Republicans on the Home Committee on Schooling and the Workforce this week urged U.S. Schooling Secretary Miguel Cardona to implement a Trump-era government order supposed to fight antisemitism.
Yearly because the government order was signed, the Schooling Division has indicated it will develop laws to adjust to it, in line with the letter.
“It by no means has,” the letter said.
This inaction has left faculties “unprepared for and unwilling to handle the fires of antisemitism which have swept campuses this fall,” the lawmakers argued.
An Schooling Division spokesperson confirmed through electronic mail Wednesday that the company has obtained the letter.
“Any harassment or discrimination in opposition to college students primarily based on shared ancestry or ethnic traits, reminiscent of Jewish ancestry, is unacceptable and prevents our nation’s learners from reaching their full potential within the classroom,” the spokesperson mentioned.
The Republicans’ letter comes amid spiking antisemitism and Islamophobic acts throughout U.S. faculties within the wake of the newest Israel-Hamas battle.
Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 doesn’t cowl discrimination primarily based on faith. Nonetheless, in late 2019, then-President Donald Trump signed an government order stating that discrimination in opposition to Jewish individuals could violate Title VI whether it is primarily based on their race, coloration or nationwide origin.
“It shall be the coverage of the manager department to implement Title VI in opposition to prohibited types of discrimination rooted in anti-Semitism as vigorously as in opposition to all different types of discrimination prohibited by Title VI,” the manager order said.
The U.S. Division of Schooling plans to amend its laws in response to the manager order, although a web-based discover mentioned it doesn’t anticipate to craft new language till December of subsequent yr.
Nonetheless, an Schooling Division spokesperson mentioned Wednesday that the company is “working tirelessly to make sure that this rulemaking course of is accomplished as quickly as attainable and anticipates completion effectively earlier than December 2024.”
Within the meantime, the Schooling Division will proceed adhering to the manager order, the spokesperson mentioned.
A 2021 doc from the Schooling Division says that the manager order doesn’t change how its Workplace for Civil Rights handles discrimination complaints involving allegations of antisemitism.
“OCR has lengthy acknowledged that anti-Semitism could violate Title VI,” the doc mentioned, citing steerage issued in 2004 and 2010. These paperwork clarify that Title IV protects in opposition to discrimination primarily based on college students’ “precise or perceived shared ancestry or ethnic traits.”
