"The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is charged with enforcing anti-discrimination laws in the workplace. Last week, the EEOC demanded via a broadly worded subpoena that the University of Pennsylvania provide the federal agency with lists of Jewish employees and their personal information. The extraordinary scope of the subpoena includes such things as membership lists of Jewish organizations, information about those who provided confidential feedback to Penn's Task Force on Antisemitism, and the names of Jewish staff who have submitted complaints to Penn but explicitly object to the university sharing their information with the agency.
This is an abuse of power that singles out Jewish employees even as it fails to advance Penn's strenuous efforts to combat antisemitism. Indeed, no matter the EEOC's intentions, it evokes painful historical memories of other times when governments have compiled names of Jewish community members and doing so again would establish an outrageous and dangerous precedent.
Penn has worked in good faith to cooperate with the agency's investigation. This has included offering to share information with all employees about the investigation and how to contact the agency directly in order to share information. The EEOC should proceed on this basis and drop its strong-arm tactics."