Nemat Shafik, the president of Columbia University, will face a group of House Republicans on Wednesday who have accused the school of allowing a pervasive pattern of antisemitic assaults, harassment and vandalism on campus since the Oct. 7 Hamas attack in Israel.
Columbia and Dr. Shafik have had months to prepare for this hearing, and they know in advance the line of questioning they will face. Four months ago, the same congressional committee questioned the presidents of Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania and M.I.T. about similar allegations. After that hearing, the presidents of the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard stepped down, in part because of blowback over their responses.
Lawmakers will also have much more material to work with this time. Since the earlier hearing, Columbia’s campus has been host to heated protests related to the war, and the school has become the target of criticism by both pro-Israel groups and supporters of Palestinians over how it has handled them. The committee, led by Representative Virginia Foxx, a Republican of North Carolina, has also received roughly 4,000 pages of internal information from Columbia related to the antisemitism investigation, a committee spokesman said.
Dr. Shafik, an Egyptian-born economist who started in her job last July, will be flanked by the co-chairs of Columbia’s board of trustees: Claire Shipman, a journalist and author, and David Greenwald, a corporate attorney. Here are a few things to watch out for:
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Elise Stefanik’s line of questioning. She is the No. 4 Republican in the House and a potential vice-presidential pick for Donald J. Trump. It was her aggressive grilling of the presidents at the last hearing about whether calling for the genocide of Jews would violate campus rules that got the most traction. She has counted their subsequent resignations as personal wins.
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Dr. Shafik’s reactions under pressure. Dr. Shafik has decades of experience dealing with complex situations as an executive in organizations including the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. But she has not before faced a highly partisan congressional committee.
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What lawmakers and university officials say about academic freedom. The committee’s questioning is taking place amid a wider battle over what can be taught in American classrooms, and how much influence the government should have over those decisions. Some of Dr. Shafik’s supporters are hoping she defends the right of students and faculty to express unpopular, and even controversial, views.