The US Justice Department is examining whether student protests at Columbia University over the Gaza war violated federal “terrorism” laws, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said on Friday.
Blanche said the investigation is also looking into civil rights violations tied to the demonstrations that roiled the New York campus last year.
Blanche, the Justice Department’s second-highest ranking official, said the investigation was part of President Donald Trump administration’s “mission to end antisemitism in this country.”
“We are also looking at whether Columbia’s handling of earlier incidents violated civil rights laws and included terrorist crimes,” Blanche said. “This is long overdue.”
Blanche added that federal law enforcement had executed a search warrant on Thursday night as part of a separate probe into whether Columbia University harboured undocumented immigrants on its campus.
The probe is part of an escalating assault on the university by the Trump administration, which it accuses of facilitating antisemitism on campus following last year’s demonstrations against Israel’s war on Gaza.
The government has stripped the university of $400 million in federal funding, imposed restrictions on its area studies departments, and threatened to deport foreign nationals protesting against the university’s links to Israel.
Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil this week became the first foreign student to be arrested by immigration authorities. The Columbia graduate’s deportation has been blocked by a US court, which is assessing whether the order violates free speech protections in the US constitution.
Khalil, who is being held in a federal facility in Louisiana, has not been charged with committing any crime.
Trump accused him without evidence of being a Hamas supporter while Secretary of State Marco Rubio argued that any student who causes disruption at universities should have their visas revoked.
(Reuters)
