The Trump administration is trying to investigate alleged antisemitism on the University of Pennsylvania’s campus. To aid in its effort, the administration wants to collect information on Jewish staff members who filed discrimination claims, participated in Jewish activities or worked for the Jewish studies department.
This is a step too far, according to Jewish groups on the Penn campus and in the wider community.
First, the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission attempted to get this information directly from the school through a subpoena. Now, a new lawsuit filed in Pennsylvania federal court accuses Penn of refusing to comply.
“The EEOC remains steadfast in its commitment to combatting workplace antisemitism and seeks to identify employees who may have experienced antisemitic harassment. Unfortunately, the employer continues to refuse to identify members of its workforce who may have been subjected to this unlawful conduct,” said EEOC Chair Andrea Lucas in a press release. “An employer’s obstruction of efforts to identify witnesses and victims undermines the EEOC’s ability to investigate harassment. In such cases, we will seek court intervention to secure full cooperation.”
Penn officials insist they haven’t obstructed. They say they have merely protected the personal and confidential information of employees who did not agree to share it.
“We have cooperated extensively with the EEOC, providing over 100 documents, totaling nearly 900 pages; however, we have not turned over to the government lists of Jewish employees, Jewish student employees and those associated with Jewish organizations, or their personal contact information. Violating their privacy and trust is antithetical to ensuring Penn’s Jewish community feels protected and safe,” the school told Philadelphia Jewish Exponent in a statement on Tuesday.
School officials claimed there were eight employee complaints about antisemitism during the period in question, which began in November 2022, according to the lawsuit. Penn asked each complainant if they wanted to cooperate; two said yes, according to school officials. Penn also provided information about each complaint.
“There is no merit to the EEOC’s claims that Penn is withholding complaints,” said a Penn spokesperson.
On Nov. 21, Penn Hillel posted its position about the issue to its Facebook page.
“We support serious efforts to address antisemitism on campus, and we recognize and appreciate the EEOC’s concern for civil rights and workforce protections,” it stated.
“At the same time, we are deeply concerned that the EEOC is now seeking lists of individuals identified as Jewish, including their personal home addresses, phone numbers, and private emails, based solely on their affiliation with Jewish organizations on campus – and without their consent,” it continued.
“In our view, Penn has offered a reasonable alternative – informing all employees of the investigation and inviting them to contact the EEOC directly,” it concluded.
The Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, ADL and the American Jewish Committee of Philadelphia/Southern New Jersey posted the same stance on X.
The groups said they “share the EEOC’s commitment to combating antisemitism and protecting Jewish employees from discrimination and harassment on college campuses” and “appreciate that the EEOC has undertaken a number of critical investigations to help do just that.”
“We are, however, concerned about the privacy and constitutional implications of any effort (even those that are well-intentioned) to force the production of a list of Jewish faculty, staff, and students by religious affiliation,” they concluded.
A Bad Historical Reminder
The groups also cited history as a reason for their concern.
The Federation-ADL-AJC statement also said that, “History has taught us to be vigilant when governments compile lists of people based on religious identity.”
Penn Hillel’s post stated that, “Across history, the compelled cataloguing of Jews has been a source of profound danger, and collection of Jews’ private information carries echoes of the very patterns that made Jewish communities vulnerable for centuries.”
There is a deep history of Jewish cataloging in the U.S., according to Brandeis University emeritus professor Jonathan Sarna, widely considered one of the foremost scholars on American Jewish history.
In the 19th century, Jews who committed crimes were often publicly identified as Jews.
“If there was a Protestant, he would not be identified as a Protestant,” Sarna said.
In the 20th century, many elite universities imposed quotas against Jews. Those quotas tasked their administrators with figuring out who was Jewish and who wasn’t.
“Because people changed their names, they wanted to figure out what your original name was,” Sarna explained. “If there were lists of Jewish students, you could keep them out, not on the basis of what they admitted, but you could, even at an earlier stage, not consider them, and they might not even know why they were not considered.”
The historian, though, was quick to note that he was not accusing the Trump administration of malicious intent.
“They had a different intent. They needed some information,” he said.
But he added that the Jewish community “gets nervous when Jews are singled out as Jews.”
“I think that the Jewish community has a memory, a historical memory, of how minority groups are targeted,” he concluded.