Pennsylvania state House Republicans propose antisemitism education legislation
By Danny Freeman, CNN
(CNN) — In the aftermath of the University of Pennsylvania’s president quitting after critiques of her handling of antisemitism on campus, a group of Republican state representatives announced a legislation package promoting education about antisemitism in the commonwealth’s schools.
“I can’t believe I have to stand here at a podium in 2023 to tell people this,” Republican state Rep. Aaron Kaufer said at a news conference Monday about the preliminary proposal.
“But antisemitism is wrong. Calling for genocide of the Jews or any group for that matter is wrong, it’s hateful,” said Kaufer.
The first bill would require universities that receive state funding to acknowledge antisemitism as harassment and/or bullying.
That was one issue former UPenn President Liz Magill faced steep criticism over after testifying last week before Congress, which was looking at a rise in antisemitism at UPenn and other college campuses after the October 7 Hamas attacks on Israel and the ensuing war.
Magill – who stepped down over the weekend – struggled to answer questions about whether calls for genocide against Jews would violate UPenn’s code of conduct. She and presidents of MIT and Harvard failed to explicitly say calls for genocide of Jewish people constituted bullying and harassment on their campuses.
“Calls for genocide on campus are unacceptable and the fact that the leadership of these elite universities could not see it at such and declare that it was simply contrary to their codes of conduct was a failure of leadership,” said GOP state Rep. Rob Mercuri.
According to the House co-sponsorship memoranda, there would be two additional bills in the package.
The second would introduce “holocaust instruction transparency” in public schools, requiring them to post curriculum guidelines when teaching about the Holocaust, genocide and human rights violations.
The third bill would make November 9 “Antisemitism Awareness and Education Day” in Pennsylvania.
“Hate has no place here in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania – whether antisemitism, Islamophobia, racism, homophobia – it has no place here, and we must stand against it together,” said Manuel Bonder, a spokesperson for Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat.
“The Governor appreciates the bipartisan condemnation of antisemitism, and we look forward to reviewing any proposals to help root out hate as they move through the legislative process,” the statement continued.
Democrats, who control the state House, did not immediately respond Tuesday to CNN’s request for comment.
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