US to probe Columbia protests for terrorism violations, official says

The US Justice Department said yesterday (14 March) it was looking into what it said were possible violations of terrorism laws during protests over the Gaza war at Columbia University, putting fresh pressure on the epicenter of last year's nationwide anti-Israel activism.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the investigation was part of President Donald Trump's "mission to end antisemitism in this country," calling it a pushback that was "long overdue."

Civil rights proponents criticised the move, saying that protesters were covered by the First Amendment of the Constitution, which protects rights including free speech.

The announcement is the latest in a series of signals that the Trump administration has no intention of easing its crackdown on pro-Palestinian student activists and university policies that it says allow antisemitism to flourish on campus.

The Trump administration has told Columbia that the school must make a series of policy changes as a precondition for beginning talks on restoring $400 million in federal funding suspended last week.

The demands, spelled out in a letter dated Thursday (13 March), coincided with a search of two dormitory rooms by federal agents at Columbia's New York campus. The searches came a week after immigration agents detained Mahmoud Khalil, the leader of last year's protests at Columbia, in a bid to deport him that so far has been blocked in federal court.

Earlier this week, the Department of Education warned that it was investigating 60 schools for allegedly tolerating a hostile environment for Jews. In a related move, it said on Friday it was looking into complaints that 45 universities engaged with a diversity program that set eligibility based on race. It said such activities violated a 1964 civil rights law.

Dorm Searches

The campus demonstrations that precipitated the federal scrutiny began after the October 2023 attack by Hamas on Israel, and the subsequent US-supported Israeli assault on Gaza, the Palestinian enclave controlled by Hamas, which the US has designated as a terrorist group. Protesters demanded that university endowments divest from Israeli interests and that the US end military assistance to Israel.

The Trump administration has accused Columbia of an inadequate response to the weeks-long encampment that activists set up on campus and to a brief occupation of a campus building.

The university has defended itself, saying it has worked to combat antisemitism. At the same time, it has sought to fend off accusations by civil rights groups that it is letting the government erode academia's free speech protections.

Brian Hauss, a senior staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union and part of Khalil's legal team, said the Justice Department probe was misguided.

"The First Amendment does not allow for grounds to conflate between being pro-Palestinian and pro-Hamas," he said at a briefing.

Agents from the Department of Homeland Security conducted the dorm searches after serving Columbia with warrants signed by a federal magistrate, interim president Katrina Armstrong said in a statement. No one was detained, no items were removed, and no further action was taken, she said.

Blanche said the searches were part of a probe into whether Columbia University harbored immigrants on its campus who were in the country illegally.

Students say federal immigration agents have been repeatedly spotted at dorms and student housing around Columbia's Manhattan campus.

Among the demands in Thursday's letter to the school, the Trump administration said Columbia must formally define antisemitism, ban the wearing of masks "intended to conceal identity or intimidate," and place its Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies departments under "academic receivership," which would take control out of the hands of their faculties.

It also demanded that the school reform its admissions and international recruiting policies in compliance with federal law, but offered no specifics.

Columbia said it was reviewing the letter. "We are committed at all times to advancing our mission, supporting our students, and addressing all forms of discrimination and hatred on our campus," it said in a statement.

This week, it said it had meted out a range of punishments - including suspensions, expulsions and the revocation of degrees - to students who occupied the building last spring. It did not name the students or say how many were disciplined.

As hundreds of Khalil's supporters demonstrated at Columbia's main gate on Friday, a graduate student passing by who asked to be identified only by his first name, Demetri, said the mood on campus was depressing.

"The federal government can't be dictating what and whom it does and doesn't teach, like who can and cannot be admitted," he said.