We Bear Witness: Episode 5

Landmark Ruling against Antisemitism at UCLA

Year 1938: “Peaceful protestors” at the University of Vienna lock hands to prevent Jewish students from entering.

Year 2024: “Peaceful protesters” at UCLA campus lock hands to prevent Jewish students from entering.

Today we present the fifth video in a series of documentaries produced by a member of The Circle in collaboration with JFrg (the Jewish Faculty Resilience Group at UCLA).

The previous videos in the series are available available here, here, here, and here.

Why Did It Take a Federal Judge’s Ruling for UCLA to Recognize It Is Illegal to Allow Protestors to Block Jewish Students From Attending Classes and Parts of Campus?

This short video provides the background to the landmark ruling in Frankel vs Regents of University of California. The ruling was discussed in the L.A. Times (Jaweed Kaleem, “Judge Orders UCLA to Ensure Equal Campus Access to Jewish Students After Pro-Palestinian Protests,” August 14, 2024). Legal Filings in Frankel vs Regents of University of California are available here.

In the year 2024 … Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith. This fact is so unimaginable and so abhorrent to our constitutional guarantee of religious freedom that it bears repeating. —U.S. District Judge Mark Scarsi

The landmark injunction issued by Judge Scarsi signals to universities that allowing discrimination against Jewish students violates the Constitution. But why do we even need a court case to ensure that Jewish students have equal access to classes and to all parts of campus? Why has UCLA appealed? And why does it take a legal battle to ensure that Jewish rights are protected on our campuses?

Timeline of the Ruling

June 5: Three UCLA law students file a lawsuit after the university enabled the Palestine Solidarity Encampment to effectively enforce a “Jew Exclusion Zone” on campus. Dozens of faculty members supported the activists in their efforts to set up and maintain the encampment, and these violations of campus policy and Jewish civil rights were tolerated on campus for a full week before the encampment was removed. 

UCLA Response: UCLA opposed this claim.

July 29: Federal Judge Mark Scarsi tells UCLA and the Jewish Students to meet and craft a plan to protect Jewish students by August 5. 

Plaintiffs and UCLA filed separate responses to the order, and after oral arguments in Court at the end of July, the two parties were “unable to make meaningful ground on a compromise.”

August 13: U.S. District Judge Mark Scarsi issues a preliminary injunction acknowledging that Jewish student access was blocked (see quote above). Judge Scarsi rules that UCLA cannot offer programming if Jewish students don’t receive equal access, and that exclusion of Jewish students includes “exclusion of Jewish students based on religious beliefs concerning the Jewish state of Israel,” affirming that Jews and Jewish supporters of Israel deserve equal rights to campus. 

August 14: UCLA again opposes the injunction and appeals the decision to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Mary Osako, UCLA vice chancellor for strategic communications said the judge’s injunction is “improper and would hamstring our ability to respond to events on the ground and to meet the needs of the Bruin community.”

August 19: UC President Michael Drake directs chancellors of all 10 UC campuses to strictly enforce rules against encampments, masking, and blocking paths on university campuses (see the memo “Updates on UC Campus Climate Efforts” sent by President Drake).