New York City Mayor Eric Adams detailed his plan to combat rising antisemitism on college campuses across the city and highlighted the creation of a new mayor's office to fight antisemitism during an appearance on CNN's "The Situation Room" on Friday.
The mayor called out increasing "anti-Jewish" and "anti-American" sentiment on college campuses in New York City and noted that the two seemed to be "tied together."
Adams also addressed the issue of rising antisemitism in New York City public schools, referring to two newsletters allegedly distributed by public schools that glorified the Hamas terrorist organization.
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"We saw two newsletters that went out that really gave the impression of lifting up Hamas, and what Hamas stands for," Adams told anchor Wolf Blitzer. "Hamas is a terrorist, dangerous organization, and that cannot be tolerated within our public school system."
In an effort to be proactive about this issue, Adams said the city has been utilizing a program called "Breaking Bread, Building Bonds" to unite the community against antisemitism.
"We had over 1,000 dinners in the last few years where people are sitting down and communicating with each other and then looking at information that's been printed, that's sent out to any agencies within the city that is having any form of procurement contracts with entities that are dealing with hate or antisemitism," Adams said. "It's about being really, not only reactive to the cases that come up, but also proactive."
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Blitzer asked Adams what he makes of free speech activists criticizing the deportation of foreign students attending American universities for voicing their "pro-Palestinian" viewpoints, and how he will ensure students' First Amendment rights are protected while also fighting antisemitism.
"Well, think about it, Wolf," Adams replied. "We had last year over 3,000 protests that came after the October 7 attacks, 3,000 people were able to voice their concerns, exercise their right to free speech."
Adams continued, "This city, when you look at the various protests, exercising of free speech, people giving their views with 8.5 million people, we do it in an orderly fashion. We allow people to do so. You can look at the marches that have occurred in this city because that's what we believe in. This is a city with free speech, which is crucial and important."
The Trump administration cut $400 million in federal grants to New York's Columbia University in March over concerns about the rise in antisemitism on the school's campus.
In May, the university announced it was laying off approximately 180 staffers in response to the cut in funding.
