The Justice Department’s newly formed Federal Task Force to Combat Antisemitism filed a statement of interest in court on Monday night supporting Jewish students and a professor in their case alleging that the University of California Los Angeles permitted antisemitism on campus. 

According to the suit, in the spring of 2024 UCLA violated Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act by knowingly allowed members of an anti-Israel protest encampment to physically prevent students and faculty from accessing portions of the campus if they were wearing items that identified them as Jewish if they refused to denounce Israel. The filing comes as the task force is separately investigating the University of California system for Title VI violations. 

The brief filed on Monday marks the first time the federal government has filed a statement of interest in court to argue that a university should be held accountable for the campus antisemitism that has skyrocketed across the country since the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks in Israel.  

Leo Terrell, head of the antisemitism task force, said in a statement that “the President, Attorney General Pam Bondi, and the Task Force know that every student must be free to attend school without being discriminated against on the basis of their race, religion or national origin.” 

The Trump administration’s new multi-agency task force to combat antisemitism announced earlier this month that it would visit 10 university campuses that have experienced an increase of antisemitic incidents. 

The task force already announced it will cut $400 million from Columbia University’s federal funding due to antisemitic demonstrations unless the university agrees to a number of conditions by Thursday. At the time, Terrell said that was “only the beginning” of university funding cuts.

Jason Miyares, the attorney general of Virginia, announced this week that his office had filed a petition to enforce a judge’s order from last July that a pro-Palestinian advocacy group with alleged ties to Hamas turn over closely guarded financial records that could shed light on its donor network — which has faced growing scrutiny in the wake of the Oct. 7 Hamas terror attacks.

Miyares’ office said in a statement on Tuesday that American Muslims for Palestine (AMP), a nonprofit group headquartered in Virginia that he has been investigating in a probe of its fundraising operations, “has refused to comply” with a civil investigative demand for documents the group has long shielded from public view.

The petition “seeks AMP’s immediate compliance” with the demand, the statement said, reiterating that Miyares’ team has been requesting records as part of an ongoing investigation into allegations that the group “may have used” funds “for impermissible purposes, such as benefiting or providing support to terrorist organizations.”

In a major court ruling last summer, a Richmond judge rejected AMP’s effort to challenge the demand, ordering the group to “produce records” and denying its petition to narrow the focus of the probe, according to a statement from the attorney general’s office after the decision had been made.

But Miyares, a Republican who first launched his investigation shortly after Hamas’ attacks on Israel in October 2023, said that AMP has continued to drag its heels several months later.

“Despite the court denying AMP’s previous efforts to halt my investigation, they continue refusing to comply,” he said in a separate statement posted to social media on Tuesday, while calling the petition “necessary to ensure accountability and uphold the law.”

A spokesperson for his office did not respond to a request for comment on the investigation.

Christina Jump, an attorney for AMP, said that she was unable to comment on the petition because she had “yet to see the referenced enforcement action,” claiming the attorney general’s office had “issued a press release prior to making any effort to contact AMP — or its counsel — about this new step.”

Jump added that AMP had filed a “timely” appeal of the judge’s decision and made “requests for a stay of the enforcement,” accusing the attorney general’s office of attempting to “thwart” the group’s “right to utilize the full legal process,” which she called “both disappointing and premature.”

“We will continue to pursue all legal actions which AMP may rightfully pursue — and its appeal of the underlying decision remains actively pending,” she wrote in an email to Jewish Insider on Wednesday.

Founded in 2006, AMP describes itself as “a grassroots organization dedicated to advancing the movement for justice in Palestine by educating the American public about Palestine and its rich cultural, historical and religious heritage and through grassroots mobilization and advocacy.”

But in the wake of Oct. 7, the group has faced growing scrutiny over its involvement in anti-Israel protests on college campuses around the country and its financial backing of National Students for Justice in Palestine, members and chapters of which have voiced outspoken support for Hamas.

Top officials at AMP, meanwhile, were also once affiliated with a now-defunct group, the Islamic Association for Palestine, found liable for aiding Hamas.

The attorney general’s investigation is one of several legal challenges now targeting AMP’s records, which critics have long suspected of hiding illicit financial activity.

The group has insisted it has never supported or funded terrorism and that it does not send money overseas. Jump, in her email to JI, said “no court, in any jurisdiction, has ever found that AMP has done anything inappropriate regarding its fundraising. It has not.”

AMP’s fiscal sponsor, AJP Educational Foundation, took in more than $2.2 million in revenue in 2023, according to its most recent tax filings, which do not disclose the group’s donors.

In an interview with JI last September, Miyares — who has largely avoided commenting publicly on the active investigation — said that his office has been “aggressively in the process of using the legal system” to obtain additional records that AMP has fought to withhold.

“We have been relentless in that pursuit, and we will continue to be relentless,” he said. “Our job is to get to the truth.”