Federal Judge Approves Trump Effort to Obtain List of Jews From Penn
Source: New York Times
March 31, 2026 Updated 3:41 p.m. ET
The Trump administration was within its rights to demand that the University of Pennsylvania turn over information about Jews on campus as part of a federal investigation into discrimination at the school, a federal judge decided Tuesday. The governments investigation had unified Penn leaders with Jewish students and faculty in opposition to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commissions subpoena. Many on campus drew parallels between the governments approach and methods deployed in Nazi Germany.
But the Trump administration has said that its request was typical for discrimination investigations, and Judge Gerald J. Pappert of Philadelphias Federal District Court agreed on Tuesday. He gave Penn until May 1 to comply with the administrations subpoena, though the ruling appeared unlikely to quell the debates around how the administration has pressured top American universities.
In a 32-page ruling, Judge Pappert, an Obama appointee, wrote that Penns constitutional claims were easily dispensed with and that the governments subpoena was valid. Though ineptly worded, the request had an understandable purpose to obtain in a narrowly tailored way, as opposed to seeking information on all university employees, information on individuals in Penns Jewish community who could have experienced or witnessed antisemitism in the workplace, he wrote.
The judge, however, said that the university would not have to reveal any employees connection to a specific Jewish-related organization. Penn did not immediately comment.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/31/us/politics/trump-jews-penn-list-judge.html
No paywall (gift)
Link to ORDER (PDF viewer) - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XLfjh20DJdEBHar8HghB4cqqlFZzp8IP/view
Obama judge but I *know* that will be immediately appealed.
Article updated.
Original article/headline -
March 31, 2026, 2:53 p.m. ET
The Trump administration was within its rights to demand that the University of Pennsylvania turn over information about Jewish people on campus as part of a federal investigation into discrimination at the school, a federal judge decided Tuesday.
The ruling clears a hurdle for the Trump administration as it targets elite schools over accusations of antisemitism. Judge Gerald J. Pappert of the U.S. District Court in Philadelphia issued the decision, which largely sided with the government, writing that Penn's "constitutional claims are easily dispensed with."
He gave Penn until May 1 to comply with the subpoena, though he said that the university would not have to reveal any employee's connection to a specific Jewish-related organization. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has been pursuing an inquiry into potential workplace discrimination against Jewish faculty and staff at Penn, an Ivy League school in Philadelphia, since 2023.
While university officials said they welcomed the investigation, they balked last year after the government issued a subpoena seeking names and phone numbers for members of Jewish groups on campus. The school said much of the information that the government had requested is not collected. Students and faculty groups also condemned the government's demand for a list of Jews, drawing a parallel to methods deployed in Nazi Germany.
C Moon
(13,642 posts)pcdb
(116 posts)C Moon
(13,642 posts)Miguelito Loveless
(5,751 posts)it's all lining up for a repeat of history.
maxsolomon
(38,711 posts)through their Antisemitism investigations.
This isn't leading to Holocaust 2.0.
Behind the Aegis
(56,108 posts)"This isn't leading to Holocaust 2.0."
We shall see.
obamanut2012
(29,367 posts)maxsolomon
(38,711 posts)You're saying I have no idea what the actual, nefarious reason is?
For now, I'll stick with the ongoing shakedown of liberal, especially Ivy League, Universities under the guise of an antidiscrimination investigation.
lonely bird
(2,940 posts)And the Trump administration has never lied about anything.
The scam is bad enough but the reality is nobody knows what they will do.
Miguelito Loveless
(5,751 posts)The optics are not good:
Secret Police: Check.
Concentration of all power in one man: Check.
Demonization of minorities: Check.
Forced deportations: Check.
Extrajudicial murder: Check.
Illegal invasion of other countries: Check.
War crimes: Check.
Subversion of courts and legislature: Check
Open corruption of government: Check.
Making lists of Jews: Check.
ColoringFool
(705 posts)Behind the Aegis
(56,108 posts)Earlier this month, Guy Wolf, the president of the Jewish Cultural Centre in Liège, Belgium, awoke to alarming news: overnight, an IED was detonated outside his local synagogue, blowing out the windows and setting the front doors and nearby cars alight.
The attack on the historic temple was the first such incident in the city since the Holocaust, according to local officials. Though Wolf had heard about a rise in antisemitic attacks in other cities, he was taken aback that it happened in Liège. There are only about 500 Jewish people in this city of half a million, the synagogue isnt particularly active and the Jews are well-integrated. If you attack the Jewish community here, Wolf said, you are attacking the city of Liège, because we are completely inside of it.
The whole thing has left the 68-year-old Wolf wondering: If Jews cant feel safe here, can they feel safe anywhere?
This is an increasingly urgent question for Jewish communities as antisemitism rises across the globe, and particularly in the West where Jews have lived in relative peace since the end of World War II. But a spasm of antisemitic violence and hostile rhetoric stemming from conflicts in the Middle East is making many Jews feel increasingly isolated from their homelands and their neighbors.
more...
question everything
Cha
(319,067 posts)AZLD4Candidate
(6,780 posts)SpankMe
(3,719 posts)What does that mean? So, a Democratic president can demand a list of all students who own guns from Texas A&M, and that would be OK?
I don't get this.
eggplant
(4,199 posts)Are they making all the men drop their drawers?
Behind the Aegis
(56,108 posts)Most women do not have penises and not all Jews are circumcised and many who are, aren't Jews.
BumRushDaShow
(169,714 posts)a Jew would be born from a woman who was a Jew but there are obviously converted Jews too (see Ivanka, who also went to Penn).
eggplant
(4,199 posts)I was (unsuccessfully, apparently) referencing an old SNL skit which explored what would have happened if Superman had landed in Germany.
LymphocyteLover
(9,842 posts)Bayard
(29,679 posts)They're a hellofa lot more worried about the gestapo.
usonian
(25,300 posts)From "IBM and the Holocaust"
https://explaininghistory.org/2025/09/30/ibm-and-the-holocaust-technology-as-a-force-multiplier-for-genocide/
The Hollerith card was a death sentence.
https://allthatsinteresting.com/ibm-nazis-ww2
"It's just a census. Nothing could possibly go wrong"
Reminder: Elon Musk has passwords to, and back-doors planted in every major government computing system.
And he would NEVER misuse the information.

How IBM Helped The Nazis Carry Out The Holocaust
https://allthatsinteresting.com/ibm-nazis-ww2/3

Information in the hands of a MURDEROUS fascist government WILL BE MISUSED.
THEY CANNOT MISUSE information that THEY DO NOT HAVE.
"It's just a census"
Torchlight
(6,820 posts)and the nation watches in rapt disinterest. It'll be fascinating (to me) to hear the administraiton's true purpose for this rather than the stated excuse they manufactured and sold to rubes.
Deuxcents
(26,912 posts)Its not what they say..its what they do
Baitball Blogger
(52,341 posts)Did the judges take into account that the Trump Administration is dismantling all the anti-discrimination laws in order to benefit white male. So, why suddenly take their word that this time, they want to protected Jewish students?
Someone skipped a step.
Response to BumRushDaShow (Original post)
orangecrush This message was self-deleted by its author.
nycbos
(6,715 posts)tha Ivy League schools is the Trump administration.
Martin68
(27,741 posts)ColoringFool
(705 posts)Precisely "how" to ID and what the "purpose" is and it's not the "Holocaust"...
ARE ALL BESIDE THE 🤬🤬🤬🤬 POINT!
Solly Mack
(96,940 posts)Just NO.
I don't give a fuck where the question is coming from - left/right.
Nope.
pat_k
(13,371 posts)And if the records don't include religious affiliation, what the hell is Penn supposed to provide? Are they supposed to go on a "Jew hunt" of some sort?