President-elect Donald Trump announced on Monday that he’s selecting Harmeet Dhillon, a legal advisor to his 2020 campaign who worked to challenge the election results and a Republican Party official, to lead the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division.

Dhillon and her firm have advocated an aggressive legal approach to antisemitism on college campuses, targeting both universities and protesters, but she also opposes the Antisemitism Awareness Act.

The legislation, currently stuck in Congress, codifies existing federal guidance first promulgated under the Trump administration that deem antisemitism a banned form of discrimination on college campuses and instruct the federal government to use the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism to evaluate such cases. The Biden administration extended that guidance to include a broader array of federal departments.

“Sue Yale. Sue every university that refuses to keep students safe based on their religion. Make them regret their choices,” Dhillon said on X in April, responding to a Jewish student who was attacked by anti-Israel demonstrators. “Deplete their endowments. Sue each and every violent protester and organizers.”

She criticized college campus protesters as play-acting without any real knowledge or understanding of what is happening in Gaza or the Oct. 7 attack. 

“They’re just swept up in a mob,” Dhillon said. “They’re ill-informed, they’re poorly educated. They have no good parental guidance at home.”

Responding to protests on the University of California, Los Angeles campus, she said, “I defend the right of these jackass terrorist apologists to protest, but they do NOT have the right to block access to other students or prevent them from going to class. My tax dollars are subsidizing UCLA and the Regents need to get their act together ASAP or be sued!”

She has described members of the progressive Squad as the “Hamas caucus” and has criticized “Hamas professors and students.”

Dhillon’s eponymous law firm advertises on its website that “antisemitism in schools and workplaces” is one of its practice areas. The site says that the firm is “proud to extend our unwavering legal support to Jewish individuals who have encountered discrimination, retaliation, or harassment in their school or workplace environments.”

“Our firm is ready to allocate extensive resources to support individuals who have suffered due to antisemitism,” the site continues.

But Dhillon has also been a critic of hate speech legislation, including the Antisemitism Awareness Act. She supportively reposted a social media post by former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) in which Gaetz claimed that the legislation would label the Bible as antisemitic and that Jews are responsible for killing Jesus.

“I have been a First Amendment and religious liberties lawyer for minority and majority faith communities for decades and this bill is knee-jerk anti-constitutional dreck,” Dhillon said. “Do better, think harder, and be smarter, Congress. ‘Hate speech’ laws are a liberal concept.”

It’s not clear how Dhillon’s views on the law will play into her enforcement of the existing regulations on which it is based.

Mark Goldfeder, the director of the National Jewish Advocacy Center, which works on lawfare cases against antisemitism, praised Trump’s selection of Dhillon.

“She is a great pick and has been doing really important work in the antisemitism space both on and off campus,” Goldfeder told Jewish Insider. “Thrilled that she will be there to make sure that federal antidiscrimination laws will finally be enforced equally and as written.”

As for her opposition to the AAA, he said he’s “hopeful she takes the time to learn more about the Antisemitism Awareness Act and how it should be used,” emphasizing that it does not govern speech but is instead about assessing the intent behind unlawful discrimination.

He said that significant misinformation had been spread about the legislation and its impacts.

Dhillon was involved in the 2020 Trump campaign’s efforts to challenge the election results, and Trump, in his announcement, suggested that election issues will be a focus for her at the Department of Justice.

“Harmeet has stood up consistently to protect our cherished Civil Liberties, including taking on Big Tech for censoring our Free Speech, representing Christians who were prevented from praying together during COVID, and suing corporations who use woke policies to discriminate against their workers,” Trump said. “Harmeet is one of the top Election lawyers in the Country, fighting to ensure that all, and ONLY, legal votes are counted.”