The Department of Justice said George Washington University violated federal civil rights law during pro-Palestinian student protests last year, making it the latest target in the Trump administration’s campaign to exert power over US colleges.
Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon said GWU had been “deliberately indifferent” to alleged antisemitic discrimination and harassment on campus during the protests, in a letter sent to the university’s president, Ellen Granberg.
Dhillon wrote that the DOJ “intends to proceed with enforcement” and is seeking “immediate remediation,” while noting that the university could resolve the issue through a “voluntary resolution agreement.”
The letter didn’t spell out what enforcement would entail. But the DOJ’s finding echoes a pattern that presaged funding freezes and subsequent negotiations at schools including Columbia, Brown, Harvard, Northwestern and Cornell — suggesting that George Washington could be subjected to similar penalties.
Most recently, the Department announced similar findings of civil rights violations at the University of California Los Angeles on July 29. Less than a week later, the administration suspended more than half a billion dollars in federal grants. The public flagship has since entered talks with the White House to restore the funding, in exchange for a significant fine and concessions to the Trump team’s political priorities.
George Washington, a private university based in the nation’s capital, was home to a weeks-long pro-Palestinian student protest movement last spring, featuring encampments erected on campus that remained for two weeks. Dhillon wrote that their main purpose was to intimidate Jewish and Israeli students, and cited claims of harassment ranging from blocking campus entrances to physical endangerment.
The university did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The school’s leadership initially called for DC police to clear the encampments, and clashed with city officials who refused the request. Trump announced Monday that he would take federal control of the capital’s police department, and deploy 800 National Guard troops there.
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