A protester holds a Palestinian flag at the encampment at UCLA on April 25, 2024.
(Ringo Chiu/For The Times)
- President Trump has issued an executive order promoting a crackdown on campus antisemitism and said he supports canceling visas of pro-Palestinian international students.
- The order has put California university leaders and activists on alert.
- UC leaders said they are carefully reviewing the order.
An executive order from President Trump promoting a federal crackdown on campus antisemitism and his threats to cancel visas of pro-Palestinian international students have put California university leaders and activists on alert after many of the nation’s largest and most contentious protests unfolded at their schools.
USC leaders were cautious in comments about the order, saying they adhere to state and federal laws, while a UC spokesman said it was committed to “combating antisemitism” but did not respond to a Trump promise to deport internationals who are “Hamas sympathizers.” The chair of a UCLA Jewish group welcomed the order as an acknowledgment of the “crisis” of campus antisemitism. And a pro-Palestinian UCLA faculty representative described the threats in the order as “authoritarianism, plain and simple.”
The order calls on the federal government to “prosecute, remove, or otherwise hold to account the perpetrators of unlawful antisemitic harassment and violence” on college campuses and directs the federal Education, State and Homeland Security departments in the next two months to develop “recommendations for familiarizing institutions” with how to “monitor and report activities by alien students and staff” that would potentially qualify them for visa revocation.
It cites federal law that bars noncitizens from being in the U.S. if they support terrorism. The order does not explicitly equate pro-Palestinian protesters with supporters of Hamas, which the U.S. designates as a terrorist organization.
But a fact sheet about the executive order on the White House website, quoting Trump, makes clear the president’s intentions to “deport Hamas sympathizers and revoke student visas.”
The move follows Trump’s campaign promises to expel pro-Palestinian protesters who do not hold U.S. citizenship.
“If you come here from another country and try to bring jihadism or anti-Americanism or antisemitism to our campuses, we will immediately deport you,” he said at a May event. At the Republican National Convention in July, the party agreed to include the goal on its platform.