HR 6806

Antisemitic incidents in the United States have reached historic levels, with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) documenting 1,938 antisemitic incidents in 2024, representing a 73 percent increase from 2022 and the highest number recorded since the FBI began tracking hate crimes in 1991, with Jews—comprising only 2 percent of the United States population—accounting for 69 percent of all religion-based hate crimes.

Following the October 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel, multiple tracking organizations documented a 360 to 388 percent increase in antisemitic incidents during the 3-month period from October 7, 2023, to January 7, 2024, with FBI Director Christopher Wray testifying that antisemitism has reached historic levels in the United States.

Academic research has documented severe deterioration of campus climates for Jewish students, with Brandeis University finding hostility rates approximately twice as high as 2016 baseline measurements.

The May 2023 United States National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism represented a landmark, gold-standard, and comprehensive approach to addressing antisemitism, developed with extensive input from Jewish institutions and individuals across the political spectrum, emphasizing that combating antisemitism requires protecting democratic institutions, civil liberties, and coalition-building across diverse communities, and establishing coordination mechanisms across over 30 Federal agencies.

Despite the real and documented crisis of antisemitism, there has been a systematic pattern of weaponizing antisemitism accusations by the Trump Administration to pursue ideological and partisan political objectives unrelated to protecting Jewish communities from discrimination and hatred, including attacks on educational institutions for political disagreements, suppression of constitutionally protected speech, and enforcement of ideological conformity.

The Department of Education has launched investigations into approximately 60 institutions of higher education, not primarily to protect Jewish students from discrimination, but to use the false premise of antisemitism accusations as pretext for forcing the elimination of academic programs related to diversity and Middle Eastern studies, threatening to withdraw Federal funding to compel ideological conformity, and undermining the autonomy and academic freedom of such institutions, with common patterns including lack of due process, conflation of criticism of Israeli government policies with antisemitism, and targeting of protected speech and academic inquiry.

The Trump administration has inappropriately appropriated the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism as a tool for immigration enforcement and deportation proceedings, applying a non-legally binding educational tool in punitive legal contexts for which it was never intended, with the Department of Homeland Security announcing in April 2025 that it would screen social media activity for antisemitism using the IHRA definition to guide determinations.

Multiple documented cases demonstrate the systematic targeting of students and legal residents for deportation based solely on their pro-Palestinian activism, including peaceful protests, academic inquiry, and political organizing, with every case that has reached Federal court resulting in release orders and findings of likely constitutional violations, including Federal judges ruling that the Trump administration is in continued violation of the First Amendment to the Constitution by detaining individuals for protected speech.

The Trump administration has sought to tie nonprofit security grants, which fund critical houses of worship and religious community center security measures (including synagogues and Jewish Community Centers), to compliance with administration positions on immigration enforcement and diversity policies, with the Department of Homeland Security imposing conditions in April 2025 mandating that recipients cooperate with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials and prohibiting any programs that advance or promote DEI, effectively holding Jewish community safety hostage to unrelated political objectives.

Federal judges have blocked enforcement of these conditions through permanent injunctions in multiple jurisdictions, ruling that conditions were arbitrary and capricious and unconstitutional, with nearly 70 religious organizations and over 120 faith leaders signing a letter rejecting these conditions and stating they are unified in refusing to capitulate to conditions that would require us to sacrifice the safety and dignity of our community members.

The Heritage Foundation's Project Esther: A National Strategy to Combat Antisemitism, released on October 7, 2024, has served as a blueprint for the administration's antisemitism policies, but rather than genuinely combating antisemitism, it weaponizes accusations of antisemitism to pursue partisan political objectives, including dismantling diversity programs, suppressing pro-Palestinian advocacy, defunding educational institutions, attacking nonprofit organizations, and undermining academic freedom.

The New York Times investigation published in May 2025 found that the second Trump administration had called for or acted upon more than half of Project Esther's proposals, with Heritage Foundation officials stating there are clear parallels between their recommendations and administration actions.

Project Esther’s development was led by predominantly Christian nationalist individuals with minimal Jewish organizational support, is tied to Christian Zionism theology and beliefs that Jewish presence in the Holy Land will precipitate End Times, and focuses exclusively on left-wing critics of Israel while ignoring antisemitism from white supremacists and other far-right groups, making no mention of Proud Boys, white supremacist militias, neo-Nazi groups, the Charlottesville violence, the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting, or other far-right antisemitic violence.

Effective antisemitism prevention and response requires comprehensive, evidence-based approaches that strengthen rather than undermine democratic institutions, with research and experience demonstrating that approaches are most effective when they address antisemitism as connected to other forms of hatred and extremism, strengthen democratic institutions and civil liberties, build broad coalitions across diverse communities, focus enforcement on clear cases of discrimination while protecting political expression, and invest in education and prevention rather than relying solely on punitive measures.

History demonstrates that Jewish communities are safest in robust democracies with strong civil liberties, equal protection under the law, and inclusive pluralistic cultures, and most vulnerable when these democratic foundations are eroded, and that weaponizing antisemitism for partisan political purposes not only fails to protect Jewish communities but actively breeds more antisemitism by associating Jewish safety with the suppression of civil liberties and the targeting of political dissent.

Congress has a responsibility to ensure that Federal efforts to combat antisemitism are effective, evidence-based, and consistent with democratic values, and to prevent the weaponization of antisemitism concerns for ulterior political objectives, requiring substantial Federal investment in education initiatives, civil rights enforcement, community security programs, and other evidence-based approaches to combating antisemitism and related forms of extremism and hate.

The term relevant agency means—