The
@usedgov Settlement Agreement with
@UNC requires mandatory antisemitism training for all students, faculty, and staff.
Requiring mandatory antisemitism training as part of a legal settlement is not a new strategy. All of the settlements listed below require the university to implement antisemitism training.
- Northwestern University (Nov 2025 Federal Agreement with DOJ/EDU Dept./HHS)
- Reed College (2026 EDU Dept. OCR-mediated settlement with the ADL and Brandeis Center)
- Harvard University (Jan 2025 settlements of Title VI lawsuits)
- Haverford College (settlement with The Deborah Project)
- Occidental College (settlement involving ADL and Brandeis Center)
- Pomona College (settlement with Brandeis Center, Hillel International, and ADL)
- Cooper Union (settlement via The Lawfare Project)
- UC Berkeley (settlement with Brandeis Center)
The real question is - who is producing the material for these trainings? How are they defining antisemitism?
Most of these agreements (including UNC’s) do not designate an external organization as the producer of training content. Many of them DO require the universities to adopt the IHRA Working Definition of Antisemitism.
The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism is widely used by governments, universities, law enforcement, and others as the standard for identifying antisemitism. The IHRA definition is accompanied by a preamble and a list of illustrative examples.
The preamble states: “Manifestations might include the targeting of the state of Israel, conceived as a Jewish collectivity.”
According to the examples listed:
- You cannot question details about the holocaust.
- You cannot accuse the state of Israel of racism.
- You cannot accuse a Jewish person of being more loyal to Israel than to their residing nation.
Surely it’s plausible that historians got some details about the Holocaust wrong. Surely it’s possible that Israel could commit an act of racism. Surely it’s possible that out of the millions of Jewish-American citizens, one of them cares more about the interests of Israel than The United States.
We’re barred from addressing any of these?
Is Israel a foreign government? Or is it a global racial/religious collective? It cannot be both. Governments are secular. Governments do not have religious beliefs or ethnic lineage.
Why is it so difficult to get an answer to this question?
Are we okay forcing all college students to attend a training that teaches them that they questioning or criticizing the SECULAR foreign government of Israel, makes them a racist antisemite?
Didn’t we just win a Presidential Election that championed the elimination of DEI and Critical Race Theory from academics?
This feels a lot like mandatory DEI training.