Northwestern’s Jewish president to resign after tension with White House over handling of antisemitism

Michael Schill, president of Northwestern University, at a House hearing on May 23, 2024. Photo by Michael A. McCoy/Getty Images

By Hannah Feuer September 4, 2025

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Northwestern University President Michael Schill announced he would resign Thursday, ending a three-year tenure during which the Trump administration targeted the university over allegations of antisemitism.

Schill, who is Jewish and the descendant of Holocaust survivors, guided the university through hundreds of layoffs related to government funding freezes over alleged discrimination against Jewish students on campus.

Schill also faced intense scrutiny over his decision in 2024 to negotiate with pro-Palestinian protesters in encampments. Protesters ultimately removed their tents in exchange for Northwestern agreeing to fund temporary positions for two Palestinian faculty members, pay for the education of five Palestinian undergraduate students, and answer questions about its investments.

After the agreement was reached, the Anti-Defamation League, StandWithUs and the Brandeis Center called for Schill’s resignation, writing that he had “capitulated to hatred and bigotry.”

Schill later defended his decision in an op-ed in the Chicago Tribune.

“I am a proud Jew who practices many of our rituals. Being Jewish is core to my identity, and I grew up with a love for Israel, which remains today,” he wrote. “My family has experienced antisemitism, and so claims by some that I have collaborated with antisemitic people feel like personal affronts.”

Schill is the latest in a series of university presidents to resign after controversy over their handling of alleged antisemitism on campus.

A congressional hearing last year during which Rep. Elise Stefanik asked university presidents if “calling for the genocide of Jews constitutes bullying or harassment” set off a cascade of resignations, beginning with Liz Magill of the University of Pennsylvania in December 2023.

Harvard University president Claudine Gay and Columbia University president Minouche Shafik, also questioned at the hearing, soon followed. Columbia’s interim president Katrina Armstrong then resigned after just seven months in office following pressure from the Trump administration. Rutgers University president Jonathan Holloway and University of Virginia president James Ryan stepped down under similar pressures.

In his resignation statement, Schill referred to “painful challenges” facing Northwestern during his tenure.

“In the face of those challenges and the hard, but necessary choices that were before us, I was always guided by enduring values of our University: protecting students, fostering academic excellence, and defending faculty, academic freedom, due process and the integrity of the institution,” he wrote.