We, the undersigned, stand in opposition to the Trump administration’s targeting of college students and professors whose only “crimes” are exercising their First Amendment rights.

We write, specifically, as Jewish Americans who condemn the charge of antisemitism being leveled against student activists—many of whom are Jewish—for their legitimate criticisms of Israel’s violence in Gaza and their universities’ connections to the Israeli occupation. That this accusation is being used as a pretext to abrogate students’ rights to free speech, and to deport non-citizen students, should raise the highest level of alarm.

We also oppose how the Trump administration disingenuously uses accusations of antisemitism to wage an assault on American higher education and on the ability of scholars to pursue research and knowledge independent of government interference.

We also write to remind our fellow Jewish Americans that the weapons the Trump administration now wields against political dissidents — public humiliation, state persecution, expulsion and deportation — are the very same that Jews have suffered from at various points in history. It is imperative that we stand on the frontlines in opposing this wanton assault on civil liberties and the right to dissent. We should know history well enough to understand that such curtailment of individual freedoms will not stop here.

We are aware of the danger inherent in an administration full of people comfortable using antisemitic tropes while using purported anti-antisemitism as a cudgel to attack free speech, the most sacrosanct of American values.

We, as Jewish Americans, reaffirm our support for free speech and independent scholarship. We wholeheartedly condemn these heinous and anti-democratic policies of the Trump administration.

Initial list of signers: (Organizational affiliations for identification purposes only)

Abba A. Solomon, American Zionism researcher and author

Adam Green, Immigration attorney

Adam Shatz, US editor of the London Review of Books

Alan Minsky, Executive director, Progressive Democrats of America

Alice Rothchild, MD, retired asssistant professor, Harvard University

Alyosha Goldstein, Professor, University of New Mexico

Rabbi Andrue Kahn, Executive director, American Council for Judaism

Ariel Dorfman, Novelist, playwright, essayist, human rights activist

Rabbi Aryeh Cohen, American Jewish University

Ash Bohrer, Assistant professor of gender and peace studies, University of Notre Dame

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Aviva Chomsky, Professor of history, Salem State University

Barbara Weinstein, Silver Professor of History, New York University

Barry Trachtenberg, Rubin Presidential Chair of Jewish History, Wake Forest University

Ben Cohen, Cofounder, Ben and Jerry’s

Ben Katchor, Cartoonist

Ben Manski, Assistant professor of sociology, George Mason University

Beth Miller, Political director, Jewish Voice for Peace

Rabbi Brant Rosen, Founding rabbi of Tzedek Chicago

Rabbi Cat Zavis, Beyt Tikkun

Cecilie Surasky, University of California, Berkeley

Charlie Fisher, Emeritus associate professor of sociology, Brandeis University

Corinne Hirsch, JD

Cynthia Kaufman, Director, Vasconcellos Institite for Democracy in Action, De Anza College

Dan Segal, Professor emeritus, anthropology and history, Pitzer College

Daniel Boyarin, Taubman Professor of Talmudic culture, UC Berkeley (emeritus)

Dave Zirin, Sports editor at The Nation, author

Rabbi David Cooper, Emeritus, Kehilla Community Synagogue

David S. Goldstein, University of Washington

David N. Myers, Professor of Jewish history, UCLA

Rabbi David Mivasair, Member, Jewish Voice for Peace

David Rovics, Singer/songwriter

Dennis Bernstein, Journalist, KPFA/Pacifica Radio

Dev Noily, Senior Rabbi, Kehilla Community Synagogue

Rabbi Diane Elliot, Director, Wholly Present; Founding Faculty, Taproot Community

Donald Greenspon, Attorney and activist

Dove Kent, US senior director, Diaspora Alliance

Eliot Katz, Poet

Emma Saltzberg, US deputy director, Diaspora Alliance

Eric Drooker, Painter and graphic novelist

Eric Mann, codirector, Labor/Community Strategy Center–Los Angeles

Eric Ross, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Erwin Chemerinsky, Dean, Berkeley Law

Estee Chandler, Founder, Jewish Voice for Peace, Los Angeles

Eva Borgwardt, National spokesperson, IfNotNow

Gene Bruskin, Veteran labor organizer and playwright

Hollie Ainbinder, Program director, Institute for Public Accuracy

Ira Shor, Professor and author

James Schamus, Filmmaker, professor, Columbia University

Jane Gordon, Professor, University of Connecticut

Jay Levin, Founder of LA Weekly

Jeff Cohen, Media critic, retired Ithaca College journalism professor

Jeff Gottlieb, Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist

Jennifer Loewenstein, University of Wisconsin–Madison

Jerry D. Rosen, California State University, Northridge

Jessica Backman-Levy, Professor of practice, Washington University in St. Louis SPH

Rabbi Jessica Rosenberg, Jewish Voice for Peace Rabbinical Council

Joel Beinin, Donald J. McLachlan Professor of History, emeritus, Stanford University

Jonathan Feingold, Professor, Boston University School of Law

Joshua Lewis Goldstein, Professor of history, University of Southern California

Judith Butler, University of California, Berkeley

Karen Ackerman

Karen Brodkin, Professor emerita, UCLA

Lara Langer Cohen, Associate professor, Swarthmore College

Leora Auslander, Professor, University of Chicago

Lily Greenberg Call, First Jewish Biden appointee to resign over Gaza

Rabbi Linda Holtzman, Tikkun Olam Chavurah

Rabbi Lonnie Kleinman, Tikkun Olam Chavurah

Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb, Shomeret Shalom

Marcy Winograd, Cochair, CODEPINK Central Coast

Margaret Morganroth Gullette, Scholar, Women’s Studies Research Center, Brandeis

Marjorie Cohn, Professor emerita, Thomas Jefferson School of Law

Marjorie N. Feld, Professor of history

Mark Sapir, Author and physician

Mark Weisbrot, Codirector, Center for Economic and Policy Research

Martin Lee, Author, The Beast Reawakens

Martin S. Hirsch, MD, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School

Maya Schenwar, Director, Truthout Center for Grassroots Journalism

Rabbi Meryl Crean, Jewish Voice for Peace Rabbinic Council

Rabbi Michael E. Feinberg, Director, Greater New York Labor-Religion Coalition

Michael Kazin, Professor of History, Georgetown University

Michael Roth, President, Wesleyan University

Miriam Klein Stahl, Artist/activist/educator

Mitchell Plitnick, President, ReThinking Foreign Policy

Mneesha Gellman, Associate professor of Political Science, Emerson College

Molly Crabapple, Artist and writer

Rabbi Mordechai Liebling, Instructor emeritus of practical rabbinics, Reconstructionist Rabbinical College

Morriah Kaplan, Interim executive director, IfNotNow

Nancy Stern, Professor, the City College of New York, CUNY

Nicole Schulman, Artist

Nina Menkes, Filmmaker

Noah Dor Lind, Havurah Shalom

Norman Solomon, National director, RootsAction

Orian Zakai, Hebrew literature scholar and writer

Osha Neumann, Human rights attorney, author, artist

Penny Rosenwasser, Author, instructor of antisemitism course, City College of San Francisco

Peter Beinart, Columnist and journalist

Peter Kuper, Illustrator and cartoonist

Phyllis Bennis, Fellow, Institute for Policy Studies

Phyllis R. Stein, career counselor

Rabbi Rebecca Alpert, Professor of Religion Emeritus, Temple University

Rebecca Vilkomerson, Codirector of Funding Freedom and former executive director of Jewish Voice for Peace

Richard (R.J.) Eskow, Journalist, host of The Zero Hour

Richard E. Rubenstein, Professor emeritus, George Mason University

Rick Goldsmith, Documentary filmmaker, Stripped for Parts: American Journalism on the Brink

Rick Perlstein, Historian and journalist

Rinat Abastado, Rabbinic student in AOP

Robert Brenner, Professor emeritus of history, UCLA

Robert Greenwald, President of Brave New Films and director, Gaza: Journalists Under Fire

Robert M. Gould, MD, physician and peace activist

Sam Rosenthal, Political director, RootsAction

Sandy O, Singer/songwriter, Emma’s Revolution

Santiago Slabodsky, Kaufman Chair in Jewish Studies, Hofstra University

Sarah Katz, Law professor, Temple Law School

Sarah Anne Minkin, PhD

Seth Morrison

Seth Tobocman, Comic book artist

Rabbi Shai Gluskin, Rabbinic Advisory Council, Jewish Voice for Peace

Stefanie Fox, Executive director, Jewish Voice for Peace

Stephanie Kristal, Therapist and immigrant defense advocate

Stephanie Levy, Hunter College

Steve Brodner, Illustrator, educator, journalist

Susan Adelman, Feminist, activist, and philanthropist

Suzi Weissman, Professor of politics, St. Mary’s College

Victor Silverman, Professor emeritus, Pomona College

Victor Wallis, Professor of liberal arts, Berklee College of Music

Zillah Eisenstein, Professor emerita, writer, activist