Attending to EEOC’s New Workplace Focus: Antisemitism on College Campuses
Related links
- EEOC Acting Chair Promises to Hold Accountable Universities and Colleges for Antisemitism on Campus Workplaces (statement)
- Federal Register: Additional Measures To Combat Anti-Semitism (EO)
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) Acting Chair Andrea Lucas issued a statement on March 17, 2025, notifying universities and colleges that the EEOC intends to hold them accountable for antisemitism in on-campus workspaces.
Lucas has served as an EEOC commissioner since 2020 and was appointed by President Donald Trump as acting chair on Jan. 21, 2025.
The statement refers to the increase in antisemitic bias, conduct, and harassment on campuses since the Hamas terror attacks in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. The EEOC’s new focus is buoyed by President Trump’s Executive Order 14188, “Additional Measures to Combat Anti-Semitism,” a “government-wide effort to combat antisemitism.” Lucas states that the antisemitic conduct was made “[u]nder the guise of promoting free speech” and was in fact “often in violation of the universities’ own time, place, and manner policies….”
Lucas promises to “hold universities and colleges accountable,” although she does not identify what measures will be specifically undertaken to enforce this promise.
The acting chair characterizes antisemitic conduct as creating a hostile work environment, a form of employment discrimination that violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and fits squarely within Lucas’ purview.
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