City Council member Charles Barron. Photo by Ray Tamarra/Getty Images

By Beth Harpaz June 21, 2023

The union representing 30,000 faculty and staff members at the City University of New York tweeted a reelection endorsement for City Councilman Charles Barron, who’s been criticized by the Anti-Defamation League.

The Professional Staff Congress said in the tweet that it was “proud to endorse Charles Barron.” 

The ADL has called Barron out for a variety of statements and behaviors, saying that he “has associated with anti-Semitic hate groups and promoted extreme anti-Israel positions intended to demonize the Jewish state since his election in 2001,” including asserting that Israel should never have been created and that “Blacks, not Jews, are the ‘real’ Semites.”

A spokesperson for the union declined to comment, saying, “all these articles are the same.”

Barron’s office did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

Barron represents District 42, which includes the East New York section of Brooklyn, a predominantly African American area. He is an alumnus of Hunter College, a CUNY school, and has been a staunch supporter of funding for the CUNY system. Nearly 80% of CUNY’s 240,000 students are people of color, and 60% come from families earning less than $30,000 a year. Studies have repeatedly confirmed CUNY’s effectiveness as an engine of economic mobility, lifting students out of poverty and into the middle class.

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