Republicans urge Bernie Sanders to hold hearing on campus antisemitism

Republicans on the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee are urging Chairman Bernie Sanders (I-VT) to hold a hearing on the rise in antisemitism on college campuses.

In a letter to Sanders, eight Republicans on the committee led by ranking member Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) urged Sanders to hold a hearing “on ensuring safe learning environments for Jewish students, as required by the Civil Rights Act of 1964.”

GRANITE STATE GAFFE: DEMOCRATS PUSH BIDEN WRITE-IN EFFORT IN NEW HAMPSHIRE

The senators noted that there has been a rise in antisemitic activity on college campuses following the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel by the terrorist group Hamas and noted that the Department of Education is tasked with ensuring students are afforded a “safe learning environment” on campus. The attacks and Israel’s military response in the Gaza Strip have claimed thousands of lives.

“It is our duty to ensure federal officials are doing everything in their power to uphold the law and ensure students are not excluded from participation, denied the benefits of, or subject to discrimination at school based on race, color, or national origin,” the senators wrote. “We need to engage in a direct discussion with Department of Education leaders Secretary Miguel Cardona and Assistant Secretary of Civil Rights Catherine Lhamon about the actions they are taking to address anti-Semitism on college campuses.”

Susan Walsh/AP

In an interview with the Washington Examiner, Cassidy said that the committee has not heard of any steps the Department of Education is taking to address rising antisemitism and that it is responsible for “making sure that the administrative agencies are doing their work.”

“Let’s make sure the federal agencies are doing their responsibility to make sure that there is access to education services free from discrimination and that a hostile environment is not been created by the administration, or professors or teachers within that institution,” Cassidy said. “I think it’s a perfect thing for us to have a hearing on.”

Cassidy has been critical of a recent decision by Sanders to hold a field hearing on a nurses strike in New Jersey last week. No other members of the committee attended the hearing.

“Sen. Sanders clearly is trying to push a pro-labor union set of priorities,” he said. “I’m also pro-labor because there’s a lot of labor which is not labor union that would probably differ with some things which he emphasizes.”

Cassidy said that he was not going to “prejudge” the chairman’s priorities, noting that he could easily call a hearing on campus antisemitism, but he also pointed out that the Democratic Party and the progressive Left have been increasingly hostile to Israel amid the latest conflict.

“There is a perception that the woke Left is very much antisemitic,” Cassidy said. “[They are] even celebrating, in some cases, the Oct. 7 atrocities.” He noted that a professor at the University of California, Berkeley was granting students extra credit to attend a protest in support of Hamas.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

“So [if] I’m Jewish in that class, I’m not going to go because I actually want to stand by Israel and I find the Oct. 7 atrocities horrendous, but everybody else is getting extra points,” he said. “You almost can’t believe it … but this is where the woke Left has ended up.”

The Washington Examiner has reached out to Sanders’s office for comment.