Yavapai News

Yesterday, Rep. Eli Crane (R-AZ) introduced the No Taxpayer Funding for Ivy League Schools Act in response to the presidents of Harvard, MIT, and Penn offering inadequate responses to calls for violence against Jewish students on their campuses. The bill aims to halt federal funding for any university in the country with an endowment greater than $5 billion.

According to Rep. Crane, these institutions, including every Ivy League university, have failed to protect their students and have instead fostered antisemitic environments sympathetic to genocidal terrorists. He believes that American taxpayers should not be forced to finance institutions that promote hateful and anti-American ideologies.

"Bankrolling institutions that sympathize with terrorists is unthinkable – especially with $33 trillion in national debt. The 'elite' institutions of this country are failing the American people & abusing federal funds," said Rep. Crane. "We have to start reining in our national debt somewhere and what better place to start than eliminating federal subsidies for overvalued institutions that consistently undermine American values?"

The legislation, if passed, would impact the following universities: Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Princeton, MIT, UPenn, Notre Dame, Northwestern, Columbia, Washington University in St. Louis, Duke, UChicago, Vanderbilt, Emory, Cornell, Johns Hopkins, Dartmouth, Rice, University of Southern California, Brown, and NYU.

This bill comes at a time when these "elite" institutions have seen alarming increases in antisemitic activity on their campuses following the October 7th Hamas terror attack against Israel. Calls for genocide and Jewish students fearing for their lives have become prevalent, yet the universities have done little to address the issue.

Furthermore, Rep. Crane highlights the discrepancy between the funding received by these prestigious institutions and the lack of support for critical rural institutions like Navajo Nation's Diné College, which is often ignored.

"Despite the heads of these 'elite' institutions droning on about racial and economic 'equity,' they're more than happy to reap the benefits of absurd amounts of federal funding while critical rural institutions like Navajo Nation's Diné College – the first tribal college in America – are often ignored," said Rep. Crane.

The introduction of this bill reflects the growing concern among some lawmakers about the use of taxpayer funds to support institutions that fail to uphold American values and prioritize the safety and well-being of their students. The bill seeks to address these concerns by defunding universities with large endowments and redirecting taxpayer money to other educational institutions that may be in greater need of support.

To find out more, go to this link: https://crane.house.gov/media/press-releases/crane-introduces-bill-defund-americas-hate-filled-elite-institutions