U.S. Dept. of Education launches antisemitism probe into University of Minnesota

The U.S. Department of Education has initiated a probe into the University of Minnesota regarding allegations of antisemitism on the Minneapolis campus. 

Former University of Minnesota law professor Richard Painter and regent Michael Hsu sent a letter last month, asking U.S. education officials in Washington to investigate alleged Civil Rights Act violations.

The department lists the university among dozens of other educational institutions that are “under investigation for discrimination involving shared ancestry.”

Hsu and Painter noted that a faculty statement posted to the Department of Gender Women and Sexuality Studies website last fall is antisemitic, saying that unjustifiably criticized Israel while “justifying the terrorist attacks by Hamas.”

Some of the university’s faculty members, according to the letter, wrote that Israel’s response to the Oct. 7 attack “is not self-defense but the continuation of a genocidal war against Gaza.”

“This is not about being pro-Palestinian,” Painter told Minnesota Public Radio News in December.

“This is about official statements of departments on websites paid for by the Minnesota taxpayers that justify the actions of Hamas.” 

For its part, the university said it would investigate the inquiry, vowing it “will be fully responsive to the Office for Civil Rights throughout its inquiry. The university stands firmly in support of speech and actions that provide an atmosphere of mutual respect, free from any form of prejudice and intolerance, as our Board of Regents policies state. We will continue to work every day to uphold these values while balancing our legal responsibilities to honor free speech.”

University of Minnesota was founded in 1851 and is currently a public land grant research university in the Twin Cities of the state, which makes up Minneapolis and St. Paul.

The university’s home page currently features three different photos accompanied by the words, “We are driven.”

The photos are of a White male speaking to an Asian male, a White female and a Muslim woman wearing a hijab.

The university if the largest in the Minnesota university system.