The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee will hold its long-awaited hearing on campus antisemitism on Thursday, its first time addressing the issue as a full panel since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks and ensuing war.

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA), the HELP Committee’s chairman, will kick off Thursday’s proceedings by calling out universities for their underwhelming responses to the surge in reports of campus antisemitism in the last year and a half, according to text of his opening statement obtained by Jewish Insider ahead of the hearing. Cassidy had been pushing for the committee to hold a hearing on the issue since a month after Oct. 7. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), the committee’s chairman in the last Congress, declined Cassidy’s repeated requests. 

“At colleges and universities, Jewish students were harassed and attacked for who they are,” Cassidy is expected to say. “Instead of standing up for Jewish students, too many university officials failed to respond or refused to even condemn these horrific incidents.”

“Universities have been put on notice: failing to protect a student’s civil rights will no longer be tolerated. If universities refuse to follow the law, address discrimination on campus, and support their Jewish students, then they should not expect the support of the federal taxpayer,” Cassidy’s opening statement continues. “Jewish students and their families are depending on us to defend their civil rights. President Trump and congressional Republicans are committed to this.”

Witnesses will include Carly Gammill, director of legal policy at StandWithUs; Rabbi Levi Shemtov, the executive vice president of American Friends of Lubavitch (Chabad); Charles Asher Small, the executive director of the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism & Policy (ISGAP); Rabbi David Saperstein, the director emeritus of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism; and Kenneth Stern, the director of the Bard Center for the Study of Hate.

“I will be sharing with the committee crucial information about the continuing problem of antisemitism on our nation’s campuses, including some of the underlying reasons for the campaign of anti-Jewish hate, and suggesting concrete actions that Congress can take to strengthen accountability measures for administrations and ensure a safe campus environment for all students,” Gammill said in a statement to JI.

Saperstein, in written testimony shared with JI, will argue that effectively protecting Jewish students requires comprehensive efforts to address “hate speech, hate crimes, dehumanization, demonization and discrimination against all those who are so victimized,” both Jewish and non-Jewish.

Saperstein will also argue that the response to antisemitism has produced attacks on fundamental American values and principles, and will criticize the Trump administration’s moves to slash funding to college campuses, deport visa holders and gut the Department of Education. He will accuse the administration of focusing on antisemitism on the left, which he will link in part to the Heritage Foundation and its Project Esther and Project 2025 initiatives.

Saperstein will also characterize the bipartisan Antisemitism Awareness Act as “mostly symbolic.”

Saperstein will provide recommendations to the committee on the proper use and implementation of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism; best practices for colleges and universities regarding campus protests, Middle East studies curricula and efforts to combat antisemitism; and content moderation on social media platforms.