Northwestern University President admits to getting an 'F' from ADL with combatting antisemitism

Northwestern University President Michael Schill admitted Thursday that he got an "F" rating from the Anti-Defamation League during a back and forth between him and Rep. Elise Stafanik, R-N.Y. during a hearing to address antisemitism. 

"Isn't it also true that Northwestern earned an 'F' for your failure to respond and combat antisemitism and they called for your resignation?" Stefanik asked Schill.

"I have great respect for the ADL," Schill started to say before Stefanik interrupted him and said, "I'm not asking for your respect for the ADL. I'm asking, is it a fact that you earned an 'F' and they called for your resignation?"

Eventually Schill admitted that he was sad that Northwestern was given an "F" rating.

Rutgers University President Jonathan Holloway said Thursday during the hearing that the New Jersey college has held "listening sessions" to address antisemitism.

"In New Brunswick, we established an advisory counsel on antisemitism and Jewish life," Holloway said. "Jewish studies and Middle Eastern studies faculty have brought Israeli and Palestinian students together in a classroom not to convince or change minds, but simply to listen to each other."

According to the House Republicans' social media page, at one of the listening sessions, chants such as "one solution, intifada revolution" and "globalize the intifada" were chanted.

Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-Va., chairwoman of the House Education and the Workforce Committee, offered harsh words Thursday for campus leaders, accusing them of nurturing "a campus culture of radicalism" for years before antisemitism became rampant after Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas attacked Israel.

Foxx opened the hearing with a quote from Ernest Hemmingway in "The Sun Also Rises," when one of the characters says he went bankrupt, "Gradually, then suddenly."

"No three words better apply to the decline in postsecondary education that has transpired—gradually then suddenly," Foxx said. 

"Over the course of years—decades even—universities gradually nurtured a campus culture of radicalism, in which antisemitism grew and became tolerated by administrators," she said. "Then, suddenly, over the course of weeks—days even—universities burst into antisemitic chaos. October 7 ignited a powder keg of pro-terror campus fervor, a shocking spectacle for the American public."

Meanwhile, the committee's ranking member, Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Va., said that nothing productive had happened from the hearings other than some people losing their jobs, such as Harvard University President Claudine Gay, who resigned earlier this year just weeks after she appeared before the committee. Scott said that important hours that could be spent fighting antisemitism on campus are instead being spent preparing for the hearing.

The hearing featured the leaders of Northwestern University, Rutgers University and the University of California, Los Angeles. All of the campuses had so-called "Gaza Solidarity Encampments."

"Northwestern University, like many universities, has an antisemitism problem," Northwestern President Michael Schill said in a pre-written statement before the committee. 

Northwestern is currently facing a civil rights complaint after it agreed with protesters to offer scholarships for Palestinian students as part of the exchange to take down the encampments.

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