Trump's week in review: Executive orders on public education, ending child mutilation and protecting parental rights
5. Combatting anti-semitism
In an executive order published Wednesday, Trump reinstated an executive order implemented in his previous administration that enforced Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to prohibit recipients of federal financial assistance from engaging in or tolerating anti-Semitism. As explained in the 2019 executive order, Title VI prohibits discrimination on the basis of “race, color, or national origin,” it does not explicitly apply to religion.
Wednesday’s executive order also directed the Attorney General to “employ appropriate civil-rights authorities, such as 18 U.S.C. 241, to combat anti-Semitism.” The statute mentioned in the executive order subjects anyone who conspires to “injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate any person in any State, Territory, Commonwealth, Possession, or District in the free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege secured to him by the Constitution or laws of the United States” to federal charges.
The executive order called on the heads of several executive agencies to provide “recommendations for familiarizing institutions of higher education with the grounds for inadmissibility under 8 U.S.C. 1182(a)(3).” The statute in question governs which aliens are ineligible to receive visas to enter the U.S., identifying those wishing to engage in acts of terrorism or anarchy as inadmissible to the U.S.
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The stated purpose of familiarizing colleges and universities about the statute about inadmissible aliens is to enable them to “monitor for and report activities taken by alien students and staff relevant to those grounds and for ensuring that such reports about aliens lead, as appropriate and consistent with applicable law, to investigations and, if warranted, actions to remove such aliens.” The language in the executive order suggests that removing foreign students who engage in anti-Semitism from the country will be a priority.
Trump also ordered the submission of reports from the Attorney General as well as the Secretary of Education documenting all incidents of anti-Semitism that have emerged in court cases and in Title VI complaints following the Oct. 7, 2023 terror attack in Israel that he credited with launching “an unprecedented wave of vile anti-Semitic discrimination, vandalism, and violence against our citizens, especially in our schools and on our campuses.”
The executive order listed “denial of access to campus common areas and facilities, including libraries and classrooms; and intimidation, harassment, and physical threats and assault” as examples of hostile treatment directed at Jewish students on college campuses.
Ryan Foley is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: ryan.foley@christianpost.com
