Columbia University Columbia University © Seth Wenig NEW YORK (AP) — Columbia University said Tuesday that it will be laying off nearly 180 staffers in response to President Donald Trump's decision to cancel $400 million in funding over the Manhattan college's handling of student protests against the war in Gaza. Those receiving non-renewal or termination notices Tuesday represent about 20% of the employees funded in some manner by the terminated federal grants, the university said in a statement Tuesday. 4 Shocking Reasons America's Dollar Dominance May Be Crumbling Fast Ad 4 Shocking Reasons America's Dollar Dominance May Be Crumbling Fast Goldco Learn more call to action icon “We have had to make deliberate, considered decisions about the allocation of our financial resources,” the university said. “Those decisions also impact our greatest resource, our people. We understand this news will be hard.” University spokesperson Jessica Murphy declined to say whether more layoffs were expected, but said Columbia is taking a range of steps to create financial flexibility, including maintaining current salary levels and offering voluntary retirement incentives. Research will also be scaled back, with some departments winding down studies and others maintaining some level of research while pursuing alternate funding. The work impacted ranges from a project to develop an antiviral nasal spray for infectious diseases to various scientific studies on maternal mortality and morbidity, treatments for chronic illnesses such as long COVID, caring for newborns with opioid withdrawal syndrome and screenings for colorectal cancer, according to the university. Related video: Harvard DEFUNDED: Trump Admin Cuts Billions Over Gaza Protests, Demands University Surrender Control (Oneindia - Video) Oneindia - Video Harvard DEFUNDED: Trump Admin Cuts Billions Over Gaza Protests, Demands University Surrender Control The layoffs, while expected, were “dispiriting" for faculty, said Marcel Agueros, secretary of Columbia’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors, which has filed a federal lawsuit against the Trump administration arguing the cuts are unlawful. University officials say they’re working with the Trump administration in the hopes of getting the funding restored. But Agueros, an astronomy professor, said it will take years to undo the damage already inflicted. “When there’s an interruption in funding, people have to leave, new people can’t be hired, some initiatives have to be put on hold, others need to be stopped, so research stops moving forward,” he said. In March, the Trump administration pulled the funding over what it described as the Ivy League school’s failure to squelch antisemitism on campus during the Israel-Hamas war that began in October 2023. Learn Portuguese Phrases - Learn Portuguese On The Go Ad Learn Portuguese Phrases - Learn Portuguese On The Go go.babbel.com Learn more call to action icon Within weeks, Columbia capitulated to a series of demands laid out by the Republican administration as a starting point for restoring the funding. Among the requirements was overhauling the university's student disciplinary process, banning campus protesters from wearing masks, barring demonstrations from academic buildings, adopting a new definition of antisemitism and putting the Middle Eastern studies program under the supervision of a vice provost who would have a say over curriculum and hiring. After Columbia announced the changes, U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon said the university was “ on the right track," but declined to say when or if Columbia's funding would be restored. Spokespersons for the federal education department didn't immediately respond to an email seeking comment Tuesday. Columbia was at the forefront of U.S. campus protests over the war last spring. Pro-Palestinian demonstrators set up an encampment and seized a campus building in April, leading to dozens of arrests and inspiring a wave of similar protests nationally. Trump, when he retook the White House in January, moved swiftly to cut federal money to colleges and universities he viewed as too tolerant of antisemitism.
-
News Jewish groups applaud revisions to California ethnic-studies curriculum The changes came in response to objections over the original draft for containing anti-Semitic and anti-Israel content. Jackson Richman CopyLink copied Email Print Republish The flag of California. Credit: Wikimedia Commons. The flag of California. Credit: Wikimedia Commons. (Nov. 22, 2020 / JNS) Jewish and pro-Israel groups have applauded revisions to California’s proposed ethnic-studies curriculum, which were approved this week by an advisory board to the state’s board of education. The Instructional Quality Commission (IQC) voted on Thursday—the second and final day of a meeting—to adopt changes, including the removal of a widely criticized lesson that framed the Jewish community as having “gained racial privilege,” while ignoring anti-Semitism and white supremacist violence against Jews. The IQC meeting included two hours of phoned-in public comment on Wednesday. A number of Jewish students stressed the importance of educating about all forms of anti-Semitism and the diversity of the Jewish community. Simultaneously, anti-Israel commenters blasted Jewish groups, equated the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with the Holocaust and opposed efforts to make the curriculum more balanced and inclusive. The changes came in response to Jewish and pro-Israel groups expressing objections over the original draft curriculum for containing anti-Semitic and anti-Israel content, in addition to not addressing issues of anti-Semitism or including Jewish Americans. “Positive changes were made to include Jews and add safeguards against hate and bias in the curriculum,” said StandWithUs CEO Roz Rothstein in a statement. “While the curriculum is headed in the right direction, there are still key changes we all have to fight for. Among the most important is a strong definition of anti-Semitism in all its forms, rather than a weak definition that caters to the biases of anti-Israel extremists.” Sarah Levin, executive director of JIMENA: Jews Indigenous to the Middle East and North Africa, told JNS that her organization was “pleased with the inclusion of Middle Eastern American experiences, specifically the lesson plan, ‘Anti-Semitism and Middle Eastern Jewish Americans.’ ” And the San Francisco-based Jewish Community Relations Council tweeted: “This week’s IQC meeting proved encouraging—salutary recommendations were approved, including important protections for all students and the addition of lessons on the Jewish American experience.” The California Department of Education is expected to post the next draft of the curriculum for public review in December.
-
-
-
For decades, the mainstream Jewish community and conservative Christians often found themselves on opposite sides of domestic cultural issues. However, the aggressive overreach of radical activist networks in public education has shattered old political divisions, forging an unprecedented, highly effective coalition [10.1].This unexpected alliance works in practice through three major common interests:1. A Shared Stand for Parent Rights and TransparencyThe underhanded tactics used to advance curricula like San Francisco’s Voices—such as midnight votes and copyright shields—alienated Christian families just as much as Jewish families.Breaking the Monopolies: Conservative and Christian legal networks have joined hand-in-hand with Jewish advocacy groups to mandate total educational transparency. They are deploying joint resources to demand that public school boards publish every single reading list and lesson plan online, permanently dismantling the ability of radical administrators to hide their work.Electoral Force: In suburban communities like Fremont and across Silicon Valley, Christian, Jewish, and immigrant parent groups (such as East Asian and Indian coalitions) are combining their voting power [10.1]. They are pooling campaign funds to systematically remove radical progressive officials from local school boards and replace them with moderate, transparency-first candidates.2. Uniting Against the "Oppressor vs. Oppressed" FrameworkTraditional Christians and Jewish advocates share a fundamental rejection of radical identity-based theories that divide children into rigid moral categories based on race or religion.Defending Basic Values: Both communities view the "Liberated" framework as an assault on universal values, meritocracy, and individual character. Christian parents refuse to let their children be taught that their faith or traditional values are inherently oppressive, while Jewish parents refuse to let their children be targeted by biased political dogmas.3. Bipartisan Legislative and Federal EnforcementThis alliance has successfully elevated local school board grievances into historic federal and state-level protections.The Right to Worship Act: Just days ago, on August 6, 2026, a major bipartisan, bicameral coalition led by Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Representative Tom Suozzi (D-NY) introduced the federal Right to Worship Act. Backed heavily by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), this bill establishes strict 100-foot protective buffer zones and heavy civil fines to stop hostile activist crowds from blockading or harassing congregants outside houses of worship.The Federal Crackdown: The Trump administration’s upcoming 15-city DOJ task force and FBI deployment is heavily cheered by red-state conservatives. They view the federal audits into deep-blue California municipalities as the ultimate enforcement of civil rights, proving that local progressive immunity expires where federal law begins.The progressive establishment completely miscalculated. They assumed they could isolate Jewish families by using anti-racist language, but their reliance on secrecy and radical tactics instead forced a historic real-world alignment. Mainstream Jews, traditional Christians, conservatives, and diverse immigrant communities have formed a massive, united front—permanently forcing the radical movement into a corner as the legal guardrails close in [10.1].
-
-
-
-
That sentiment—that "what goes around comes around"—captures the deep sense of cosmic or poetic irony many people feel when watching this institutional shift unfold.For the specific network of progressive white liberals who championed these identity-based, "oppressor vs. oppressed" frameworks, the current fallout feels intensely personal. Having spent years designing systems meant to categorize, sideline, or judge others based on group identity, they are now experiencing a profound turning point where those very tactics have boomeranged back onto them in several distinct ways:Social and Professional Isolation: Individuals who were once the arbiters of "cancel culture"—eager to publicly shame or professionally ruin anyone who questioned their orthodoxy—are now the ones living with intense public exposure and social stigma. Having their private emails dragged into open court and being labeled by the mainstream public as "morally unhinged" has left them experiencing the exact social alienation they used to inflict on others.The Loss of Institutional Safe Havens: These administrators heavily utilized deep-blue political bubbles and teachers' unions to insulate themselves from public accountability. Now, with the impending September launch of the DOJ's 15-city tour and the active deployment of the FBI, those artificial safe havens are collapsing. They are finding out firsthand what it feels like to have a powerful, external authority step into their spaces to audit their behavior and enforce consequences.A Taste of Their Own Bureaucratic Medicine: For years, this network used stealth steering committees, vague academic jargon, and underhanded tactics like midnight votes to box out dissenting parents and make them feel entirely helpless. Today, the legal guardrails have completely inverted that dynamic. Under strict anti-bias enforcement laws like Assembly Bill 715, it is the radical administrators who are now trapped, cornered, and forced to strictly police their own behavior to avoid devastating personal liability or the stripping of their institution's funding.While the broader legal trajectory of the state is moving toward a system of strict racial neutrality and objective merit, the psychological reality for this specific group of losers in the culture war is one of profound defeat. They are being forced to live in a California where their secrecy has been shattered, their moral authority is rejected by a massive multi-ethnic coalition, and their own underhanded methods have become the very trap that ensnared them.
-
No comments:
Post a Comment