The Biden Administration paved the way for Trump’s policy of punishing Pro-Palestine campus organizers

In the past few days we learned that Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agents entered a student residential building at Columbia University in uptown New York and detained Mahmoud Khalil, one of the lead negotiators on behalf of pro-Palestine protesters at 2024’s Gaza solidarity encampment.

Within just a few days, over 2 million letters have been sent to the Department of Homeland Security, to Immigration and Customs Enforcement and to Columbia University, demanding the Immediate Release of Palestinian Student Activist Mahmoud Khalil from DHS detention.

Just yesterday, we learned that a New York federal court judge ordered that recent Columbia University graduate Mahmoud Khalil cannot be deported from the United States until a further court order.

Like several of the Trump Administration’s oppressive policies, the public and the courts have pushed back, so we’ll see what happens with Mahmoud Khalil and those who have been part of the pro-Palestine campus movement.

Of course, all of this is offensive and disgusting, since it means that free speech is no longer protected. However, if we are to honestly engage in fighting this issue, we have to come to terms with the fact that the Biden Administration paved the way for Trump’s policy of punishing Pro-Palestine campus organizers. 

Do you remember President Biden’s swift and strong response when pro-Israel extremists reportedly blasted the chemical weapon “skunk spray” on students peacefully protesting at Columbia University earlier this year? Do you remember how the White House condemned the attack, demanded accountability, and called on the school to protect students from such hate?

No? You don’t remember? Of course you don’t. Because none of it happened. President Biden didn’t respond swiftly or strongly to the skunk spray attack. He didn’t respond at all.

How about President Biden’s response when a Texas man hurled racist slurs at a group of Palestinian Americans after a ceasefire protest at the University of Texas in Austin, ripped a Palestinian flagpole off their car, dragged one of them out of the backseat, and stabbed him? 

The Biden administration’s silence was nothing new. 

On Stanford University’s campus, a driver yelling“F—k you and your people” reportedly used his car to ram an Arab Muslim student attending a ceasefire protest, sending him to the hospital. No response from the White House.

At the University of Texas, pro-Israel extremists disrupted a Palestine Solidarity Committee meeting and hurled profanities at the attendees. No response.

In Arizona, Texas, Georgia, New York and other states, law enforcement agencies have brutalized students and even professors who attended peaceful protests against the genocide in Gaza. Again, no response.

Now contrast the White House’s lack of response to violent actions motivated by anti-Palestinian hate with the White House’s vocal response to inflammatory words that a small number of individuals have allegedly said at or near pro-ceasefire protests on college campuses.

“I condemn the antisemitic protests, that’s why I set up a program to deal with that,” the president said, broadly mischaracterizing the sit-ins led mostly by Jewish and Palestinian students.

In a statement marking Passover, Biden said, “Even in recent days, we’ve seen harassment and calls for violence against Jews. This blatant antisemitism is reprehensible and dangerous – and it has absolutely no place on college campuses or anywhere in our country.” 

Last fall, the White House rushed to falsely claim that ceasefire protesters in Philadelphia were antisemitic for demonstrating outside a kosher restaurant—the protesters actually targeted the business because it held a fundraiser benefiting the IDF.

But the White House said nothing when protesters at November’s March for Israel chanted genocidal slogans. On the contrary, a prominent Biden administration official spoke at the march, sharing the stage with notoriously anti-Muslim and antisemitic pastor John Hagee.

All of what the Biden Administration did or didn’t do, helped to pave the way for the Trump Administration to further target pro-Palestine activists. If the Biden Administration would have condemned violent actions against pro-Palestine activists or spoke up to condemn the witch hunts that Rep. Elise Stefanik from New York was engaged in by going after University Presidents and other campus leaders, it would have made it harder for the Trump Administration to do what they want to do with Pro-Palestine campus organizers.

The same could be said for the role that Rep. Hillary Scholten played in demonizing pro-Palestine campus organizer. 

Last April, I wrote a piece about how Rep. Scholten responded to the pro-Palestine campus movement. Scholten wrote in her weekly newsletter:

“I’m sure many of you have seen the ongoing protests happening on college and university campuses across the country right now. The right to free speech and protest is fundamental, but far too many of these protests have crossed the line into harassment, intimidation, and discriminatory anti-semitism. Colleges and universities do not have enough clear guidance on what does and does not cross the line into antisemitism– which has put Jewish students at risk and at the same time, jeopardizes legitimate free speech. Students have the right to peacefully protest, but antisemitism is never –and never will be– tolerated.

As others rushed to the cameras, I got to work on solutions. This week, my Republican colleague and fellow midwesterner Rep. Rudy Yakym from Indiana and I championed our new bill, the PROTECT Jewish Students and Faculty Act, to require colleges and universities to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s official working definition of antisemitism in student and faculty codes of conduct as a condition of receiving Title IV federal funds for financial aid. This way, we’re protecting students and faculty and ensuring that institutions of higher education can be safe spaces of learning and free expression for all.”

Rep. Scholten, the so-called liberal, once again is demonstrating her allegiance to US Imperialism, to Zionism and her commitment to the repression of free speech. Notice that the Congresswoman provides no evidence of antisemitism. You just have to invoke it to make it a fact, just like Zionists preach. On top of the unsubstantiated claim of antisemitism, Rep. Scholten takes it one step further by partnering with a Republican from Indiana to introduce legislation that in reality is meant to further silence critics of Israel and US policies that support Israel. However, this might be a good time to point out why Rep. Hillary Scholten is on the wrong side of history and the wrong side of justice.

• US students and faculty are organizing to stand in solidarity with the Palestinians and against the US-funded Israeli genocide that has already killed 35,000 Palestinians.
• Many of the campus protests against the Israeli genocide are being led by Jewish students and faculty.
• US students who are organizing encampments across the country are following in the same tradition as previous movements like the Civil Rights Movement, the anti-Vietnam and anti-Iraq War Movements, the Climate Justice Movement, and the South African anti-Apartheid Movement, just to name a few. 
• US students and faculty are exposing the political and economic commitment that Higher Education has to conformity, especially when it comes to US foreign policy and Israel.
• US students and faculty are also exposing how the police state functions in the US, especially when university trustees and university donors are pressuring campuses to actively suppress this movement.

Instead, what Rep. Hillary Scholten is doing is taken right from the Zionist playbook to blame the victim or anybody else, but never Israel. Scholten is one of 9 co-sponsors of H.R. 7478, which was introduced by Rep. Rudy Yakym from Indiana. Scholten is only one of two Democrats who cosponsored this shitty piece of legislation that includes the likes of Rep. Elise Stefanik from New York. Stefanik has been the person leading the charge to discredit universities who allow Palestine Solidarity actions or Middle East Studies that question Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian land. 

It’s bad enough that Rep. Scholten has consistently voted to send billions of dollars in US military aid to unconditionally support Israel and to participate in an AIPAC funded trip to Israel last year, she now wants to use a right-wing tactic to silence college students across the US for courageously denouncing genocide. Rep. Scholten’s legacy as a member of Congress will be that she defended genocide and the suppression of those who opposed genocide. This is also the legacy of the Biden Administration and it paved the way for the Trump Administration to escalate the repression against pro-Palestine campus organizers.