Columbia bans face masks in protests and acquiesces to other Trump administration demands
The changes are a bid to regain federal funding cut to penalize the school for its pro-Palestinian protests
Students/demonstrators lock arms to guard potential authorities against reaching fellow pro-Palestinian protesters who barricaded themselves inside Hamilton Hall, an academic building which has been occupied in past student movements, April 29, 2024. (Alex Kent/Getty Images)
(JTA) — Columbia University is banning the use of face masks by protesters and hiring dozens of police officers as it seeks to win back federal funding cut by the Trump administration to penalize the school for its pro-Palestinian protests.
Columbia also says it will review its admissions practices, citing “a recent downturn in both Jewish and African American enrollment.” The school had not previously disclosed the downturn, which follows both high-profile anti-Israel protests on campus and a Supreme Court ruling barring universities from weighing race in admissions decisions.
A ban on face masks and changes to admissions had been among the demands laid out last week by the Trump administration for the school to regain $400 million in federal grants, mostly for science research, cut over what it said were threats against Jewish students on Columbia’s campus.
The administration had also demanded that Columbia’s Middle East, South Asian and African Studies department be put under special supervision for at least five years. Columbia announced that it was hiring a new provost to oversee the department and several others, including the Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies, that teach about the Middle East.
The moves reflect broad concessions to the Trump administration, even as Interim President Katrina Armstrong said in a letter to community members that academic freedom remained a top value for the university.
“The way Columbia and Columbians have been portrayed is hard to reckon with,” she wrote in announcing the changes. “We have challenges, yes, but they do not define us. We are a community of scholars who have deep respect for each other and our mission. We teach the brightest, most creative students in the world, and we care deeply for each and every one of them. I have every faith in our ability to overcome the greatest of challenges. We stand resilient and brilliant.”
Armstrong added, “At all times, we are guided by our values, putting academic freedom, free expression, open inquiry, and respect for all at the fore of every decision we make.”
A website that accompanied Armstrong’s note laid out all of the changes underway at the school, including the shakeup of the academic departments and the mask ban, which includes exemptions for masks worn for religious and medical reasons. The university also says it has almost finished training 36 “special officers” who will have the right to arrest students on campus.
It is rare for the federal government to intervene in the internal operations of a private university. But the Trump administration said it was compelled to act because the university had failed to protect students from “antisemitic violence and harassment” during protests against the Israel-Hamas war that began on Oct. 7, 2023. Columbia was the first school to see students form a pro-Palestinian encampment in the spring of 2024, launching a movement that reached dozens of colleges across the United States.
The administration has also conducted multiple law enforcement actions at the school, arresting Palestinian protester Mahmoud Khalil earlier this month.
Critics of the Trump administration’s intervention at Columbia, including thousands of Jewish academics who signed a protest letter this week, say the crackdown there and at other universities reflects an inappropriate incursion on academic freedom and uses fears of antisemitism to justify repression.
The administration’s supporters, who include some pro-Israel students, meanwhile say the moves are necessary to improve the climate for Jewish students.
“This is a huge win for Jewish safety at Columbia,” tweeted Eliana Goldin, who is enrolled in Columbia’s joint program with the Jewish Theological Seminary and a leader in the campus Zionist group Aryeh, on Friday. “I’m looking forward to seeing how the university improves these coming weeks.”
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