Chris Walker Truthout
This article was originally published by Truthout
For some of the inquiries, “there was little to no factual predicate justifying opening them,” the complaint states.
A whistleblower complaint submitted to Congress this week alleges that Department of Justice (DOJ) investigations into supposed instances of antisemitism at Ivy League universities were done so for political reasons, as the Trump administration sought to compel schools into agreeing to settlements that involved changing their policies.
The complaint from former DOJ attorney Haley Van Erem, who worked for nearly a decade at the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division, was formally given to the House Judiciary Committee on Monday. Democrats within the committee made it public on Tuesday.
Van Erem was directly assigned to the task force on antisemitism, which was formed shortly after President Donald Trump issued an executive order following his return to the White House in January 2025. She ended up leaving the DOJ in May 2025, as she was “unwilling to be made vulnerable to further participation in politically motivated investigations unsupported by facts and contrary to law,” her attorneys wrote.
According to Van Erem’s complaint, the DOJ, along with the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), “departed from longstanding investigative practices designed to ensure due process, accuracy and legal compliance.”
“For at least some of the investigations, there was little to no factual predicate justifying opening them,” the whistleblower document states, noting that, when she and other DOJ employees raised questions, they were “sometimes admonished and their concerns were often disregarded.”
Some of the investigations into universities were “predetermined before the relevant evidence was collected and evaluated,” the complaint adds. For example, an investigation into Brown University yielded no conclusion that a Title VI violation had even happened. Yet the DOJ still successfully compelled the university to enter a settlement with the government, which included the institution changing its policies to reflect the Trump administration’s views on gender.
The investigations by the DOJ focused on three universities: Brown, Columbia, and Harvard. Columbia also entered into a settlement with the administration, while Harvard has so far fought against the investigations, challenging their legality in the courts.
The administration has also expanded its investigations to potentially examine supposed acts of antisemitism elsewhere, sending warning letters to 60 schools across the U.S. last year. Harvard’s legal successes, coupled with Van Erem’s complaint, could provide those institutions sufficient reason to challenge future inquiries by the administration.
Some of the investigations also appeared to target Muslim academics without reason. In April 2025, Van Erem’s disclosure noted, there was a plan by the DOJ to “systematically interview Middle East studies professors, particularly Muslim faculty” to see if they would say anything that could be called antisemitic. This included the targeting of one Muslim professor, who was singled out for questioning despite no allegations of antisemitic behavior being made against them.
Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash
Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the ranking Democratic member of the Judiciary Committee, panned the administration’s actions, citing Van Erem’s revelations in a letter to Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon.
“From the start of the Trump Administration’s ferocious attack on universities, it has been apparent that its investigations have been structured deliberately to harass and intimidate rather than protect anyone from discrimination,” Raskin wrote. “These credible new disclosures, although limited to the experience of several professionals involved, allow the world to look under the hood and see just how far the Trump Administration strayed from any notion of professional responsibility, public ethics, or legal candor in its attacks on perceived political enemies in academia.”
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