The taxpayer-defunded PBS News Hour Wednesday retained its hostility (as documented in a Media Research Center study) against the Trump administration protecting Jewish students and faculty from the Hamasniks marauding elite liberal campuses in protest of Israel’s defensive war in Gaza. Wesleyan University president Michael Roth made another News Hour appearance ridiculously claiming that efforts to protect Jews from anti-semitism on campus is akin to a kidnapping for ransom.
Co-anchor Amna Nawaz set the scene before introducing Roth.
Amna Nawaz: Columbia University and the Trump administration have reached a deal that restores federal funding and research grant money to the university. As part of the agreement, Columbia will pay $200 million to the federal government over three years and an additional $21 million to resolve alleged civil rights violations against Jewish employees. The university agreed to suspend, expel, or revoke degrees from some 70 students who participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations….
Roth is a familiar face discussing the issue on PBS. He’s a pro-DEI administrator who has been outspoken in defense of the rights of pro-Hamas campus agitators. He says he’s pro-Israel, yet defended protests on his campus by telling the campus community “The protesters’ cause is important -- bringing attention to the killing of innocent people.” Naturally he’s PBS’s go-to expert on the issue of defending the civil rights of Jewish students, and of course, there was no alternate viewpoint offered.
Michael Roth: Well, I felt like one must feel when you have paid a ransom in a kidnapping situation and the person who's been kidnapped is returned safely. You think, thank goodness, the kid's OK, or the person kidnapped is OK. But I wouldn't praise the agreement that led to the liberation of the kidnapped person. And so, in this case, I was pleased that this particular moment of assault on higher education by the Trump administration has been resolved, at least for now….
Roth extrapolated wildly from the federal government extracting consequences from Columbia University’s neglectful behavior.
Roth: ….The White House has determined how students should be disciplined at a private university. This is massive overreach. This is an assault on the independence of civil society in America. And conservatives, liberals, moderates, they should all be concerned when a White House tells you how to run your private associations.
No mention was made of the Obama Administration’s notorious 2011 “Dear Colleague” letter, which, in the words of K.C. Johnson, was “Obama administration guidance on Title IX that sought to crack down on campus sexual assault by requiring universities to adjust their procedures to make it more likely that accused students would be found responsible.” What was that about the White House telling universities how to discipline students?
Roth pretended there was no proof of anti-semitism at Columbia University (never mind the university’s own damning report) then pivoted to the “chilling message” sent by the cancellation (in May 2026) of The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.
Roth: ….There's no findings of facts there. It's just, you give us $221 million, and then we allow you to compete for grants. I mean, it's a very old-fashioned game. You pay the powerful figure so that you can go along and continue to operate. Now, you operate in a way, of course, that you don't want to annoy that powerful figure or that powerful organization. And it sends a chilling message across America that, if you have a late-night comedy show, if you have a law firm, if you are working in an educational institution or a library, or, as we read today, in a museum like the Smithsonian, if you don't please the president, you are at risk….
Nawaz finally found the other side of the story, briefly.
Nawaz: ….This was a deal welcomed by Columbia's Hillel Jewish organization….I guess the question, President Roth, is if it makes Jewish students and staff feel safer, did the administration pressure and the deal do what it intended to do?
Roth got in a silly crack about Elon Musk before smearing the administration as “not concerned with Jewish welfare.”.
Roth: How does paying the government $220 million to do basic science make Jews safer?....the idea that you pay off the government in order to get them off your back so you can do cancer research, and that's good for the Jews, I think it's ridiculous. We don't need the White House to tell us antisemitism is real two weeks after the Defense Department contracts with Grok, Elon Musk's artificial intelligence entity after it praised Hitler. This is an administration that is not concerned with Jewish welfare….
Of course, PBS’s version of a “conservative” commentator, David Brooks, agreed with Roth the succeeding night when Columbia’s concession came up.
Co-anchor Geoff Bennett: [Roth said the Trump administration is] using this as a way to chill speech that they find politically offensive. How do you see it?
David Brooks: That's how I see it. Michael Roth is right.
This segment was brought to you in part by BNSF Railway, and also taxpayers like you (though not for much longer).
A transcript is available, click “Expand.”
PBS News Hour
7/24/25
7:25:42 p.m. (ET)
Amna Nawaz: Columbia University and the Trump administration have reached a deal that restores federal funding and research grant money to the university. As part of the agreement, Columbia will pay $200 million to the federal government over three years and an additional $21 million to resolve alleged civil rights violations against Jewish employees.
The university agreed to suspend, expel, or revoke degrees from some 70 students who participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations and it will issue a report to a monitor to ensure diversity, equity, and inclusion is not promoted on campus.
Columbia, which was at risk of losing billions of dollars from the government, says it retains its academic freedom.
For a closer look at this agreement and what it means for a higher education in the U.S., I'm joined by Michael Roth, president of Wesleyan University.
President Roth, welcome back to the "News Hour." Thanks for joining us.
Michael Roth, President, Wesleyan University: Thanks for having me.
Amna Nawaz: So let's just start with your initial reaction. When you heard the news and the details of this settlement, what did you think?
Michael Roth: Well, I felt like one must feel when you have paid a ransom in a kidnapping situation and the person who's been kidnapped is returned safely.
You think, thank goodness, the kid's OK, or the person kidnapped is OK. But I wouldn't phrase the agreement that led to the liberation of the kidnapped person. And so, in this case, I was pleased that this particular moment of assault on higher education by the Trump administration has been resolved, at least for now, although who knows. These agreements come and go with this White House.
I was and I am distressed that, in this country today, the executive branch of the federal government wants to be able to dictate terms to private universities, law firms, newspapers, TV stations. And so all of these things are evidence that the current administration is trying to erode support for institutions in civil society.
Amna Nawaz: Let me put to you, if I may, what the acting president of Columbia University, Claire Shipman, said in an interview on CNN this morning defending the terms of the deal.
Claire Shipman, Acting President, Columbia University: I think there are a couple of really important things about this agreement from our point of view. One, it doesn't cross the red lines that we laid out. It protects our academic integrity. That was, of course, essential to us.
And, two, it does reset our relationship with the federal government in terms of research funding. And it's not just money for Columbia. I mean, this is about science. It's about curing cancer, cutting-edge, boundary-breaking science that actually benefits the country and humanity.
Amna Nawaz: President Roth, do you believe that, after this deal, Columbia can move forward with full academic freedom, as President Shipman there is saying? And what do you believe the downstream effects of making a deal like this are for other universities?
Michael Roth: Well, it's very clear that if you annoy the White House in this regime, you could get sucked into a process of litigation or fines that bear no relation to the facts of the matter, but just become a way of expressing loyalty, of conforming to the wishes of the government.
We saw it at UVA just a week or two ago. You see it now at George Mason. This is an effort to tell universities, as they have told law firms, as they're telling newspapers and as they have done with TV stations, telling these organizations, you are not independent. If you contract with the federal government, we have a — we, the government, has the right to tell you what to do.
This agreement does protect many things at Columbia. And, again, I'm not criticizing them for signing it. I don't criticize the parent for paying a ransom to get their kids back. They're getting their science back. But they're also telling the federal government, you can tell us how to run our Middle East studies program, telling the federal government, you can tell us how many police officers we should have at a minimum on campus or how students should be disciplined.
The White House has determined how students should be disciplined at a private university. This is massive overreach. This is an assault on the independence of civil society in America. And conservatives, liberals, moderates, they should all be concerned when a White House tells you how to run your private associations.
Amna Nawaz: So you're saying they should be concerned.
As you note, Columbia is not the only university that's been targeted by this administration. Harvard, as we have been covering, has actually been fighting the administration in court, but we know there's also settlement talks going on. Do you believe universities and colleges will have no other choice but to make some kind of deal in order to move forward?
Michael Roth: Well, I do think that, when you're dealing with a very, very powerful entity like the federal government, especially when it doesn't obey its own laws — I mean, there are no findings of fact here about what the specific actions of antisemitism were — or discrimination against white people.
There's no findings of facts there. It's just, you give us $221 million, and then we allow you to compete for grants. I mean, it's a very old-fashioned game. You pay the powerful figure so that you can go along and continue to operate.
Now, you operate in a way, of course, that you don't want to annoy that powerful figure or that powerful organization. And it sends a chilling message across America that, if you have a late-night comedy show, if you have a law firm, if you are working in an educational institution or a library, or, as we read today, in a museum like the Smithsonian, if you don't please the president, you are at risk.
And, again, I don't blame them for trying to make the best of that situation, but, as Americans, I'm not worried about Columbia. I'm not worried about Wesleyan. I'm worried about the country, where we are being subject to a White House that thinks it could tell us what to do at every turn.
Amna Nawaz: As you know, the administration has long argued that this was about combating antisemitism on campus. This was a deal welcomed by Columbia's Hillel Jewish organization.
The executive director said in part: "The announcement's an important recognition of what Jewish students and families have expressed with increasing urgency. Antisemitism at Columbia is real. It has a tangible impact on Jewish students' sense of safety, belonging, and their civil rights."
I guess the question, President Roth, is if it makes Jewish students and staff feel safer, did the administration pressure and the deal do what it intended to do?
Michael Roth: How does paying the government $220 million to do basic science make Jews safer? As a Jew, I find this horrific.
I know antisemitism is real, and I know it was real and is real at Columbia, as it is in Congress, as it is in most places in the United States. But the idea that you pay off the government in order to get them off your back so you can do cancer research, and that's good for the Jews, I think it's ridiculous.
We don't need the White House to tell us antisemitism is real two weeks after the Defense Department contracts with Grok, Elon Musk's artificial intelligence entity after it praised Hitler. This is an administration that is not concerned with Jewish welfare. I am concerned with Jewish welfare as a Jew, as a professor, as a college president. I think it's really important to call out antisemitism.
But to pay up basically protection money in a way that's supposed to make Jews safer, I think, in the long run, it's — as we say in my community, it's not good for the Jews.
Amna Nawaz: That is Michael Roth, president of Wesleyan University, joining us tonight.
President Roth, thank you for your time.
Michael Roth: Thank you for having me.
