The University of California, Los Angeles, should toughen its approach to combating antisemitism, an internal committee recommended Thursday, after the Trump administration and many students and faculty members said it had not done enough to curb harassment of Jews on campus.
U.C.L.A., one of the nation’s best-regarded public schools, had already taken some steps, such as reviewing protest policies and strengthening training programs. But a handful of the committee’s new proposals, like a push to enforce how faculty advocacy groups harness U.C.L.A.’s name and a recommendation that the broader university system adopt a debated definition of antisemitism, could prove far more contentious.
The recommendations, issued by a group associated with U.C.L.A.’s Initiative to Combat Antisemitism, came almost 19 months after a university task force said it had found “broad-based perceptions of antisemitic and anti-Israeli bias on campus” and less than three months after the Trump administration brought a civil rights lawsuit.
The university commissioned the group in March 2025, before the federal government began applying its most overt pressure to U.C.L.A., and the report released on Thursday does not specifically refer to the Trump administration’s efforts. The report nevertheless outlines ideas that could satisfy, at least to some extent, the school’s critics.
The group, for instance, suggested that U.C.L.A. implement a deadline of no more than 120 days to resolve disciplinary cases, and it said the university should more clearly define disciplinary consequences for civil rights violations.
The committee also said that the university should enforce rules against faculty advocacy groups using university resources or “leveraging departmental or program authority” to suggest that U.C.L.A. endorses anti-Zionism or the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel.
U.C.L.A.’s chancellor, Julio Frenk, said in a campuswide message on Thursday that he had assigned working groups to carry out the new recommendations.
“There is much more to be done,” the chancellor wrote, “and we remain committed to advancing these efforts with care, accountability and resolve.”
Dr. Frenk, who took over at U.C.L.A. last year, added: “A university’s strength lies in its people. Ensuring their safety, dignity and full inclusion is essential to who we are and what we aspire to be.”
U.C.L.A. has reeled since unrest related to the war in Gaza rocked campuses in 2024 and led to widespread protests. The demonstrations were especially fraught at U.C.L.A., and a university task force said it believed campus officials had failed to enforce “many rules and laws, resulting in lack of protection of the constitutional rights of Jews on campus.”
The repercussions for the school, which has about 47,000 undergraduate and graduate students, have been significant.
The University of California system, for instance, reached a settlement last summer in a case that accused U.C.L.A. of having allowed pro-Palestinian protesters to impede Jewish students. Although the university acknowledged no wrongdoing, it agreed to pay more than $6 million in connection with the settlement, with $2.65 million earmarked for efforts to combat antisemitism and help the Jewish community at U.C.L.A.
The agreement, though, wound up relieving only some of U.C.L.A.’s legal troubles: Within hours, the Justice Department said it believed U.C.L.A. had violated its students’ civil rights. The government cited the lawsuit in its letter, and it soon after demanded more than $1 billion in payments to settle the claims about the school.
Democratic politicians in California pressured the university to resist the demand, and its own financial outlook made the sum untenable. The Justice Department has not gone to court over the accusations involving students, but it brought a lawsuit in February, saying that U.C.L.A. had “turned a blind eye to — and at times facilitated — grossly antisemitic acts and systematically ignored cries for help from its own terrified Jewish and Israeli employees.”
That case is pending.
Some of the recommendations in Thursday’s report fall beyond U.C.L.A.’s authority. For example, the group suggested that the University of California as a whole consider using the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism.
The definition, developed in 2016, describes antisemitism as “a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews.” But the definition’s critics have said that accompanying examples, such as contending that Israel’s existence is “a racist endeavor,” appear intended to suppress free speech.
Dozens of American universities have adopted the definition, including Columbia and Harvard last year. In March, the University of California, Berkeley, agreed as a part of a legal settlement that it would continue to consider the definition and its examples “whenever investigating or assessing claims of discrimination or harassment against Jews or Israeli individuals.”
The president of the University of California system, James B. Milliken, did not immediately commit to embracing the definition across its 10 campuses. But Mr. Milliken hailed U.C.L.A.’s efforts as “important and impressive” and said, “Antisemitism is antithetical to the core values of the University of California, and it is essential that we continue to demonstrate this principle through our policies and actions.”
Alan Blinder is a national correspondent for The Times, covering education.
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