Antisemitism and the Law in Trump 2.0: A Perspective from UPenn

In this week’s episode, host David Myers leads a discussion with Amanda Shanor, Sigal Ben-Porath, and Serena Mayeri about the legal and historical implications of the Trump administration’s request for lists of Jewish students, faculty, and organizations at the University of Pennsylvania. The conversation situates the subpoena within broader federal investigations into alleged campus anti-Semitism following October 7, 2023, while arguing that the demand for names, personal contact information, and organizational affiliations raises profound constitutional concerns. The panelists contend that the request threatens First Amendment protections surrounding free association, religious identity, and academic freedom, particularly because it targets individuals based on protected forms of expression and affiliation.

Serena Mayeri is the Arlin M. Adams Professor of Constitutional Law at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School and a Professor of History (by courtesy). Serena has many publications including her first book Reasoning from Race: Feminism, Law, and the Civil Rights Revolution (Harvard University Press, 2011) and her new book is Marital Privilege: Marriage, Inequality, and the Transformation of American Law (Yale University Press, 2025).

Sigal Ben-Porath is the MRMJJ Presidential Professor at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education. She also currently serves as the faculty director of the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF) Paideia Program. Her areas of expertise include philosophy of education and political philosophy. She has published numerous books including Cancel Wars (2022) and Making Up Our Mind: What School Choice is Really About (2019).

Amanda Shanor is an Associate Professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Amanda’s research explores the changing meaning of the First Amendment and the forces that affect it; democratic theory, illiberalism, and equality; and the intersection of constitutional law and economic life. Amanda has published more than ten scholarly papers including “Greenwashing and the First Amendment” (Columbia Law Review 2021) and “

Transcript

Narrator 0:11

Welcome to the History Politics Podcast, putting the past to work from UCLA's Lutskin Center for History and Policy. We study change in order to make change, linking knowledge of the past to the quest for a better future. Every other week we examine the most pressing issues of the day through a historical lens, helping us understand what happened then and what that means for us now.

David Myers 0:40

Welcome to today's discussion, Anti-Semitism and the Law of the Second Trump Administration, which is part of the series on the past and futures of higher education in the United States, which is sponsored by the UCLA Luskin Center for History and Policy. My name is David Myers. I'm the director of the Luskin Center. I'm delighted to be joined by our assistant director, Rose Campbell. A few other people will join us in person, which is why I'm at such a distance from the camera to allow them to fill in. But we're delighted to welcome all of you who are online. This is the third conversation of the year in our series as we try to understand the new and fraught terrain on which higher education stands at this crucial and dire moment. The second Trump administration has issued several volleys against universities. The first in the spring summer of 2025, and then again another round in early 2026, perhaps the end of 2020, December 2025 as well. Prior to that time, we should recall, Congress began to scrutinize universities over their degree of commitment to combating anti-Semitism after October 7th, 2023. And along with UCLA, one institution that has drawn a great deal of scrutiny both from Congress and the administration is the University of Pennsylvania. You may recall that its former president, Liz McGill, was summoned to Congress in December 2023 with two other university presidents, Claudine Gay and Sally Hornbuth, in the wake of which two of those, two of the three uh ended up submitting their resignations under pressure, including Liz McGill. But that was not the end of the story for Penn. In July 2025, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission of the federal government opened up an investigation alleging anti-Semitic discrimination at Penn. The government issued a subpoena that included a demand for lists of the names of Jewish faculty, students, and organizations who might have been subjected to discrimination. And what was asked for uh included personal details such as home addresses and personal emails. The university refused, which prompted a federal judge in January 2025 to ask the university to justify its refusal. And it's in the wake of that um request by the district court judge uh that three faculty members from the University of Pennsylvania joined together to write a piece in the Guardian newspaper titled Why the Trump Administration's Demand for a List of Jews at Penn is so dangerous. To help us understand why, I'm pleased to welcome the three authors of this op-ed uh to our discussion today. And I'll introduce them very briefly so we can jump right into the conversation. Uh, first, Amanda Shanor is associate professor of legal studies and business ethics at the Wharton School at Penn. Sigal Ben -Porath is presidential professor of education at Penn, where she also serves as the faculty director of the SNF Paideia program for civil dialogue. And Serena Mayeri is Arlen N. Adams Professor of Constitutional Law at the Penn Law School and Professor of History by Courtesy in the History Department. She's also a core faculty member of the program on gender sexuality and women's studies. So welcome, Amanda, Sigal, and Serena. Really delighted that you were able to take time out in the midst of a um busy workshop devoted to free speech to be with us. We'd like to unpack over the course of our conversation why you think the administration's request for Jewish names was and is so dangerous. But maybe we could just begin at the beginning and ask, what is it that brought you three together? So you come from different schools, two of you engage with law, one of you is a scholar of educational philosophy. What is it that brought you together at that particular moment to write the op-ed that you did?

Sigal Ben-Porath 5:10

I think um Serena and Amanda have been writing in this domain, including together, for a while, uh, including a piece that I had the opportunity, and you know, an article that I had the opportunity to read um a little bit earlier. And this uh op-ed, um uh they ended up inviting me to join, I think, um, because we really come from diverse disciplinary uh perspectives. I'm a philosopher by training, I'm at the School of Education here. Um we have differences of identity, of course. I'm from Israel um and have experienced some of these last couple of years in a different way uh based on my personal identity as well as institutional positionality. And I also think we come from uh different um uh values and beliefs in some areas, and so I think it was meaningful for all of us to identify what it was that we really all three of us are committed to um through our diverse contexts and perspectives and experiences. That's at least my take.

Amanda Shanor 6:48

I'll add these are two of my very favorite people who are incredibly brilliant, and uh it's a pleasure and uh honor to get to work with them and to think through some of what are really hard issues uh and really pressing ones now. And so I think that that's that's also part of, you know, really I think what happened then is all of us were sort of thinking through similar kinds of questions and sort of struggling with how to best respond to attacks on higher ed and academic freedom uh in a context where a lot of people disagree about a lot of different things. Um and, you know, one of the things that Serena and I had talked about a lot is like really trying to figure out ways to bring people together in a world of fractures uh around important things. And I think that that was that was part of the thinking and the motivation too.

David Myers 7:47

Yeah, I'm curious if it had that effect. Um, if the op-ed, in fact, occasioned some coming together that otherwise hadn't existed. Maybe Serena, do you have any insight into that?

Serena Mayeri 7:59

Well, I don't, I don't know if I would give our op-ed credit for that entirely, um, though I think it was um it was a wonderful um experience to work with um Seagal and Amanda on it. Um I think the it might be helpful to give a little bit of additional context um to sort of the what was going on when um the EEOC filed suit against Penn to enforce the subpoena. This was sort of against the backdrop of um a charge that had been issued by uh then EEOC Commissioner Andrea Lucas um back in December 2023, shortly after Liz McGill stepped down. Um, and then it was the investigation was dormant for for quite some time. Um, and then uh some might recall that sort of early in the Trump administration, uh the government um accused Penn of violating Title IX in connection with allowing um Bea Thomas to swim on the women's team three years earlier, you know, which was something that was uh at the time, I think, required by then current interpretations of federal law. Um and um and shortly after Penn reached an agreement with the Trump administration, I believe, is when this um demand sort of resurfaced for uh this list of names and contact information. Um I I think it's probably worth uh kind of looking closely at what the what the subpoena asks for. Um so the subpoena specifically requests um lists of all members of Jewish affiliated organizations at Penn, um, all members of the Jewish Studies program, everyone who participated in confidential listening sessions and surveys about antisemitism, and then the notes from those sessions and surveys, as well as anyone who filed a complaint about anti-Semitism. Um, and the context was that, and this was as as David mentioned, this was um a demand for uh not just the names, but also the personal cell phone numbers, email addresses, and home mailing addresses of of each of those individuals. Um and the the sort of in this context, Penn turned over hundreds of pages of documents, but refused to turn over these particular uh pieces of information, the personal contact information and the membership lists of organizations. Um, and I think, you know, after, I'll just speak for myself, I think after the initial shock of this demand, um, you know, I think it it started to become clear that while, you know, I think Jewish university affiliates and Jews generally, we don't agree on much these days. And but this was something that seemed to be uh somewhat unifying and kind of universally uh horrifying to people. Um and so I I guess I would say that to some degree, um, it was the subpoena itself that um that provided an opportunity to bring people together in this way.

David Myers 11:20

Yeah. So um I'm just wondering, what did Penn agree to turn over?

Serena Mayeri 11:25

They did turn over, for example, um, summaries of the listening sessions. Um they asked the folks who had complained about anti-Semitism for their consent to turn over their personal contact information and the individuals who consented to that, they they did give that information. Um I'm not remembering. Amanda, do you do you remember other? It was about nine, nine hundred plus pages of documents, I think, that they turned over.

Amanda Shanor 11:56

That's about all I know, too.

David Myers 11:58

Okay. And one of the unusual features of the effect of the subpoena was that, as you noted, it brought together um a fractious and often divided a set of Jewish individuals and organizations um into um a shared effort to resist this uh uh this demand for Jewish names, um, including quite mainstream uh actors who may share the view that anti-Semitism uh is a very serious presence on Penn's campus. Um is that that that's how it seemed from afar? Is that in fact the case?

Sigal Ben-Porath 12:37

So maybe I'll say a word about that. I mean, I actually, David, don't think that we are often or typically very fractured, but I do think that since October 7, we have been more fractured than we've been before. Penn's Jewish community is actually quite robust, as some of you may know, um, and is not particularly uh typified by contention. I mean, we surely have people who are more orthodox or more reform or more secular, and we have people with different political and other interests, but we don't tend to be at each other's throat. I mean, there is a lot of space for everyone on this campus, and it is, it has been historically and you know, in um and remains, even if in smaller numbers, a fairly, you know, relatively Jewish campus. I mean, you know, there is a large Jewish community here, and um, it's quite a friendly community overall. We have had significant disagreements within this community about the extent to which um anti-Semitism has been a um uh you know a concern. People had different views on how to interpret some of the well-known um incidents or or expressions that we had on campus, including the encampment and other things. Um and we have had uh some, you know, like open disagreements as to whether the campus responded sufficiently or should have done more. Um so so I, you know, I think um some of our differences, political and experiential, has has been surfaced by um our responses to things like the encampment, etc. But and and so it became more evident to me, for example, that some of my colleagues, just focusing now on Jewish colleagues in particular, uh, based on your question, David. Um, some of my Jewish colleagues, uh, as well as some of my students have um had really different experiences and perspectives and expectations than I do. Um, and that was sometimes a source of tension and sometimes just a source of very vibrant discussions, you know. This subpoena, I have to say, I have not seen much of a you know sunlight between any of us. I mean, um no one that I've met, and I've really hear from a lot of people and try to talk to a lot of people. I don't think I met anyone, Jewish or otherwise, who was not just anything between taken aback or was horrified by uh this by this demand. So it brought us together, but uh in in a clearer way, but I don't think it's from a place of a huge fracture, um, at least by my experience.

David Myers 16:14

Okay, well that would be I think somewhat different than other campuses where there have been very pronounced uh differences um between and amongst members of the Jewish community. But um, you know, I'm really curious about the the provenance, the origin of this uh effort, since it seems linked to a single person. Then EEOC member uh Andrea Lucas, who I believe now is the chair of the EEOC. Um and you know, maybe the personal nature of it helps us understand what's so distinctive about it. UCLA and many other institutions have been subjected to various kinds of assaults. Um but what seems distinctive about the Penn case is the request for lists of people. Um I'm just trying to figure out where how how do you understand that? That that's kind of the the demand or the ask of of Penn. I mean, there have been there have been similar efforts at other institutions as part of a larger um assault upon them at Berkeley, and there are reports of that at UCLA, but this seems to be such a singular focus at Penn. Um I'm just curious about how that works. Like is this just the idiosyncrasy of a single person? Um I'm wondering, Amanda and Serena, if you have thoughts on the singularity of that ask of pen.

Amanda Shanor 17:44

So um I think it's singular in terms of the ask in ways that are really important for the stakes, um, but it's also not all that different in some ways. So the, you know, the administration has asked for the contact information, you know, of everyone at the university and has been given, you know, uh, I think all employees' information, personal contact information at Cornell. I know um at Barnard, they contacted, I think, all the students and faculty uh with a survey, the first question of which is, are you are you Jewish or Israeli? And I think that that really, really terrified a lot of people. Um, and I'll say I think that part of maybe why they changed course at Penn is because they have been less successful. Uh, I don't know this, but I I wonder if they've been less successful uh in in those contexts in terms of um identifying people who uh have had experiences that they want to report um with regard to anti-Semitism. So um, but I'm not I'm not sure. So but I'll say I think the the ways in which this is a really distinctive ask is really important because of its potentiality to affect all manner of people and all manner of groups and has really important constitutional bearings. So um they're not asking for this is different from them asking, for example, a list of employees who have X job title and had this experience, or who weren't given the shift they wanted, or et cetera. The way in which they're defining the group of people they want the information for is based upon things that they teach or research, expressive events that they attended or participated in based on the topic of those discussions, um, and their membership in particular groups based upon the subject matter or interest of the particular group. And they define it very broadly about the sort of like religious, cultural, uh, political, or you know, national origin related to Judaism or something very broad. Okay. Um and those types of categories are types of categories, one that people don't generally tell their employer, right? It's not like you're going around saying, like, oh, and I participate in this type of civic activity or I'm political in this way, or these are my specific religious beliefs as seen by my membership in this religious group or whatever. Um, but also those are actually all core First Amendment protected categories. And if the government could demand a list of people who, you know, teach these certain things, go to certain, you know, expressive events, or affiliated with certain types of associate in certain ways with certain groups, that would be really scary for all manner of groups, right? Uh, not just religious groups, not just Jews, but like, you know, uh immigrants or people who teach about, you know, the history of race, or you name the type of thing, and not just in the context of this government, whatever you might think of it, but also future governments. And I think that um, I think for that reason, this particular demand for a list is something that um all people should be worried about, regardless of their religion or political ideology.

David Myers 21:11

So it seems to me, but apparently not so to federal judge Gerald Paprick, um, who noted um when confronting or addressing uh Penn's refusal to uh agree to this subpoena, that the government's uh uh demand was ineptly worded, he said, but had an understandable purpose. Um and since that time when he asked Penn to justify uh its refusal, he has since ordered that Penn should in fact proceed uh with um uh handing over the list. What what do you think Judge Papper who I should know was an Obama appointee, if I'm not mistaken, was seeing that we didn't see, that you didn't see, Amanda, uh or Serena or Seagal. What what what could unconstitutional grounds? I'm wondering what I mean you've laid out the case for this enormous threat uh for many groups and individuals should this precedent be uh uh established. Uh what's the counter argument?

Sigal Ben-Porath 22:27

As the one person who's not a lawyer here and actually has no idea what the answer is to your question, David, I do want to jump in first. Uh and just to say that the judge has expressedly at the beginning so I was at the courtroom of course uh all of us were but I I I was at the courtroom just listening and he expressedly um noted at the start of the um you know of the hearing that um history has nothing to do with it that you know so he basically said that the arguments from history um and the arguments about threats you know potential downstream threats are completely besides the point I have to say as somebody who really um you know doesn't spend a lot of time in courtrooms at all if I can help it this was very jarring to me what does it mean that history has nothing to do with it what other where will we find anything about lists of Jews? I mean okay in the constitution which I'm not gonna comment on but the um excising of historical uh context for this request as irrelevant to the debate for me was just uh sort of like as a first step before people made their arguments for me was yeah jarring is how I put it and also disconcerting this very helpful Sigal actually to hear that I did not know that way we'll I hope take that up in just a bit but um Sharina Ramanda um any insight into why Judge Papert so differently so I think that he both from the opinion and the oral argument I think that he didn't think that this was invasive of people's privacy um in a significant way and I think that he didn't think that there were significant threats to the people whose um information would be put on these sorts of lists.

Amanda Shanor 24:44

And I think that in significant part that's because he saw what the EOC was doing as you know a garden variety, the government said a garden variety type of anti-discrimination investigation. And so I don't think he saw, for example, what I laid out as the what's constitutionally distinctive about this type of list or how it might bear on you know people's uh he didn't see there as being a chill, right? He didn't think that people would actually stop you know affiliating with a group or would actually uh sort of this would affect their religious practice. He didn't seem to think there was any type of religious sort of uh stake here. And I think that that is um I'll note that like following his decision, I know at least one person requested to have their name take be taken off of one of the student groups lists out of concern. And I'll say that there is um significant amounts of concern that this will actually chill people's willingness to associate with Jewish groups or participate in you know Jewish life on campus in very serious ways. And so I think at least from all the signs from the Jewish community at Penn, uh those people whose information would be given up feel very differently about the the chilling question about whether or not this is is something that is of concern.

David Myers 26:10

Not to mention the disregard for the historical backdrop to listmaking which has its own ignominious uh um background um I mean Jewish listmaking in the 20th century uh has a very very dark uh uh history um uh the most important uh episode of which of course is uh the Nazi request to members of Jewish councils to assemble lists of people for the purpose of deportation there's obviously an American chapter to this sorry tale as well um during the 1950s uh the uh blacklisting and and red baiting uh tactics of uh of anti-communist warriors um led to um very deleterious effects um from the making of the compiling of lists so it's kind of hard to imagine that someone with any sense of uh of history would argue that you know list making need not have deleterious effects um and I think Amanda you've laid out a very compelling case why this is different from other requests made other garden variety quests it seems to be anything but garden variety in terms of the depth of uh uh of um inquiry being sought uh it's not give us your name and we will get back to you to examine whether you um feel you have been subjected to uh a hostile workplace environment but that goes well beyond that um so would one expect this I don't think is the next step moving to uh an appellate court and and seeking to overturn this request

Sigal Ben-Porath 27:56

can I just say another word David about your historical comment which obviously is for me uh the the core reason to um to worry about this list I mean obviously there are legal reasons but these are also I mean the legal case that Amanda and the other um uh legal representatives are laying out is really an effort to protect this group of individuals from exactly the kind of fate that you are describing and the need for these protections is only just made more urgent because of the historical context that was left outside the courtroom you know beyond the cases you are mentioning David the um uh city hall in Amsterdam kept a meticulous uh list of uh of uh Jewish families and their residences um and it had a a compelling bureaucratic reasons to do that but that's basically how an entire branch of my family was wiped out you know because it was very well known where you can find them and the city hall turned over the list I mean they had no not much choice once the occupation of Amsterdam began but keeping these lists and turning them over has a you know it has a historical context that I think is just misguided to um to keep outside of the conversation even as of course we have to think about um the constitutional um justifications for and and and tools for these protections but Amanda you know probably the most about about the appeal plan.

Amanda Shanor 30:05

Well I and I guess I I'll also add to that that I think that the history is something that's very salient to the Jewish community in a way that affects people's willingness to associate. And that is the way in which that becomes like a very important fact for constitutional analysis purposes, right? Because the the sort of the First Amendment question is whether or not you know there's a risk of chilling of people not engaging in the types of expressive or associational activities that they otherwise would want to, right? And that history is really something that affects what you know how people how comfortable and how safe and how free people feel to you know do the sorts of things that they're constitutionally protected to do. But yeah, so um and then I guess I'll also say I think you know uh regardless of what how salient folks think that history is um uh I think that in the context of rising anti-Semitism nationally and the ways in which, you know, just the creation of a list that has the names of people and says that they are Jewish, right, as a thing is itself, I think just genuinely really frightening. But also like in the context of data sharing, I mean data security being what it is, that that's something, no matter what you think of you know the intentions of the government, having that be something that could you know go out in the world, particularly given data breaches and the info sharing between uh you know um uh agencies that the government has, you know, touted that it's engaging in, um, I think makes it I think it genuinely makes uh I think means that there are genuine you know security and other kinds of concerns that people have.

Serena Mayeri 31:59

I think one of the things too that I I think we tried to underscore is that you as Amanda was saying, you know, whatever you think about the current administration whatever you think their intentions might be or what they might do with a list, that's actually not significant for constitutional purposes or not required for constitutional purposes to have the kinds of constitutional claims that are being made in this case. And so um I I can't speculate about what the judge thought, but I guess he seemed to feel that he needed to pass judgment on the current administration in order to find for Penn and the interveners. And I think that um was not the case and and is part of I think what makes this a very strong case um Amanda can say more about you know sort of our chances on appeal but um but in some sense both the history and the current administration's intentions are not necess do not necessarily have to be nefarious in order for this to be a constitutional problem.

Amanda Shanor 33:15

Right. I realized I realize I didn't ask answer the concrete question yes we will be appealing uh we have to seek um I got distracted we have to seek a stay uh the um digital court's order said that the university has to give over the list on May 1st uh we plan and I know the university plans to seek a stay of that because otherwise you know if they make a list now that that defeats the whole purpose of the um of the constitutional challenge and then um you know the appeal will take several months at least so uh we'll be kind of like on a longer time clock and we're I I'll say I'm cautiously optimistic um you know I don't want to jinx anything but like as to both the seeking a stay and um as to the ultimate constitutional outcome because there's a very strong case law in our favor. And I was actually um in some ways surprised because like the the case the the First Amendment case law is very clear. There's history from you know like the government demanding lists of members of the NAACP, you know, from uh you know the civil rights period to recent cases about you know the state of California asking for a list of major donors from you know nonprofit organizations, all which is to say this is sort of like in the case law has is well established for decades. You have strong First Amendment protections and rights and that is a cross ideological type of thing. So um I'm gonna I'm gonna cross my fingers uh on appeal even if we have to go all the way to the Supreme Court.

David Myers 34:47

Um I noticed that we have a couple of questions that have come in on uh uh uh on chat and we'll uh make our way to questions in just a minute um but I I did want to um just follow up and and ask um you know I guess invite some speculation well there's there there are two related questions one that which um the judge perhaps was not willing to do um but I'm gonna invite all of you to do um which is to speculate about intention uh speculate about the intent of uh of the uh of the government um you know there's the individual query of Commissioner Lucas and then there's this larger um series of assaults upon institutions of higher education very much very often in the name of combating anti-Semitism um often undertaken um in the same period of time that administration officials give voice to anti-Semitic sensibilities um which kind of undermine see the credibility of uh the claim that this is an administration administration singularly devoted to uh combating anti-Semitism I I I mean how do you under how do you understand uh what EEOC Commissioner Lucas is attempting to do and more generally how do you understand from your various perspectives what the administration is trying to do in the name of combating anti-Semitism do you believe there is it's possible to see good faith at every turn um or um do you from your various perspectives um cast doubt upon that

Serena Mayeri 36:36

so you know I think um one of the projects that sort of led us into this um you know thinking about this area is is kind of an attempt to take stock of the administration's various attacks on higher education and I think you know I think the conclusion and Amanda you should jump in too you know the conclusion that I think we've come to to some degree is that you know it's it's not necessarily the case that there's no good faith um effort to combat anti-Semitism um certainly and it's certainly not the case that anti-Semitism isn't a problem um that exists on campuses and across the political spectrum. But I think it's fair to say that the extraordinarily disproportionate penalties that the administration is visiting upon universities and other institutions without following any of the regular processes um you know associated with what you do when there's a suspected civil rights violation. So I mean I guess one one thing to do is kind of take a step back and you know what is a what is a civil rights um process normally look like so normally you know the um first step that the EEOC would take and the first step that the Department of Education would take if it's a Title VI case would be to uh well first investigate fully um you know which usually takes a very long time and involves talking to a lot of of different people and um is usually initiated by individual complaints by faculty and or students depending on the circumstances. This was a commissioner's charge which is a very rare occurrence where one EEOC commissioner decided to um to file this charge and um and didn't really rely on um evidence that wasn't sort of publicly available um statements by Liz McGill and um you know sort of very generalized um evidence that didn't say much about whether Penn had um in fact itself uh violated the law. And normally you would go through there's a set of steps that you you would go through um before uh for example pulling funding um and I'm sure you you all at UCLA know much more about this than we do. But at Penn too we had um an instance of you know federal funding being withdrawn without any notice or process um and that's happened to a number of different universities um no attempt to uh engage in any kind of uh sort of reconciliation or um I mean all these civil rights statutes require um uh require the government uh first to try to um you know uh come to some kind of uh consensual agreement with the institution. Um and indeed until this administration I think um you know experts on Title VI have have which I'm not um have told us that uh you know the ultimate um conclusion to these investigations is has never before been pulling federal funding. The point is to to to resolve these issues without doing that and the pulling of federal funding is kind of the the um incentive that um is is sort of held out to um to cause institutions to come into compliance with the law. So I think all of those things together you know suggest that this is not really about combating anti-Semitism even if you know uh even if anti-Semitism is a real problem and there are people maybe even within the administration who care about it, that's not the primary objective here. The other thing I'll say is just I think um it is a very effective strategy to divide people who otherwise would be um allied with one another. And I think we see this a lot across a lot of different contexts and it's part of a larger um project of using issues like anti-Semitism but also DEI and anti-trans policies um that people really disagree about, genuinely disagree about um uh and using those to um to further divide communities that would otherwise kind of oppose this kind of these kinds of attacks

David Myers 41:23

Amanda did you want to jump in

Amanda Shanor 41:26

no I I just want to echo everything that um Serena said and that I think that um eventually sort of what we came to was that you know no matter what you think about anti-Semitism or how to define it or whether or not our university or other universities are you know uh responding correctly or sufficiently that both sort of like in general the ways in which um the administration is making those claims and then leveraging without normal processes really extreme forms um of uh of of punishment towards universities uh is not the way I guess uh you should go about these sorts of problems and that you know uh and we'll say that I'll say that also about the list of Jews, right? Like no matter what's happening with anti-Semitism, this isn't the best way to to deal with that um as a problem. And that the Serena and I have a paper um the one that um uh the Seagull said noted before talking about the ways in which they're doing this they're they're looking at and exploiting really significant divides among people about contested issues like how to think about you know diversity um and inclusion how to think about the participation of trans people particularly in sports um and anti-semitism and in that way it's sort of like very much dividing communities um uh who might otherwise uh be concerned about attacks on higher education and uh you know about sort of larger attacks on on American democracy

David Myers 43:13

so my final question really follows on that and it is has the strategy of division be been a failure because um in the first instance um various Jewish constituencies have come together in the wake of the attempt to uh uh to uh squeeze out a pen of the names of Jews and this I wonder um has the subpoena and all that followed from it actually brought faculty and administration to constituencies that very frequently have found themselves uh at Lagerheads uh together in lockstep um and I wonder in particular Manda since you have litigated um what the degree of consonance is between your efforts and that of the university I mean, it would seem that strategy of vision um has had the exact opposite effect in a number of important domains. Is that an overread?

Amanda Shanor 44:09

I don't know if it's overly optimistic, but that's definitely how I feel. Uh so I I hope you're I hope you're right in that read. I think that um I can think of nothing that has uh galvanized the Jewish community to join together uh more or the faculty to join together with the Penn administration than than the subpoena and opposition to the subpoena. Um and I think that that's uh has been a really heartening and great thing uh in so many different ways. And yes, you know, we've been we talked to like, you know, uh I think the interveners represent a different set of interests because it's actually the groups whose information would be given to the government. Uh and we're able to make a number of different types of legal claims that the university can't make. And I think that that is um important for a lot of reasons. Um I also think that maybe we have a different view of like the importance of anti-discrimination law and the importance of the EEOC in longer historical kind of context. Um But, you know, as to the question, I think that in a lot of ways we're we're helping the university and that they recognize that, which is, you know, surprising. At one point during the hearing, uh uh Seth Waxman, who was representing the um uh the university, said that like this is the only, this has been the one time that the AAUP has agreed with the administration ever in the history of time. So I don't know if that's true, but uh it was funny, I thought.

Serena Mayeri 45:38

To uh to add to that, you know, I think um while this uh I don't want to represent this as kind of a singular situation in the sense that it followed uh shortly after um the compact, the higher compact for higher education was presented to nine universities, including Penn. And that was another instance, I think, where faculty um at Penn and lots of other universities and sort of across universities came together um to you know encourage uh their administrations to uh to reject the compact. And they did, and I think that was you know a huge um a huge step forward and and you know possibly a model for for other opportunities to come together. So I don't think you have to ask for a list of Jews, in other words, in order to produce this kind of unity, or at least I hope not.

David Myers 46:26

Great. Um okay, I we have a number of questions online. I know we have a question here. Um Ariel is furiously doing something, but would would like to ask a question. So the floor is yours, Ariel.

Speaker 9 46:37

Hey. Hi guys, it's great to see you. Um so I've just been thinking, of course, about the California content. It it strikes me. Uh I'm interested in the fact that like we I think the issue of lists of names came up first in the California state system before the pen case, right? Both the uh Berkeley's list, but also all of Cal State, right? All and Cal State actually brought suit, Cal State faculty unions brought suit over the the demand for Lisp. And EOC definitely asked for Jewish names here uh for the University of California. And although only Berkeley actually told faculty who to people whose names they'd given, we basically have admissions from the whole system that they gave the name. Like we know that all the schools gave the names. It's just only Berkeley actually told you if your name was given. And those were taken, those were both, they on both sides of the aisle, as it were. Like they it was people who had signed letter pro-israel kind of October 7th letters and and pro-Palestine, broadly speaking. Like they um, and it didn't, although there was there were some rallies, there were some, you know, it didn't get the kind of national attention, I think, that the pen. So partly I'm curious about why you, you know, if you have ideas about like why is it just like you know, because of pen status or something, you know, why it became such a uh focal point national of national attention. Well, in California it didn't. And I'm especially thinking that that was a subpoena as part of a case. Um, and we have a new case right now here at UCLA based on uh now Title VII Um claims about anti-Semitism. And I'd be super surprised if there weren't subpoenas. I mean, that's what they do when they have a case. They want to find more people who have complaints. So um I'm just thinking about, you know, strategically how we make it more of um an issue because it did not um and and I wondered myself whether that was because people I think quite wrongly assume that the names that were being asked for were the names of people in the only really of sort of pro-people on the pro-Palestine side, but that really wasn't the case. When they asked for names of people who signed letters, um, they asked for the names of people who signed those first, you know, uh October 7th letters who were who were um uh not at all uh taking pro-Palestine positions. So anyway, I'm I'm curious if you all have thoughts about that as we're as we think about strategy here in California.

David Myers 49:55

Esteem Triumvirate. We turn to you for expert audience on resisting the efforts of the federal administration to see plus.

Amanda Shanor 50:06

So I I'm really interested to hear um what Sigal and Serena think. I think I don't have an answer to that. Like I have no idea. I think that um I do think the fact that the Penn administration opposed was really important. I think the fact, I think some of the kind of actual people and their experiences was really important. So I'll say our general counsel is a Jewish woman who is, I don't know, older than me and I think has a historical memory that I think that that is was significant in this context, is I think that like she saw this to be dangerous, even though you know she's like a normal general counsel and doing things I don't always agree with. So um uh do you know what I'm saying? And so I think that that mattered. I also think, you know, we were lucky or something about some of the pr early press. Um, and I think in part that may be, but I don't know because of, you know, what the media outlets are and the people who read and watch them, those outlets. Like I think that, you know, um, but but I'm really interested to hear what uh Serena and Sigal think. I uh one other thing. I also think the timing mattered because I think after before the compact, like universities were just rolling over left and right. And I think after it became clear that you make a deal with the Trump administration, they don't leave you alone. I think that was significant learning, including on behalf of like our um leadership. And so uh I think those things in uh combination I think helped here.

Sigal Ben-Porath 51:57

I would just, by way of advice, if any, I would say that you need a big tent with a small cause. You know, you need not to try to have some kind of an on omnibus that will resolve all of your fractures and disagreements. You need to basically say the way that uh earlier petition did, and some of these efforts did do you want a list of Jews and their home addresses? Do you want to be on that list? Right, it's a very narrow and easily um identified with cause, right? And you need to try and say we can keep our differences for tomorrow. Today we need to get our freaking names off the list, right? It's basically it's so visceral, you know, and I think it is some kind of a shared historical memory and self-understanding, you know, if we agree on one thing is that we don't want the list, right? So we can do something with this very minimal but quite core, this you know, like agreement among us. And I think the more you know, invite everyone, they don't have to be Jewish, they don't have to be pro-palestine or pro-Israel or wherever you stand, they don't need to be, you know, AAUP or with or against the administration. Uh help me not be on the list, and I'll help you not be on the list, you know what I mean? Like it's a very basic, so it's a small cause with a big tent, and I think this is the way I this would be my advice. Try to not uh build on that, try to do just that, really sort of like um to a broad audience, and if that works with God's help, then you can um then you can maybe build on this agreement to get further on other causes, but separate them.

Serena Mayeri 54:30

I don't have much to add to my colleagues' brilliant thoughts on this, but um, I mean I I will say like from the outside, I've been enormously like impressed and heartened by how you all at UCLA have come together with letters and petitions. And I mean, we we I don't I don't I don't want to speak for but I I don't know that Penn could have done that, and of course we now can't because that would create a list of Jews, but but but but I guess I would just I would put it sort of back at you as I would be asking you the same question of how have you done that, which I think is a really enormous accomplishment.

Amanda Shanor 55:08

So amazing, astounding, like wow.

David Myers 55:13

Well, sometimes it seems that way. Um sometimes it doesn't. But I mean I'd say in the case of Penn, um, the wide sweep of the inquiry has allowed unlikely partners to come together. And that that that really is an opportunity. That that it's but the Hill Al effect, right? You have JDP and you have you know strong pro-Israel groups, um, presumably all being subjected to the same uh treatment, and that's an opportunity, um, and one that we should get better at seizing upon uh to think about seal. But I think we have a question online.

Rose Campbell 55:47

Uh we have a comment and a question. So do you want me to read the comment or am I to look to you?

David Myers 55:52

Um you can just go ahead.

Rose Campbell 55:54

Okay, so I'll go ahead and the first comment says this is from Zavora Janal, and it says, in fact, the impact of the war type list keeping of Jews maintained by Dutch local governments echoed for many decades. When in the mid-1990s, Soviet immigrant friends asked their synagogue for a list of members so they could personally invite everyone to their son's bar mitzvah, they were told that no such list was available because of the their use during the war. That's our comment from the NL. And then we have a question. Okay, and then we have a quest one more question in the room after that. So our next question is from Dina Davis who asks why was it not acceptable to the judge what Penn had offered to notify the campus that anyone who felt they had been affected by and could send it to them could contact me in TLC.

David Myers 56:43

Amanda, that maybe first.

Amanda Shanor 56:45

That's a great question that you ask. There is not an answer uh in the opinion. There's a footnote that says, you know, uh the university, it it's uh the the university's offer is unacceptable or uh insufficient or something like that, full stop. Uh and so there's not really, I mean, I think that the idea is, given the oral argument, that there was concern about the university intermediating in the conversation or being able to read the emails of people if it's over uh pen emails as opposed to personal emails. Um, but I think that I there's no explanation legally why that isn't still a narrower and less burdensome alternative, uh, especially because you could do a lot of you could do a lot of things and them sending it out and you can reply, you know, if you reply, it goes directly to the UC or you you it says, don't use this email, use your personal email or use your cell phone or something. Um, you know, there's a lot of ways that it could be done uh that I think wouldn't have that problem. There's no discussion of that. The the district court, I think just didn't want to engage with what the other alternatives might be.

Sigal Ben-Porath 57:57

And I think one thing that was mentioned in the hearing, in the oral argument, was that that's not how things go. And that again, as a non-expert, that was confusing to me because clearly, for example, the way that this um subpoena and this complaint originated was also not the way things typically go, but that was acceptable um to the court, whereas Penn suggestion that they would circulate an email to all of the members of the community and would be like EOC is investigating us for anti-Semitism. If you want to contact them, here is the email and a phone number, right? And the EOC representative basically said the employer or you know, like the institution that's being investigated cannot mediate the collection of information. Which really and and that's basically the I think is what is reflected in the footnote that Amanda was mentioning. Um I'm just saying that as somebody who is literate again in like words, but not necessarily in the law. Uh and and um uh I think that the um justification for not doing that was not, you know, like for rejecting this suggestion, which I think is a pretty good suggestion, you know, or you can give a list of all Penn employees, everyone, and then you can email the EOC can email everyone and say, uh, have you experienced or witnessed anti-Semitism? Because I just want to say, anti-Semitism, as you may know, is not the problem of Jews, right? It's everyone's problem, and if somebody is being anti-Semitic, you can see that even if you're not a Jew, right? And maybe this person who's being anti-Semitic also is not a Jew, right? So you can send the email to everyone, and you will just get more information, right? Um, but that was not acceptable, and this is the um boundary of my literacy. I didn't get why.

Serena Mayeri 1:00:31

Just along similar lines to that, you know, I think one of the other, I'll just say inconsistencies is that, you know, us uh theoretically, if you're if you're wanting to fight anti-Semitism, um, you probably don't want to discourage people from attending listening sessions about anti-Semitism or responding to surveys about anti-Semitism, which once you say you do that and your name is going to be on a list that goes to the government, and that your employer collects for that matter, especially if you think that Penn is engaging itself in anti-Semitism or is condoning anti-Semitism, it just doesn't make a whole lot of sense to do what the EEOC is doing here.

David Myers 1:01:12

It seems the only outlier is that Judge Pepper didn't understand that, but um, maybe that can be corrected. Um, a final question.

Speaker 8 1:01:20

Yeah, final question. First of all, thank you very much. Um, I have um my my question was shifting because of how the organizations went, right? Um, but um I want to know exactly what is asked and how this list could be undermined, as you suggested in the final comments, right? So because how I picked it up from the crisis on was that really they wanted the list of Jewish faculty staff and so on, and that the response was we don't have such lists because we don't have that information, right? But from what I gathered here is that actually you they wanted to have the list of these groups and of people signing this and that, and maybe it was a combination of what they asked. As far as I know, um at UCLA, they have not asked for lists in their accusation of anti-Semitism, have they?

Speaker 9 1:02:10

Of lists of uh not in this, not in this uh most recent suit, but um there are two things. One, they asked Cal State, the entire Cal State system uh for lists, and two um, you know, Berkeley admitted over the summer that they had given lists to the EOC based on EOC investigations of anti-Semitism, and and it came out first. I mean, UC San Diego admit it. This only came out because 160 people got messages from UC Berkeley saying your name was given to the government. No other UC did that. But but they basically, I mean, I was in a meeting where Darnell Hunt essentially admitted that they gave them, and UC San Diego, they publicly admitted that they gave them. I don't think there's any reason to think that any UC did not give lists. Those lists were asked for based on letters that people had signed. Yeah, but I mean that's a little different.

Speaker 6 1:03:18

But I think Jews, they were principally, I think, list of Palestine folks and they included all of the people who signed.

Speaker 9 1:03:29

There were far more people, far more Jewish people who signed. First of all, some of those letters were Jewish letters, and and there were far more signatures that were about um October 7th from a pro-Israel standpoint. Yeah. Um, the people at Berkeley who the only one who came forward publicly was Judith Butler. So we think that they're they're the pro-Palestine, but I think that is an error to think that. Um, I actually don't think that's the name.

Speaker 6 1:04:01

I think they're the National Office for Civil Rights.

Speaker 8 1:04:08

Uh Israel, whatever, but a list of Jews in the sense I think there's a difference. Right. But anyway, so I would like to be very clear about what kinds of lists I requested or not. But the other thing so the first time when I came to this catching was a point about lists, is and I just put this in the room, and I don't know if it changes anything, was when there was the suggestion that there should be a list of undocumented um, you know, what has become the dreamers. And I thought I wanted to put the name on that list, right? And then people did sign up for it, two millions or whatever. I was really shocked that people came out, and so there it was some kind of a you know, it was coming out of the dark to say, yes, I am one of them. This was this moment, right? That they showed them that this was empowering. I this was really very confusing to me. And I don't know what happened to those lists, and if there's a backfiring now of this existence of these lists of undocumented people who came here to children, but just to say, this got sort of lists, it's not just for the judge. I mean yeah, as I said at the time I didn't, I mean, I was a part, and no, I don't have to use my quantum. It's saying I was a part about this list. Um supposedly for good cases, but clearly with the potential of being able to be useful. So I don't know if this is why this discussion about lists or if they said something or not something, but that's in my mind. Um, and how this list can be actually undermined also by just putting everyone puts themselves on the list. You know, it doesn't matter. I can't say I'm doing it and I'm not if that type is okay, but it was I'm just gonna read.

Speaker 9 1:06:00

From the LA Times in October 20, October 13th, 2025. This is six months ago. A Cal State faculty union filed suit Friday in state court after learning the personal phone numbers and email addresses of 2,600 Los Angeles campus employees were turned over to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which is investigating employee complaints of campus anti-Semitism. In addition, the EOC is contacting Jewish faculty across the 22-campus system, prompting campus demonstrations against cooperating with Trump. These are all campus anti-Semitism investigations that are leading to the collection of names and addresses. And I don't think it is primarily people like Judith Butler because they're looking for plaintiffs.

David Myers 1:07:05

Let's maybe just conclude with surprise kind of general question about lists, and it really affords you an opportunity to offer your final thoughts on what has been a really stimulating uh conversation. So um who would like to go first?

Speaker 2 1:07:18

Um well I just I mean I just want to just underscore what was just said. Um you know, I think uh largely the I mean, of course, we're as Jewish faculty members appalled by this particular demand, but really the larger significance of it um is even more horrifying. And I think, you know, I just want to underscore that it's not just about lists of Jews, but it's about lists of any group. Um, as Amanda was saying earlier, lists of Muslims or immigrants or trans people or people who study immigration or um race or gender or anything else that the administration, this administration or any other administration um thinks is objectionable. And I also want to say we've been focused on universities appropriately for the topic of the seminar, but the EEOC, you know, covers all employers or almost all employers in the United States. So it's not just about universities either. This would mean that the EEOC could say to any employer, we think you're discriminating against X group, give us a list of those people. Um, it has just really incredibly disturbing ramifications. Um, and you know, so I I think this um it's really important to think about it, you know, both as the horrifying history of lists of Jews in particular um and lists of other vulnerable groups, but also um this kind of larger context and the precedent that it could set.

Speaker 7 1:08:49

And maybe add one more word, and I really appreciate your comments here in the context, Serena, which I completely agree with. And I would say that I'm grateful that uh Penn as an institution has understood that they have to rise to this moment, and they have to um make sure that they protect the privacy, the associational rights, and the safety of um their employees and you know, their faculty and their students, and that for me is not to be taken for granted. I mean, a lot of institutions have failed to do that, even in the face of clearly unconstitutional demands, and so I just want to say that I'm grateful for that, and I would hope that it's contagious.

Speaker 3 1:09:49

I I completely agree. I think that um I take a couple things from this experience. I think that um, like Serena said, I think it's really clear to me, given the particular things that they're asking, that this is something that everybody should really care about because it goes to the very core of like having any type of civil society capacity, right? And any type of rights to express, to teach, to research, to publish, to have discussions on any topic, right, is to to associate religiously, politically, culturally, is like the ability of a government to have this type of power is not something that anybody should want to have. And I really think goes to the very core of what sort of like democratic freedoms are. Um, and I think that's part of why, and I guess this is the second thing. I have been incredibly heartened by the response here, right? And that's both the universities, right? Like it really has been, I don't know, I don't know how often I feel just like proud to be a pen, but I feel really proud. Um, and I feel really proud of my colleagues and um and students and everybody who has sort of like come together and said, you know, how this is really important and you know, to be brave and to stand up. And I guess um I hope that that's that that's contagious too.

Speaker 1:11:17

I'm definitely pointed by um pointed by uh Obama. I just saw it. Okay.

David Myers 1:11:22

On that um wonderfully and uncharacteristic, um, optimistic note, hopeful note, um, I'd really like to thank uh from the depth of my heart, Amanda, Sigal, and Serena for being with us um for the extraordinary work you've done, um, and for really sharing with us um in detail um how you went about um both writing your op-ed and uh and engaging in a noble act of resistance. Um and um we share your hope that uh that we learn from your example and and continue to uphold the values of higher education that have uh made the American university system such a source of pride. So thank you so much for being with us.

Speaker 3 1:12:04

Really grateful for you all too. Thanks so much for having us. Thank you for having us. Thank you.

Narrator 1:12:17

Thank you for listening to the History Politics Podcast, putting the past to work from UCLA's Luskin Center for History and Policy. You can learn more about our work or share your thoughts with us at our website, LuskinCenter.history.ucla.edu. Our show is produced by David Myers and Rosalind Campbell with original music by Daniel Reichmann. Special thanks to the UCLA History Department for its support, and thanks to you for listening.