Tag: Cornell

  • Cornell Pres. Nixes Kehlani Concert for “Antisemitic” Remarks

    Cornell Pres. Nixes Kehlani Concert for “Antisemitic” Remarks

    Cornell University’s president announced Wednesday that he’s canceling Kehlani’s campus concert, saying the R&B singer has “espoused antisemitic, anti-Israel sentiments.”

    Kehlani was set to perform May 7 at the annual Slope Day spring festival.

    “For decades, student leaders have taken the helm in organizing this event, hiring performers they hope will appeal to the student body,” Cornell president Michael I. Kotlikoff said in a statement. “Unfortunately, although it was not the intention, the selection of Kehlani as this year’s headliner has injected division and discord into Slope Day.”

    “In the days since Kehlani was announced, I have heard grave concerns from our community that many are angry, hurt, and confused,” Kotlikoff said, adding that the student Slope Day Programming Board agreed “that this selection has compromised what is meant to be an inclusive event.”

    The board didn’t respond to an email Thursday from Inside Higher Ed seeking comment. Kehlani has expressed pro-Palestine views—one of her music videos features the Palestinian flag and the phrase “long live the intifada.” She also said “fuck Israel” and “fuck Zionism” last year.

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  • Northwestern, Cornell Face Federal Funding Freeze

    Northwestern, Cornell Face Federal Funding Freeze

    The Trump administration is freezing more than $1 billion in federal funds at Cornell University and $790 million at Northwestern University—the latest colleges to see their federal grants and contracts threatened, The New York Times reported Tuesday, citing anonymous officials.

    The affected funds will include money from the Agriculture, Defense, Education and Health and Human Services Departments. The Times didn’t say why those universities were losing the money aside from noting that both institutions are facing civil rights investigations related to alleged antisemitism on campus. In recent weeks, Northwestern has sought to highlight its efforts to combat antisemitism, which include policy changes and mandatory antisemitism training for students, faculty and staff.

    However, the administration can’t legally pull funding from colleges for civil rights violations until after a lengthy process that’s supposed to include notice to Congress and the opportunity for judicial review. Still, the Trump administration has used other avenues—which some experts say are illegal and are the subject of legal challenges—to cut off money. They include tapping a task force to investigate colleges and targeting their grants and contracts. The task force is currently reviewing Harvard University’s federal funding, which totals $9 billion, and has demanded several changes in order for the college to continue receiving money.

    “This was wrong last week, it is wrong this week, and it will be wrong next week,” said Ted Mitchell, president of the American Council on Education.

    Jon Yates, a Northwestern spokesman, said the university learned via the media about the freeze, which would affect “a significant portion of our federal funding.”

    “The University has not received any official notification from the federal government,” Yates wrote in an email to Inside Higher Ed. “Federal funds that Northwestern receives drive innovative and life-saving research, like the recent development by Northwestern researchers of the world’s smallest pacemaker, and research fueling the fight against Alzheimer’s disease. This type of research is now at jeopardy. The University has fully cooperated with investigations by both the Department of Education and Congress.”

    Cornell didn’t respond to an Inside Higher Ed request for comment.

    The American Jewish Committee on Tuesday warned the Trump administration against making dramatic cuts to universities’ funding, adding that such a step should be a last resort.

    Colleges That Have Lost Federal Funding So Far:

    Ryan Quinn contributed to this report.

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  • Cornell Student Who Faced Deportation Leaves the Country

    Cornell Student Who Faced Deportation Leaves the Country

    Momodou Taal, the Cornell University graduate student who said his institution effectively tried to deport him in the fall over his pro-Palestine activism, announced Monday he’s leaving the U.S. of his own accord under threat from the Trump administration.

    “I have lost faith I could walk the streets without being abducted,” Taal wrote on X. He added that “we are facing a government that has no respect for the judiciary or for the rule of the law.”

    On March 15, Taal, his professor and another Cornell Ph.D. student sued President Trump, the Department of Homeland Security and Homeland Security secretary Kristi Noem, challenging executive orders that empowered immigration officials to deport noncitizens they deem national security threats. Immigration officers have targeted multiple international students suspected of participating in pro-Palestine protests. Taal is a U.K. and Gambian citizen.

    A few days after he sued, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents visited Taal in what Homeland Security acknowledged “was an attempt to detain him,” he said in a court filing. The State Department had revoked Taal’s visa, according to the lawsuit.

    Now his lawyers have dismissed the case. “Trump did not want me to have my day in court and sent ICE agents to my home,” Taal wrote on X.

    In an email to Inside Higher Ed Tuesday, an unnamed “senior” Homeland Security official called it “a privilege to be granted a visa to live and study” in the U.S.

    “When you advocate for violence and terrorism, that privilege should be revoked, and you should not be in this country,” the official said. “We are pleased to confirm that this Cornell University terrorist sympathizer heeded Secretary Noem’s advice to self-deport.”

    When asked for specifics on when Taal sympathized with terrorism, Homeland Security pointed to where Taal referenced in his Monday post the “Zionist genocide,” and wrote, “Long live the student intifada!” In his post, Taal wrote that the “repression of Palestinian solidarity is now being used to wage a wholesale attack on any form of expression that challenges oppressive and exploitative relations in the US.”

    Taal added, “If you have been led to think that your safety is only guaranteed by state kidnap, repression, deportation, the slaughter of children, and the suppression of the global majority, then let Gaza’s shards of glass be your mirror.”

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  • New policy gives Cornell head start on New Year’s gains

    New policy gives Cornell head start on New Year’s gains

    Cornell got a jump on its New Year’s resolutions this winter, unveiling an updated version of its proposed Expressive Activity Policy just before the holiday season. On Dec. 18, the Cornell Committee on Expressive Activity released a much-improved revision of the proposed policy. This comes after FIRE and nearly 500 other organizations and individuals weighed in on an earlier draft from Oct. 30. The final say belongs to university leadership, but this update marks a significant step in the right direction. 

    One of the most notable changes from the Oct. 30 version is that the policy no longer requires students to schedule expressive activities through the 25Live reservation system. The October draft also limited spontaneous protests to Ho Plaza — a tiny patch of campus measuring merely one acre out of the sprawling 745-acre Ithaca campus. We criticized this provision as well as the scheduling requirement, and thankfully, the new proposal contains neither. 

    That’s not the only laudable change. The new policy also preserves the right to put up flyers, posters, and other expressive materials without having to identify oneself on the material. That is a critical win for students who may only feel comfortable expressing their views anonymously. 

    Cornell deserves praise for demonstrating its willingness to engage critics, make changes, and to honor the principle of free expression as enshrined in our Constitution. 

    Nor is outreach to the university required to put up material in designated posting areas. While the initial March 11 interim policy stated that approval was not required to post in designated areas, it instructed community members to “[c]ontact the applicable building coordinator or campus facilities director to find out the locations of” said areas. This effectively created a prior restraint that required students, faculty, and staff to reach out to administrators before expressing themselves. In contrast, the latest proposed policy puts the onus on personnel to “communicat[e] transparently” on where they place posting areas. 

    The committee rejected suggestions from several commenters to require pre-approval or notification before posting, choosing instead to uphold the principle of free speech and honor the school’s own noble legacy of political activism and public debate.

    Unfortunately, the new proposal is not without its flaws. It maintains a broad definition of hostile environment harassment, reflecting and even exceeding the overbroad definition set forth by the controversial Title IX regulations enacted in 2024. These federal rules require colleges to adopt a standard for harassment that includes protected speech, and as a result of deep-seated constitutional concerns, courts have blocked their implementation in 26 states. Any further federal changes to Title IX regulations would necessitate another round of changes at Cornell.

    Despite this, Cornell deserves praise for demonstrating its willingness to engage critics, make changes, and to honor the principle of free expression as enshrined in our Constitution. 

    FIRE will continue to call for the reform of Title IX regulations and for universities to adopt a definition of hostile environment harassment that better reflects First Amendment principles. We’ve been writing to the Cornell Committee on Expressive Activity every step of the way during the revision process, and we will continue to nudge Cornell toward making further progress. But for now, good on Big Red for locking in some solid gains before the new year even started. 

    If you have questions about your school’s new or existing policies, reach out to FIRE’s Policy Reform team at speechcodes@thefire.org, and we’ll make sure you get answers. And if your school adopted policies you’re concerned about, we’re here to help you push back. You can also check out our FAQ on protests and our political speech FAQ if you’re interested in activism this spring.

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