Christopher Bao and Cynthia Torres
Daily Princetonian
Excerpt: The Trump administration has suspended several dozen research grants to Princeton, University President Christopher Eisgruber ’83 wrote in a campus-wide email on Tuesday. The grants were issued from several federal agencies, including the Department of Energy, NASA, and the Defense Department.
The exact amount in question and the reasoning for the pause itself are unclear, and Eisgruber acknowledged only the latter in his statement. But the Daily Caller, a right-wing news organization, reported last night that the government would halt $210 million in federal funding to Princeton due to an ongoing investigation of antisemitism on campus, citing an anonymous Trump official.
Michael Hurley
Foundation for Individual Rights in Expression
Excerpt: A federal court has once again vindicated FIRE’s longstanding concerns with the Trump administration’s unlawful and unconstitutional approach to enforcing Title VI — including combatting antisemitism — in higher education. This time, the smackdown came in a ruling for plaintiffs at the University of California.
Last Friday, the following letter was sent to President Eisgruber from the Princetonians for Free Speech Executive Committee regarding further action after the protests and event disruption that occurred on April 7th in McCosh Hall, and preparatory measures for upcoming campus events:
Pity Chris Summerlin, the dean of students at the University of Florida. He’s being sued by an anti-Semite, and that’s not the worst of his predicament. So far, judges who have ruled on the case have given mixed verdicts on whether he is likely to win or lose at trial.
College deans and administrators keep confronting the same dilemma: They face intense pressure to punish speech that elicits fear or moral disgust on campus. They also have legal obligations—and face countervailing pressure—to refrain from violating the free-speech rights of students. They cannot always do both. The result is cases such as Damsky v. Summerlin—cases that might be avoided under a better approach to fighting anti-Semitism and other hateful ideas.
The Editorial Board
Wall Street Journal
Excerpt: President Trump keeps flexing the government’s power over elite universities, with Cornell and Northwestern the latest to have federal funds withheld. After Princeton received the same treatment last week, it’s now facing a test of its principles. On Monday students disrupted a campus talk by former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett.
Princeton’s rules of conduct, drawing from the University of Chicago’s statement on free speech, say students “may not obstruct or otherwise interfere with the freedom of others to express views they reject.” Who pulled the fire alarm? Who was yelling antisemitic taunts at Jewish students? If they were students, why would Princeton want them?
April 9, 2025
Dear President Eisgruber:
We, the officers of Princetonians for Free Speech (PFS), are writing to express our organization’s very deep concerns about the disruption of the program featuring former Israel Prime Minister Naftali Bennett on April 7 and actions of severe antisemitism during and after that program.
Olivia Sanchez and Annie Rupertus
Daily Princetonian
Excerpt: In interviews with the ‘Prince,’ six students subject to University disciplinary proceedings described a tangled process that appeared fixated on searching for protest leaders to blame and employed tactics they described as invasive. The students were all investigated for supposed participation in pro-Palestine disruptions last spring.
Their accounts, corroborated by dozens of documents reviewed by the ‘Prince,’ including emails and investigation records, provide a rare glance behind the scenes of the University’s investigative apparatus.
A leading House Democrat on Tuesday called for an investigation into new whistleblower allegations that the Trump administration forced universities it deemed politically incorrect into settling antisemitism cases despite flimsy or nonexistent evidence.
Education Secretary Linda McMahon last week summoned college and university leaders to publicly declare their commitment to rebuild trust in higher education. But the path forward is murky, as leaders wrestle over whether to respond and how to walk the fine line between compliance and standing their ground.
Vitus Larrieu
Daily Princetonian
Excerpt: An executive order signed by President Donald Trump and released on Wednesday, Jan. 29 calls for Princeton and other universities to “monitor” and “report activities by alien students and staff” for actions that constitute antisemitism.
The executive order gives various federal agencies — including the Department of Education — 60 days to create a list of all cases involving a university alleging civil rights violations related to antisemitism that occurred following the Hamas attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. A Title VI case related to antisemitism at Princeton was opened by the Department of Education in January 2024, referencing chants at pro-Palestine protests in October 2023.
Princetonians for Free Speech
Since the terrorist attack on Israel and the invasion of Gaza, several universities have been prominently featured in the national news for protests, sometimes violent, on their campuses and for antisemitic acts. Princeton had protests and instances of antisemitism, but these were nowhere near the level of what occurred at some schools, such as Columbia and Harvard. At PFS, we believe this was in part because Princeton set forth clear standards in advance for protests on campus. It should have come as no surprise that two of the first schools the Trump Administration went after to freeze grants were Columbia and Harvard.
April 9, 2025
Dear President Eisgruber:
We, the officers of Princetonians for Free Speech (PFS), are writing to express our organization’s very deep concerns about the disruption of the program featuring former Israel Prime Minister Naftali Bennett on April 7 and actions of severe antisemitism during and after that program.
A group of Princeton faculty, supported by students and alumni, have developed a statement "condemning the anti-Israel and, in many cases, antisemitic demonstrations and encampments plaguing college campuses...." Signatures are being collected for the statement from Princeton and across the country. This list of signers is growing rapidly. Among the signers are Princeton Professors Robert George, Sergiu Klainerman, and John Londregan; faculty from USC and Chicago, and Princetonians for Free Speech co-founders Stuart Taylor, Jr. and Edward Yingling.
To sign, click here.
Frannie Block and Maya Sulkin
The Free Press
Excerpt: In 2024, David Piegaro attended a pro-Palestine rally on Princeton University’s campus as a self-described “citizen journalist.” After watching all this from a distance, Piegaro began to follow and videotape Princeton professor Max Weiss, who Piegaro recognized as a leader of a pro-Palestine faculty group, and another man wearing a suit. When Piegaro tried to enter a building with them, the man with the suit essentially shoved him down the stairs, alleges Piegaro.
In April, a New Jersey judge found Piegaro not guilty of all the charges, concluding that he might “have been unwise, or even defiant, but it does not amount to reckless disregard.” On Wednesday, Piegaro filed a lawsuit against Princeton and Strother in a federal court in New Jersey, alleging violations of his First and Fourteenth Amendment rights, use of excessive force, wrongful imprisonment, fabrication of evidence, and more.
