In recent weeks, Americans have been shocked by widespread student protests and statements by professors from colleges and universities that
support violence
against Israel. These incidents highlight that
radical ideologies
have taken hold of broad swaths of academia.
It’s important to counter the toxic pathologies that are opposed to the founding principles of
society
. However, it’s equally important to recognize that the federal government funnels tens of billions of dollars every year into educational institutions that are mostly or completely captured by leftist activists.
Congress has an obligation to address this problem in upcoming spending bills by reforming and eliminating the funding streams that provide financial support to the boosters of antisemitism and terrorism.
In the wake of the genocidal attack that Hamas terrorists launched against
Israel
on Oct. 7, most Americans
supported
Israel’s right to forcefully respond. However, that support is much weaker in places that represent the commanding heights of society, such as universities.
While instances of students taking the side of Hamas are discouraging, college faculty and administrators leading the way are far more troubling. Examples of professors and departments openly siding with terrorism or genuflecting to its supporters are all too common:
CU Boulder
,
Cornell
,
George Mason
,
Georgetown
,
UCLA
,
City University of New York
,
UPenn
,
UC San Diego
,
Yale
, and
many
,
many
others.
Leftist activists masquerading as educators are promoting many of the most destructive ideas in circulation. From
transgenderism
to
critical race theory
to the cult of
climate change
, radical professors instill radical ideas in students and create legions of
new radicals
.
In the case of the debate about Israel and Palestinians, the pertinent leftist theory is
decolonization
, which divides the world into colonizers and the colonized—and justifies atrocities in the name of fighting “oppression.” The concept is antithetical to Western values and is actively promoted by
universities
and institutional
thought leaders
.
Legions of radicalized students are spilling into key areas of society. They are at the head of the spear of the “environmental, social, and governance” movement that is driving
corporate boardrooms
to the left. They are taking over many important
nonprofits
. They become
teachers
and
bureaucrats
. And, naturally, many of them run “
diversity, equity, and inclusion
” departments at universities. (Tellingly, most DEI bureaucracies don’t seem particularly interested in protecting Jewish students during the ongoing wave of antisemitism.)
Some states, such as
Florida
and
Texas
, are making important reforms to pull back direct government support for woke nonsense. However, the broader national trends are not encouraging.
The spread of ideological extremism in higher education isn’t happening in isolation. The infrastructure of the academic Left is heavily funded by the massive, multilayered system of handouts from the federal government, which includes:
- Tens of billions of dollars per year in grants and subsidized loans for students (leading to tuition inflation).
- Tens of billions of dollars per year in research grants from a variety of federal agencies, with grossly excessive bonus payments for “
indirect costs
.” - Billions of dollars per year in additional programs and bureaucracies throughout the Department of Education that provide support to the ideologically captured academic establishment.
In light of the disastrous effects that excessive
federal spending
is having on the economy, this would be an ideal time for Congress to
defund academia
.
House Republicans are making progress in the upcoming slate of
spending bills
, which include significant cuts to the areas outlined above. However, those proposals will face stiff resistance in the Democrat-controlled Senate and White House. Accordingly, it will be crucial for conservatives in both chambers to stand their ground as the spending debate heats up over the coming months.
With the public increasingly aware of the rot on college campuses, now is the time to act.
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This article originally appeared in the Daily Signal and is reprinted with kind permission from the Heritage Foundation.
