Rutgers University President Jonathan Holloway on Thursday testified before the Assembly Budget Committee about the financial pressures his school is facing and why the university needs more help from the state. But the conversation quickly shifted to the recent protests on Rutgers’ and other university campuses, with state legislators focused on the agreement Holloway made with pro-Palestinian student demonstrators to end their encampment.
“They issued 10 demands, the most significant of which were … to divest from companies doing business in Israel and to sever our ties with Tel Aviv University,” Holloway said. “I’ve made my position on divestment clear, and it is consistent with the policy of the state investment funds. I think the boycott, divestment and sanction movement is wrong, and I believe in engagement, not isolation.”
Holloway’s actions outraged many Republican members of the state Legislature, who are also calling for separate hearings into the university’s handling of protests. This comes as members of Congress requested Holloway testify before them at the Capitol, including Reps. Donald Norcross (D-1st) and Josh Gottheimer (D-5th) who sent a letter to the Rutgers administration to accuse leaders of ignoring concerns repeatedly brought by its Jewish faculty members and students.
Assemblyman Gary Schaer (D-Passaic) had a similar question. “I’ve received a considerable number of phone calls from parents of Rutgers students, wanting to know if it’s safe to send their children back to school in September,” Schaer said.
Holloway acknowledged antisemitism and Islamophobia on campus have risen in correlation with the national increase, especially since the start of the war. “We have the second largest Jewish undergraduate population in the country, mostly based in New Brunswick,” Holloway said. “We also have the second largest Palestinian student population, mostly based in New Brunswick. There is no university that has that mix. That, I do believe, is one of our greatest strengths. On the question of safety, I absolutely do believe it is safe to be a student.”
Holloway added: “We are not immune to that, as the state university of New Jersey. All of those things will come to our campus. The question is how we respond to those things, with how the security on campus police is elevated.”
Holloway is set to testify before Congress on this issue on May 23. He’s likely to face more, tough questioning from members, including Norcross, who serves on that House Education and Workforce Committee.
