President Donald Trump has upped the ante in his negotiations with the University of California–Los Angeles (UCLA), eyeing a 10-digit settlement with the school following a Department of Justice investigation into campus anti-Semitism, a White House official confirmed to The Epoch Times on Aug. 8.
In a July 29 notice regarding its investigation of UCLA, the Department of Justice accused the university’s leaders of acting with “deliberate indifference” in creating a hostile educational environment for Jewish and Israeli students.
The notice provided examples of Jewish students being harassed, assaulted, or denied access to class and campus facilities. In one instance, a student was hospitalized with a head injury after being knocked down by protesters.
“This disgusting breach of civil rights against students will not stand: DOJ will force UCLA to pay a heavy price for putting Jewish Americans at risk and continue our ongoing investigations into other campuses in the UC system,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in the notice.
Similar to the deals other institutions have made with the federal government, UCLA is also being asked to prohibit males identifying as transgender from competing against women or using women’s facilities on campus, provide more oversight of administrative practices that promote discrimination by race or religion, and discontinue scholarships that are limited to applicants of certain races or ethnicities.
The Trump administration could restore some federal funding if those conditions are met, CNN reported.
UCLA announced initiatives to combat campus anti-Semitism before Trump’s recent actions. Chancellor Julio Frenk, in an Aug. 6 statement, said hundreds of millions of dollars in lost research funding would “be devastating for UCLA and for Americans across the nation.”
“We are doing everything we can to protect the interests of faculty, students and staff — and to defend our values and principles,” Frenk said.
Trump previously signed an executive order prohibiting diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs, anti-Semitism, and gender ideology on college campuses as per current civil rights laws and a 2023 U.S. Supreme Court decision prohibiting race-based affirmative action in college operations.
Trump announced his intentions to investigate at least 50 colleges and universities, starting with the wealthiest institutions. Investigations into Harvard, Princeton, Brown, Cornell, Columbia, the University of Pennsylvania, and Duke University have already taken place.
