Latest news with #LawfareProject
Yahoo
a day ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Jewish student settles religious discrimination suit against Columbia
FIRST ON FOX: A Jewish student who alleged she was forced out of her graduate program in part because of her Shabbos observance has settled her religious discrimination lawsuit against Columbia University. The terms of the settlement in the lawsuit filed by The Lawfare Project and Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP were confidential, but Lawfare Project executive Ziporah Reich said it included financial compensation and other relief. "These outcomes reflect the power of legal action to bring about meaningful change, we are proud to stand behind a courageous student who chose to stand up for her rights," Lawfare Project Director Brooke Goldstein told Fox News Digital in a statement. A Columbia spokesperson confirmed the settlement, saying, "We have reached a mutually agreeable confidential settlement with Forrest that did not include any admission of liability." Trump Admin Alleges Columbia Violated Civil Rights Law With 'Deliberate Indifference' To Campus Protests Mackenzie Forrest, an Orthodox Jewish student from Florida, claimed she was forced out of the Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) program at the Columbia School of Social Work (CSSW), after she requested that she be allowed to attend classes remotely out of concern for her safety amid widespread antisemitic campus unrest following the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attacks. Read On The Fox News App Forrest alleged that she attended the Columbia School of Social Work specifically because of her interest in the DBT program. However, when she informed the program's director, Andre Ivanoff, Ph.D., that she would not be able to engage in classroom activities that fall on the Jewish Sabbath shortly after she was accepted in Spring 2023, Ivanoff allegedly replied that that would be a "problem," court documents say. Columbia University Punishes Students Who Took Over Building During Anti-israel Protests The Jewish graduate student received further pushback regarding her religious practices when she informed Ivanoff that she would be unable to attend a weekend-long workshop on suicide risk assessment because it fell on Shabbos, also known as the Sabbath. Despite Forrest saying that she could attend the parts of the workshop that did not occur between Friday night to Saturday night, Ivanoff allegedly told her she would need a "dispensation" from her rabbi to attend the workshop. Eventually, Ivanoff decided he would assign her substitute coursework in lieu of the workshop when Forrest informed him he could not attend. Following the Oct. 7 attacks in 2023, Columbia's campus exploded into a hotbed of antisemitism. In light of what the plaintiff claimed was widespread verbal abuse and a physical assault of a pro-Israel student who was allegedly beaten with what appeared to be a broom, Forrest requested that she be allowed to attend class remotely out of fear for her safety. Not only was the grad student's request denied, but soon after she claimed she faced retaliation from the university. Despite being a straight-A student, Forrest was told she was at risk of failing the field-based internship portion of her curriculum, according to the claim. The Jewish student alleged that she had never previously been told she was under-performing by her academic advisor, whom she met with article source: Jewish student settles religious discrimination suit against Columbia
Fox News
a day ago
- Politics
- Fox News
Jewish student settles religious discrimination suit against Columbia
FIRST ON FOX: A Jewish student who alleged she was forced out of her graduate program in part because of her Shabbos observance has settled her religious discrimination lawsuit against Columbia University. The terms of the settlement in the lawsuit filed by The Lawfare Project and Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP were confidential, but Lawfare Project executive Ziporah Reich said it included financial compensation and other relief. "These outcomes reflect the power of legal action to bring about meaningful change, we are proud to stand behind a courageous student who chose to stand up for her rights," Lawfare Project Director Brooke Goldstein told Fox News Digital in a statement. A Columbia spokesperson confirmed the settlement, saying, "We have reached a mutually agreeable confidential settlement with Forrest that did not include any admission of liability." Mackenzie Forrest, an Orthodox Jewish student from Florida, claimed she was forced out of the Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) program at the Columbia School of Social Work (CSSW), after she requested that she be allowed to attend classes remotely out of concern for her safety amid widespread antisemitic campus unrest following the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attacks. Forrest alleged that she attended the Columbia School of Social Work specifically because of her interest in the DBT program. However, when she informed the program's director, Andre Ivanoff, Ph.D., that she would not be able to engage in classroom activities that fall on the Jewish Sabbath shortly after she was accepted in Spring 2023, Ivanoff allegedly replied that that would be a "problem," court documents say. The Jewish graduate student received further pushback regarding her religious practices when she informed Ivanoff that she would be unable to attend a weekend-long workshop on suicide risk assessment because it fell on Shabbos, also known as the Sabbath. Despite Forrest saying that she could attend the parts of the workshop that did not occur between Friday night to Saturday night, Ivanoff allegedly told her she would need a "dispensation" from her rabbi to attend the workshop. Eventually, Ivanoff decided he would assign her substitute coursework in lieu of the workshop when Forrest informed him he could not attend. Following the Oct. 7 attacks in 2023, Columbia's campus exploded into a hotbed of antisemitism. In light of what the plaintiff claimed was widespread verbal abuse and a physical assault of a pro-Israel student who was allegedly beaten with what appeared to be a broom, Forrest requested that she be allowed to attend class remotely out of fear for her safety. Not only was the grad student's request denied, but soon after she claimed she faced retaliation from the university. Despite being a straight-A student, Forrest was told she was at risk of failing the field-based internship portion of her curriculum, according to the claim. The Jewish student alleged that she had never previously been told she was under-performing by her academic advisor, whom she met with regularly.
Axios
29-04-2025
- Politics
- Axios
Trump order targets "sanctuary cities"
President Trump on Monday signed an executive order directing federal agencies to document " sanctuary cities" that are not complying with his immigration agenda. The big picture: Monday's order directs Attorney General Pam Bondi and the Department of Homeland Security to identify cities and states that don't sufficiently comply with Trump's federal immigration laws within a month. They are to publish the list of jurisdictions that don't cooperate with immigration agents, and to notify each sanctuary jurisdiction of non-compliance, providing an opportunity to correct it. Sanctuary jurisdictions that don't comply "may" lose federal funding, the White House said. Catch up quick: The executive order comes after Trump promised during his 2024 campaign to eliminate sanctuary policies and to use the federal government's weight to dole out consequences for jurisdictions that refuse to comply. He then signed an executive order the day he was inaugurated, calling for federal grants to sanctuary cities to be cut. But a federal judge last week blocked the administration from cutting funds for jurisdictions that limit cooperation with federal immigration enforcement, calling parts of Trump's order unconstitutional. State of play: Lawfare Project senior counsel Gerard Filitti told Axios on Monday that an order identifying sanctuary jurisdictions, and even directing prosecutions, does not run afoul of the judge's ruling last week addressing funding. Executive action on funding arguably violates the Constitution's spending clause, which gives Congress — not the President — the power to finance programs, Filitti said in an email. Yes, but:" The new executive order does not run afoul of the spending clause, nor is it susceptible to arguments that changes are being made without due process." Zoom in: Monday's executive order marks a shift in the administration's approach to targeting sanctuary cities. "We have already seen the Administration try to restrict funding going to sanctuary cities (albeit so far unsuccessfully), but what we are seeing now is an anticipated shift to legal proceedings targeting these cities for their willful failure to comply with federal immigration law," Filitti said. The distinction between non-cooperation and obstruction is subtle in the new order, but it is critical to the Trump administration's approach to enforcement, Filitti noted. "Put simply, the Justice Department will be looking at the DHS list of sanctuary cities and look to prosecute officials in them for obstruction," he said. "Because while sanctuary cities may have the 'right' to not cooperate (because of the Tenth Amendment), they do not have a legal right to obstruct enforcement through harboring." He called it a new and potentially very powerful tool to induce officials in sanctuary cities to cooperate in Trump's deportation agenda. Between the lines: Jurisdictions often have sanctuary policies in place as state law, and an executive order doesn't have the power to rescind them, Kathleen Bush-Joseph, an attorney and policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute, told Axios. "So then the conflict becomes, how does a court decide whether or not one trumps the other?" she added. Shayna Kessler, an attorney and director of Vera's Advancing Universal Representation initiative, which represents immigrants facing deportation, told Axios that "attacks on sanctuary jurisdictions are just another continued example of scare tactics." There are have already been court orders "affirming that state and local governments have the authority to decide how their own local resources and their own local law enforcement are used," she said in a phone interview Monday. State and local governments "can't be coerced into doing the federal government's work of immigration enforcement," Kessler added. What they're saying: White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt described the executive order earlier Monday as "focused on protecting American communities from criminal aliens."
