Columbia University is laying off nearly 180 staffers in response to President Donald Trump’s decision to cancel $400 million in funding over the Manhattan college’s handling of student protests against the war in Gaza
He has pro-Palestinian concerns. I think that genuinely, on a personal level, if someone is advocating for brown people, that upsets him and he thinks they should go to prison, and that’s the ultimate reason for this.
The Israel lobby is plenty strong, but I don’t think he would have taken such a personal stake in the reaction to this particular university and issue unless brown people were involved. There’s a reason he went after them first. Ironically, it is partly because they cracked down on the Palestine protests, and thus got themselves in the news as a university that has really notable Palestinian protests and is connected with them. I think if they’d mostly left them alone like most universities did, it wouldn’t have been any kind of news above the local level, and he wouldn’t have had any reason to even have them on his radar as one to punish.
He has pro-Palestinian concerns. I think that genuinely, on a personal level, if someone is advocating for brown people, that upsets him and he thinks they should go to prison, and that’s the ultimate reason for this.
The Israel lobby is plenty strong, but I don’t think he would have taken such a personal stake in the reaction to this particular university and issue unless brown people were involved. There’s a reason he went after them first. Ironically, it is partly because they cracked down on the Palestine protests, and thus got themselves in the news as a university that has really notable Palestinian protests and is connected with them. I think if they’d mostly left them alone like most universities did, it wouldn’t have been any kind of news above the local level, and he wouldn’t have had any reason to even have them on his radar as one to punish.