Education and the Workforce Committee Chairwoman Virginia Foxx (R-NC) on Tuesday again demanded accountability for Columbia University administrators after releasing text messages received as part of the Committee’s ongoing antisemitism investigation that show the disparaging and dismissive attitudes Columbia’s administrators hold towards Jewish students.
Following reports that four Columbia deans had exchanged disparaging text messages as members of the university’s Jewish community discussed antisemitism in a panel on Jewish life on campus, Chairwoman Foxx demanded that the texts be turned over to the Committee as part of its ongoing investigation into antisemitism at colleges and universities. The subsequent production offered a small but clear window into the administrators’ determination to belittle the antisemitism on campus.
The text messages, which include numerous offensive messages that have not previously been reported, show senior Columbia College administrators mocking and disparaging the university’s Jewish community, and trafficking in antisemitic tropes regarding Jews and money. The texts accused Jewish students of coming from a “place of privilege,” dismissed their concerns, disparaged officials responsible for Jewish student life, and insinuated that efforts to address the explosion of antisemitism on Columbia’s campus were merely a fundraising ploy.
NEW: Columbia Law students are demanding that the school cancel finals and pass all students because they are so traumatized from NYPD “violence” they witnessed last week.
LMAO.
The sensitive and “shaken” students say they’re so upset by police in riot gear that they can’t… pic.twitter.com/Ek9bcrBjWG
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) May 6, 2024
The new messages suggest that the administrators, Susan Chang-Kim, the vice dean and chief administrative officer of Columbia College; Cristen Kromm, the dean of undergraduate student life; Matthew Patashnick, the associate dean for student and family support; and Josef Sorett, the dean of Columbia College, who were all placed on leave pending a university investigation, see concerns about anti-Semitism as manifestations of entitlement.
“They will have their own dorm soon,” Patashnick said about Jewish students, when the head of Columbia Hillel, Brian Cohen, said that many Jews felt uncomfortable in their dormitories following the Oct. 7 attacks.
“Comes from such a place of privilege,” Chang-Kim texted. “Trying to be open-minded to understand but the doors are closing.”
The deans ridiculed Cohen’s report of offering psychological counseling to Jewish and Israeli students following Oct. 7, suggesting the Jews and Israelis were receiving special treatment that was denied to other groups.
“Not all heroes wear capes,” Patashnick texted.
“If only every identity community had these resources and support,” Kromm replied.
“Jewish students deserve better than to have harassment and threats against them dismissed as ‘privilege,’ and Jewish faculty members deserve better than to be mocked by their colleagues,” said Chairwoman Foxx. “These text messages once again confirm the need for serious accountability across Columbia’s campus.”
Several exchanges engaged in antisemitic stereotypes regarding Jews and money. One message stated, “Amazing what $$$$ can do” as panelists referenced an October 2023 op-ed on antisemitism by campus rabbi, Yonah Hain. Another charged that Brian Cohen, the Lavine Family Executive Director of Columbia/Barnard Hillel, Columbia’s center for Jewish life, “knows exactly what he’s doing and how to take full advantage of this moment. Huge fundraising potential.” An administrator also dismissed the explosion of antisemitic conduct at Columbia, saying Cohen “is such a problem !!!” for “painting our students as dangerous.”
