Protect Economic and Academic Freedom Act of 2026

Floor Speech

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Ms. FOXX. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of my bill, H.R. 4795, bipartisan legislation to combat anti-Semitic, discriminatory commercial and academic boycotts of Israel.

Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairman Walberg for yielding me time, and I thank him for advancing this critical bill out of committee.

I also thank Ranking Member Scott for his vote in committee to advance the bill on a bipartisan basis.

In addition, I also thank the coauthor of this bill, Representative Gottheimer of New Jersey, for his tireless work on this bipartisan achievement.

I thank the groups that we worked with and those that support this legislation, the American Jewish Committee and the Combat Antisemitism Movement, for their steadfast support.

Mr. Speaker, for decades now, the State of Israel, Israelis, and the people of Jewish faith have been internationally subjected to deplorable boycotts of their identity, their livelihoods, and their vitality.

As others have stated, these boycotts are anti-Semitic in their design and discriminatory in their effect, and after October 7, universities have become the epicenters of these campaigns.

Let me just quote the cofounder of the modern BDS movement, Omar Barghouti, emphasis mine: ``The ending of Israeli control in the territories is but the first stage of the road to fulfilling the vision of the dismantling of Israel.''

You heard that correctly, ``the dismantling of Israel,'' as stated by the founder of this deplorable movement.

I want every Member of the House that is about to vote on this measure to reckon with this fact: the very founder of the BDS movement wants to dismantle the Jewish state. That is why the American Jewish Committee has characterized BDS leadership as seeking nothing less than the elimination of Israel as a Jewish state.

Every Member here should let that sink in and every Member should understand that this bill represents the House's opportunity to stop this anti-Semitic, discriminatory, and inhuman campaign from being fueled by American taxpayers and stop it in its tracks.

Commercial and academic boycotts like the ones we see, when fueled by taxpayer funds, represent concrete discrimination against the people's national origin. They are discriminating against people of the Jewish faith. They result in discrimination against and marginalizing of Israeli students. No matter how you slice it, these anti-Semitic boycotts should have no place in higher education and deserve zero intersection with the Federal Government.

Now, let me speak to the chief argument from opponents of this bill: that these boycotts are illusionary, nonevents, or they haven't yet been actualized by administrators, so there is no reason to address possible taxpayer funding.

These boycotts are manifest. They are coordinated. They are real. They marginalize Jewish students. They harm Israel, Israelis, and Jewish students economically.

Case in point, the Evergreen State College in Washington, at the administrative level, reached an agreement to address divestment from companies that profit from the ``occupation of Palestinian territories.'' You can read this commitment to boycott and divest from Israel online as we speak.

The Committee on Education and Workforce's investigation last Congress revealed that faculty members and Northwestern's provost-- administrators, mind you--were openly willing to appease encampment organizers in their efforts to demand that the university boycott Sabra hummus. These demands were only rejected after Congress threw its full weight and investigative power against such appeasements.

The lack of successful commercial boycotts isn't due to a lack of trying. During the 2023-2024 academic year, at least 86 BDS resolutions were considered across graduate, undergraduate, and professional student organizations and faculty unions.

Academic boycotts have a record of taxpayer support. Keep in mind, they can be stealthily executed at the programmatic level and can be accomplished without the expressed support from university administrators.

One leading professor at Georgetown's Title VI supported National Resource Center has actively pursued a full academic boycott of Israel.

In 2013, the American Studies Association, the largest academic--

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Ms. FOXX. Mr. Speaker, in 2013, the American Studies Association, the largest academic group in the United States, adopted a policy endorsing an academic boycott of Israel. In 2014, six taxpayer-supported NRC directors signed a letter endorsing an academic boycott of Israel. These academic boycotts contravene the purposes of the title VI funding they received.

Mr. Speaker, I could go on and on, but now is not the time for talk. The facts are evident. Now is the time for action. This Congress needs to codify this preventive measure to protect students and taxpayers from this disgusting discrimination.

Again, I thank Chairman Walberg and Representative Gottheimer for their work on this bipartisan legislation. I urge the Chamber to draw a line in the sand against these harmful campaigns against the State of Israel, Israelis, and our Jewish students at home.

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