Leaders of some of the largest public school districts in the U.S. face questions Wednesday from a House of Representatives panel about incidents of anti-Semitism at their schools.
A Republican-led House education subcommittee has called Berkeley Unified Schools Superintendent Ford Morthel of California, New York City School Chancellor David Banks and Montgomery County School Board President Karla Silvestre of Maryland to testify.
“Anti-Semitic incidents have exploded in primary schools following the horrific Hamas situation October 7 attack. Jewish teachers, students and faculty have been denied a safe learning environment and forced to contend with anti-Semitic agitators due to the inaction of district leaders.” , told CBS News.
A senior committee official told CBS News that the panel did not issue subpoenas but did ask school district leaders to appear voluntarily.
In a written statement shared with CBS News, the Berkeley United School District said Morthel “was not attempting” to testify but has accepted the invitation to appear.
A spokeswoman for the Berkeley school said: “We strive every day to ensure that our classrooms are respectful, humanizing and joyful places for all our students, where they are welcomed, seen, valued and heard. take care of each other during this time.”
Each of the three school districts has a large number of Jewish students. All have faced complaints over the handling of alleged incidents of anti-Semitism.
The Anti-Defamation League and the Louis Brandeis Center, The Free Beacon noticed thishave filed a complaint against the Berkeley school system, alleging that some children have faced “severe and persistent harassment and discrimination based on their Jewish ethnicity, shared ancestry and national origin, and whose reports to administrators have been ignored for months .”
The Zionist Organization of America recently has filed a civil rights complaint against Montgomery County Public Schools, claiming they have failed to properly address anti-Semitic incidents in their schools. The school district did not respond to a request for comment about Silvestre or the board chairman's planned testimony.
The Montgomery County Public School District's publicly released religious diversity policy says, “Every student has the right to have his or her religious beliefs and practices free from discrimination, bullying or harassment.”
New York City is also facing a civil rights complaint from the Brandeis Center that alleges a “failure to address persistent anti-Semitism against teachers.” When asked for comment about the chancellor's planned testimony, the New York Public Schools spokesperson referred CBS News to comments Banks made at a public event earlier this month.
“Exclusion and intimidation go against everything public education stands for,” Banks said. “We cannot allow acts of hate, whether physical or through anti-Semitic rhetoric.”
“This causes more pain and builds even more walls,” Banks added. “We have to act collectively against it.”
Scott MacFarlane
