alarming," they went on. "It stands in stark contrast to the principles we expect leaders of top academic institutions to uphold."

"Given this moment of crisis, we demand that your boards immediately remove each of these presidents from their positions and that you provide an actionable plan to ensure that Jewish and Israeli students, teachers, and faculty are safe on your campuses," they concluded.

Ben Whedon is an editor and reporter for Just the News. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter.