Evanston RoundTable: Judge denies student petition against NU over antisemitism training
Petition sought temporary restraining order on the training, but attorneys say class-action lawsuit will continue
October 20th, 2025
Northwestern University’s Graduate Workers for Palestine filed a class-action lawsuit against NU on Wednesday, Oct. 15 and sought a temporary restraining order on a required antisemitism training. Some students who took issue with what they described as the training’s bias against pro-Palestinian activism had refused to take the training and faced registration holds that prevented them from enrolling in their classes.
A federal judge denied a petition seeking that restraining order at a Monday afternoon hearing at the Dirksen Federal Building in Chicago. But attorneys for the student group say the class action lawsuit as a whole, which alleges the training violates the Civil Rights Act, will still press forward.
The class action suit alleges that the university violated the act by imposing ethnic and political conformity on students by forcing them to complete the training and sign attestations that equate criticism of Israel or Zionism with antisemitism.
Representatives from the student group’s legal team said in a press conference following Monday’s hearing that they plan to bring back the case with a more detailed record, and will continue supporting their clients.
Professor Rebecca Zorach said faculty are supposed to have the power to determine degree requirements, and that enforcing a punishment for not doing the training effectively makes it a “degree requirement.” Credit: Margo Milanowski
“Northwestern’s insistence on the training module, particularly its insistence on punishing students for non compliance, stems from obeisance to the Trump administration and the Republican controlled congressional committee that sought to force the university to impose punishment,” said Rebecca Zorach, an art history professor who spoke in support of the lawsuit at Monday’s press conference. “Northwestern is defending the indefensible.”
Christina Abraham, an attorney for the Council on American Islamic Relations’ Chicago chapter (CAIR-Chicago), added that everyone should take issue with “the idea that students can be punished for criticizing a foreign government engaged in war crimes, engaged in genocide.”
Jonah S. Rubin of Jewish Voice for Peace and Chicago Ald. Byron Sigcho-Lopez (25th Ward) also spoke in support of the students’ case, among others.
More on the training
The mandated training module, first launched early in 2025, sparked complaints of bias from some students at the start of this school year.
Christina Abraham, an attorney for CAIR-Chicago. Credit: Margo Milanowski
The training contains inaccuracies and harmful insinuations, some students say, such as comparing critics of Israel to former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke.
Not every Northwestern student feels this way, though. Claire Conner, a Northwestern undergraduate and the student president of the Northwestern campus Hillel, told the RoundTable earlier this month that she supported the training module because “it recognizes that it’s actually a Jewish value to encourage disagreement and debate, and that not all Jewish people agree with all of the video, and that that’s okay.”
According to email communications from the school to graduate students, their refusal to do so has resulted in threats to their university status, including teaching positions and research assistantships.
Northwestern told these graduate students they will not be immediately removed from their positions, but that they will not be eligible to be hired or to continue beyond the fall term without completing the training and being approved to return.
Like Connor, the university has issued statements saying that students are not required to agree with the training, but that they have to complete it.
Rima Kapitan, another attorney on the students’ legal team, said Monday that, according to the university, just 16 students have not taken the training, but that “many, many more who are opposed to the training only took the training and agreed to the attestations because they were being threatened with loss of student status.”