The Department of Education (DOE) announced on Oct. 7 that it will be expanding a 2025 antisemitism investigation into Swarthmore College for “complaints that [the college] has not adequately and promptly responded to particularly egregious antisemitic propaganda on campus.” The expansion was prompted by a former campus group, Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), reposting a video which depicted an effigy of an Israeli soldier being doused in lighter fluid and burned two days earlier.
The DOE’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) is investigating whether the college is in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, or national origin in federally funded programs.
The press release stated that Swarthmore SJP “saw fit to release a video depicting an Israeli soldier being doused in gasoline and burnt in effigy … With the backdrop of this burning soldier, SJP displayed the message ‘Long Live Al-Aqsa Flood,’ using the term Hamas terrorists coined to describe the horrific October 7th massacres.” The video did not depict a real Israeli soldier but rather a dummy.
The reposted video has since been deleted from Swarthmore SJP’s Instagram story. The video concluded with an “ALL OUT” call to rally on Market Street and Rittenhouse Square on Oct. 6 and 7, respectively.
The post was originally shared by a “Philadelphia-based group” unaffiliated with the college, according to an Oct. 8 statement from Swarthmore President Val Smith.
Swarthmore’s chapter of SJP has not been officially recognized by the college since September 2025, when the college revoked the organization’s affiliation due to violations of campus policy.
OCR Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Kimberly Richey commented: “If Swarthmore has in fact turned a blind eye to such provocation … someone is asleep at the wheel. The Trump Administration will never allow students to be subjected to an unsafe learning environment. It appears the college’s leaders have cravenly allowed this to happen; therefore, OCR will thoroughly investigate Swarthmore College.”
The College Responds
In a recent statement to the Philadelphia Inquirer, Swarthmore Vice President for Communications and Marketing Andy Hirsch affirmed that “SJP is not a recognized organization at the college … the group is prohibited from accessing college funds, scheduling or hosting events on campus, or accessing any other college resources available to student organizations. Additionally, other student organizations are prohibited from co-sponsoring, acting on behalf of, or affiliating with Swarthmore SJP.”
“This is not the first time this account has shared deeply offensive, if not reprehensible content on its social media account.”
Hirsch told the Inquirer, “…it’s unclear whether those running the account now are even Swarthmore students.” He explained that during the investigation of the group by the college, the account started “acting anonymously” and that “students who [had been] members of the group claimed they were no longer affiliated with [SJP].”
“While we believe the complaints that led to OCR’s expanded investigation have no merit, we will comply with the law and work with the Department of Education as it reviews the allegations,” he concluded.
President Smith denounced the video in a statement: “I condemn this hateful depiction of violence, just as I do all forms of antisemitism, Islamophobia, and other discrimination.” Smith stated, “We believe the complaints against the College that led to OCR’s expanded investigation have no merit … Swarthmore embraces individuals’ rights to express their views, even views others might find objectionable, if not offensive.”
“However, as I’ve said on many occasions, we cannot allow that commitment to come at the expense of our right to learn, work, and live in a campus community free from intimidation, harassment, and discrimination,” Smith wrote.
Allegations Against Other Institutions of Higher Education
In March 2025, the OCR sent letters to sixty institutions of higher education alleging antisemitism and harassment on their campuses and opening federal investigations into them. As of October 2026, there are over 100 other similar pending investigations by the DOE.
Among the institutions under investigation are large public universities, Ivy League institutions, and liberal arts colleges alike. Many of Swarthmore’s peer institutions are listed, including eight other liberal arts colleges as well as five other Pennsylvanian colleges and universities.
One of the DOE’s most prominent ongoing investigations is into Columbia University. The university, which also received follow up from the DOE, also received a Notice of Violation from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Service in spring of 2025 regarding “student-on-student harassment of Jewish students [starting on] October 7, 2023.” The administration froze more than $400 million in federal funding for Columbia, and the DOE notified the university’s accrediting commission that it had failed to meet standards in June 2025.
Columbia later settled with the administration in late July following a $221 million payment — $200 million to the government and $21 million to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission — and new internal disciplinary measures. The university’s accrediting commission issued a press release in July 2025 stating that the university had met compliance standards.
More recently, other Ivy League institutions have come under similar scrutiny from the DOE. In March 2026, the OCR opened two new investigations into Harvard University, one relating to race-based admissions practices and one addressing alleged ongoing antisemitic harassment. Harvard refused to cooperate with these investigations, which led to official warnings from the federal government, a Heightened Cash Monitoring designation from the DOE, and a lawsuit from the Department of Justice. As a result, the Trump Administration froze over $2 billion in research grants.
Unlike many large research institutions, Swarthmore’s endowment supports a large portion of its annual spending instead of federally funded dollars. In the college’s fiscal year 2025 (FY 2025), $1.9 million of its $6.1 million research and development budget were federally funded. Federal sources account for approximately $5.6 million of the college’s $61.8 million financial aid budget.
Under the Biden administration, the DOE launched investigations into numerous universities, including Cornell University, the University of Pennsylvania, and Columbia University following allegations of antisemitism and Islamophobia shortly after the events of Oct. 7, 2023.
Concerns about anti-Jewish and anti-Muslim hate on college campuses have remained in the national spotlight. On Jan. 29, 2025, President Trump signed an executive order, Additional Measures to Combat Anti-Semitism, which led to aforementioned widespread federal investigations and enforcement actions into U.S. colleges and universities.
According to the OCR’s investigation tracker, this is one of two current Title VI investigations into the college. The second, filed in Dec. 2024 by CAIR-Philadelphia (Council on American-Islamic Relations), alleges the college has “created and enabled a hostile environment” that threatens “Palestinian, Muslim, Arab, Jewish, and other students, staff, and faculty who stand against occupation, apartheid, and genocide.”
In a 2026 campus climate survey, 70% of Muslim respondents reported experiencing discrimination or harassment at Swarthmore, the highest of all identity categories. Jewish students experienced the second-highest discrimination rate at 34%.
Both investigations are ongoing.
