Judge slams university’s ‘abhorrent’ actions helping pro-Palestinian protesters
A federal judge has ordered the University of California Los Angeles to protect Jewish students who are returning to campus for the fall semester.
However, a law firm representing a group of Jewish students says it’s still waiting to see if the university will follow U.S. District Judge Mark Scarsi’s ruling.
“The question — still — is whether UCLA will fully comply with Judge Scarsi’s order and take concrete actions to protect Jewish students on its campus,” Mark Rienzi, an attorney representing the students, told The College Fix in an emailed statement Monday.
Rienzi, president of Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, said the university has not submitted a plan yet in response to the judge’s August order.
Among other things, the order states UCLA may not allow or facilitate “the exclusion of Jewish students” from campus programs and activities, even “as a result of a de-escalation strategy.”
The Fix reached out to the UCLA media relations office three times in the past several weeks, asking about its response to the judge’s order, its plans to protect Jewish students, and plans for future protests. However, it did not respond.
The spring semester of 2024 saw a slew of pro-Palestine protests and encampments take over campuses like UCLA, Columbia University, and Yale University. At California schools alone, hundreds were arrested, and the University of California System spent at least $29 million on additional security, vandalism repairs, and trash cleanup.
Jewish students often felt unsafe and unwelcome, prompting lawsuits against UCLA and other universities.
One of the plaintiffs, Yitzchok Frankel, a third-year law student at UCLA, said he was barred from certain parts of campus by protesters because of his Jewish faith.
In the spring, UCLA “helped a group of activists as they set up encampments where they harassed Jewish students and stopped them from accessing classes, the library, and other critical parts of campus,” according to a news release from Becket.
“UCLA reinforced these zones—both by providing metal barriers and by sending away Jewish students—while taking no effective action to ensure safe passage for Jewish students,” the release states.
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According to the law firm, the university also “disavowed any obligation to protect its Jewish students, and claimed they “have nothing to fear” – a point Judge Scarsi mentioned in his ruling.
In August, Scarsi criticized the public university for helping pro-Palestinian protesters and discriminating against Jews.
“In the year 2024, … Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith,” Scarsi wrote in his ruling. “This fact is so unimaginable and so abhorrent to our constitutional guarantee of religious freedom that it bears repeating …”
Rienzi told The Fix in an earlier emailed statement that UCLA did publicly agree to follow Scarsi’s order and “recognized it has a legal duty to stop antisemitism on campus.”
However, “at this point the question is whether UCLA will fully comply with Judge Scarsi’s order and take concrete actions to protect Jewish students on its campus,” Rienzi said.
“We hope the university keeps that promise and ensures that Jewish students can freely access campus facilities without being harassed, intimidated, and assaulted for their beliefs,” Rienzi told The Fix.
He said the case is not over yet; it will “continue in the lower court following UCLA’s dismissal of its Ninth Circuit appeal.”
Earlier this month, UCLA published a “four point plan for a safer, stronger” campus in response to the tension caused by the pro-Palestinian protests.
“As a campus that promotes inclusive excellence, we must protect the ability for Bruins of all backgrounds and identities to feel safe, welcome, respected and able to participate fully in campus life,” Interim Chancellor Darnell Hunt said in a Sept. 5 news release.
The university recently opened a new Office of Campus Safety “to address safety issues related to campus demonstrations.”
Other parts of the plan include workshops for students, faculty, and staff about “how to have constructive conversations about divisive political topics.” Additionally, the plan calls for reviews of university policies and protocols.
MORE: Violence erupts at another anti-Israel protest at UCLA; police arrest 25
IMAGE: Students for Justice in Palestine at UCLA Law/Instagram
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