Arun Subramanian, a judge on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, denied a motion from recent Columbia University graduate Mahmoud Khalil and other plaintiffs to obtain a temporary restraining order preventing the Ivy League school from turning over disciplinary records to a House panel.
The Trump administration has said that Khalil, who was a leader in antisemitic protests at Columbia, has supported terrorism and seeks to deport him. The plaintiffs claim that the federal government broke the law by threatening Columbia with cutting more than $400 million in grant money in order to violate the rights of Columbia students and alumni.
Subramanian denied the motion without prejudice on Friday, noting that the plaintiffs “all but conceded” at a hearing last week that “the current complaint and motion papers fail to address some threshold requirements they need to satisfy to obtain this wide-ranging relief.”
“On Columbia’s disclosure of student records to Congress, the facts before the court counsel against interim relief. As to student records turned over before this action was filed, plaintiffs can’t enjoin what’s already done,” the judge wrote.
“Columbia also represents that it scrubbed all personally identifying information from those records,” he added. “Columbia says it doesn’t intend to produce any at the present time, and for their part, the congressional defendants aren’t currently asking for any further records.”
The judge ruled that Columbia must give 30 days notice to the plaintiffs before providing any new records to Congress or sharing the identities of students in records already provided to Congress.
Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Mich.), chair of the House Education and Workforce Committee, stated on Friday that judge’s ruling was a “victory for credible oversight.”
“An injunction would interfere with a congressional investigation and handicap the functioning of the legislative branch of government under Article I of the Constitution,” Walberg stated.
“The work to investigate antisemitism on our nation’s college campuses and develop legislative solutions will continue,” he stated. “Our committee will not sit by idly as a wave of antisemitic threats flood our colleges and universities and interfere with students’ education.”
